Edge of the Arctic Shelf

Frozen Ocean
I guess you could call me an ice-aholic. I just can't enough of the frozen seawater that goes clunk and crunch against the hull. When darkness fell last night, I assumed that the show was over for the day. Much to my surprise, it was just beginning. The bridge team clicked on the Healy's headlights and the ice in front of the ship glowed in the night. One set of lights lit up the ice directly in front of the bow and another set of lights, which can be swiveled any direction, lit up the ice a few hundred feet ahead. Standing on top of the bridge in the chill night air, it felt like we were riding some kind of futuristic space ship across one of Jupiter's icy moons.

We continued our steady transit today, plowing through the newly formed ice at a steady speed of roughly eight miles an hour. After reaching our farthest north point of 77 degrees 8.4 minutes north (still nearly 900 miles from the North Pole), we turned southeast towards our next science station. Throughout the day, we wandered the ship and watched the show. At the bow you could watch the hull breaking the ice. From the high vantage points, you could see the beautiful patterns. From the stern, you could see the churned up ice chunks and deep blue seawater. I asked the science party for their impressions of this incredible two days in the ice.

Deborah: "I am so grateful to be seeing this phenomenon. Yesterday on the way up we were able to see the whole development of ice from open water with a few "bergy bits" to flat plains of ice by nighttime. This morning the ice is solid and the ship rumbles with crunching it."

Erik: "I think the blue color is incredible..."

Val: "It has been wonderful to see ice. It would hardly be a trip to the Arctic without it. Can you imagine the Arctic without the ice?"

Julia: "I feel very fortunate to have had this rare opportunity to experience the vast Arctic Ice. It is a thrilling thought that we might have been the only people ever setting foot/or boat on some of the spots we have been driving through in the past 36 hours. I loved every minute of the feel and the sound of this powerful element!"

Jim: "Ice gives life to the Arctic. Without it there will be no polar bears."

Mifaya: "It was amazing to see the little white pieces coming close to the ship the first night."

Maureen: "I love feeling the shudder of the Healy as it cruises through the thicker pieces of ice with seemingly very little effort! Being in the ice today was great because even the "sport" of searching for the elusive polar bear adds another element of excitment to the cruise."

Anna: "In the freezer, on the winter lakes, at the mountain tops, and in the sea... new, old or ancient, the same medium but in so many different forms, places and ages!! Fascinating!"

Sarah: "The white snow and ice everywhere reminds me of Christmas."

Ryan: "The patterns which are formed by the ice are fascinating in their endless variety. It was incredible to stand upon the bow of the ship, peering down to watch flows shatter under the weight of the ship, to hear the cracking, to see a bright jag shoot forward, disappear, and then emerge as a break in the ice as we opened up a new lead. I'm exhausted now from staying up late and getting up early to see the ice, but it was well worth the effort."

As abruptly as our voyage through the ice began, it ended. I had just begun peeking at my photos of the day when Sarah Zimmermann rushed by me out to the fantail. "Ice edge" was all I heard as she clambered out through the hatch. Following, I was amazed by what I saw. Blue and white brash ice bobbed and rolled in three foot swell waves. Looking back the way we had come, the water was perfectly still. Here, then, was literally the edge of the ice, where the waves from the open sea are tamed by a blanket of frozen ocean. In moments, the ice was left behind and we were engulfed by the gray waves. I think we'll all miss it.

Tomorrow we will begin our search for swirling blobs of shelf water called eddies. Our science plan is very fluid at this point--it will depend on what the Arctic has in store for us.