near Tromso, Norway, 29.01.2020
Strong winds are blowing off the northern coast of Norway. This means that waves are too high for our transit ice breaker Kapitan Dranitsyn. The Dranitsyn is a Russian ice breaker, great to get to Polarstern through the thickening winter Arctic sea ice, but it’s not built for stormy seas. Even though it’s just one and half days to the ice edge (south of Svalbard), we need to wait. We sit just a couple of miles away from Tromsö and enjoy the beautiful scenery and northern lights.
Even though there are definitely worse places to hang out, it’s tough to sit and wait. We are all eager to get to Polarstern and take over the tasks from our colleagues. They spent now almost 50 days working on the ship and ice, and are looking forward to be relieved. Waiting here, means that the time for the handover will be shorter than we would like. Lots of information needs to be exchanged within each individual project, within our thematic groups and generally between the entire scientific staff. In addition, many logistics operations need to happen: food and fuel resupply, arrival of new equipment, removal of used equipment…
Since, the sea is flat calm in the fjord, we now take advantage of meeting in our five thematic groups, which are atmosphere, ice/snow, ecosystems, biogeochemistry and ocean. As atmosphere team leader, it is my objective to get the team ready for any type of handover scenario, to coordinate our activities and make sure, we are well prepared to help each other in case equipment fails or extra bear guards are needed.
As science team we also set up a seminar series, the film crew organizes movie nights, and other volunteers organize bar nights a couple times per week. This is great for team building and keeps us busy while waiting. Sitting here, gives us a little bit of time to tune into the new tasks while enjoying northern lights. But let’s hope the winds calm down soon so that we can get going.