It’s Science Christmas!
Our goal yesterday morning was to get the lab ready for this season’s work, which involved opening lots of boxes containing unknown items shipped up from either FIU or GVSU or packed away by the crew at the end of the last field season. For this reason, we named the day “Science Christmas”.
Sarah and I are both extra motivated to get everything done well here because we were both supposed to come up last year and couldn’t. In this case, that extra motivation meant that the lab was all cleaned up and ready to go by lunch.
Site Checks
After lunch, we went to check out the field sites in hopes that everything was still set up and working properly for us to begin collecting data tomorrow. There are two field sites that we will be monitoring this summer: “Toolik”, a site set up a little beyond but still near the camp, and “Imnaviat Creek”, a site that is a few miles down the road and up a hill or two.
Under the best summer circumstances getting to both sites is easy because there is plenty of boardwalk guiding the way. But, it’s not quite summer (or even spring) yet here, so we did end up having to hike our way through some snow.
The Attack
At each site, we check to make sure all the electronics and foundations are still functional for the tram: do the batteries still work, are the two steel towers still standing upright, etc. At Toolik, everything looked great. But when we got to Imnaviat Creek, it looked as though something had ripped off the tarp and tried to get into the cable box!
We are currently accusing a bear as the culprit of the attack, but with the lack of any obvious teeth marks or leftover fur, all of our current evidence is circumstantial at best. However, if you know of the bear who did this, please send us his home address because I believe the team would like to write him a strongly worded letter reminding him to leave our science gear alone, please and thank you!
First Impressions
We returned to camp for a much-needed rest and some dinner. At dinner, Mannie, one of the Field Operation Assistants (FOAs for short), asked Sarah and I how we were enjoying our first full day and what our first impressions of camp were. While it was very easy to say the first full day was wonderful, I realized that there has been so much going on that I hadn’t really had the time to form a full first opinion on camp. All I could truly say in response was “Busy!”
After dinner, we went back out to Imnaviat to clean up the bear wreckage. Every now and then I caught myself thinking “We’ll have to make sure we hurry to get everything done before the sun sets!” But then I realized that the sun doesn’t really set up here (our first night in Toolik, there were a grand total of 23 minutes of “darkness”), so we wouldn’t run into that problem at all!
However, even though the sun doesn’t set, the temperature sure does. We ended our day at 23 ºF (-5 ºC), all bundled up and doing science. I think now I’ll update my first impression: “Busy… and cold!”
Comments