Flight to find C28
Today myself and a few other lucky expeditioners were fortunate enough to help out as science support. We were able to go on a flight from Davis station to the West Ice Shelf, in the twin engine plane that’s know as a “twin otter”. It has ice skids or skis on its feet, instead of tyres, to make take off and landing possible on the ice.
Flown by our pilots Bob Heath and Allen Moore, we headed northeast in search of some GPS data loggers situated on a huge iceberg known as C28, a piece of what used to be part of the Mertz Glacier. Our job as passengers, made up of myself, Nick Cartwright, Greg Wilson, Steph Macdonald and Andrew Bryant, was to keep an eagle eye out for the GPS’s as we flew over the enormous iceberg. Unfortunately, after great navigation and flying by our pilots, we reached the iceberg only to find it was covered by low-lying clouds, so we couldn’t locate the equipment .
Though we didn’t find the location of the equipment we did find the iceberg, which will make locating it on the next flight easier.The sights on the flight were magnificent. We spotted two pods of killer whales, colonies of emperor penguins and seals with pups, not to mention the spectacular blues of the icebergs in the sun.
Alex Leonard, Electrician, Davis 2011-12
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
(Photo: Alex Leonard)
