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Today the ship has enjoyed smaller seas and some blue sky and sunshine.
Early this morning we crossed 60O latitude. For many of the expeditioners on board this is the first time they have journeyed this far South, at least by sea, for them a small ceremony will be held to mark the occasion once we've entered the ice. The occasion was otherwise marked by the ship's crew with the deployment of one of two Bureau of Meteorology buoys, now happily transmitting data back as it bobs along on the ocean swells.
A briefing regarding the upcoming retrieval and deployment of whale moorings en route to Casey was run by ship's crew this morning (more to follow)
Our watercraft team attended two briefings today on the use of ice lines and watercraft in support of cargo and refuelling operations once at station. The use of ice lines (mooring ropes anchored to attachment points on station and surrounding islands) has been a relatively recent and very effective method of temporarily holding ice floes at bay, thereby keeping the approaches to the wharf free from ice. Other trainings and resupply planning activities are ongoing.
A productive day for our colleagues R and D, cleaning filters and monitoring their instrumentation on the monkey deck of the ship, getting counts back up and running with data being received as planned in support of an ambitious project to conduct a comprehensive set of observations of atmospheric composition in the East Antarctic sea-ice region. To borrow from their project brief, '..aerosols act as cloud condensation nuclei, the radiative and climate impacts of this unique aerosol population are of great interest to the international climate modelling community and for the Australian climate more generally'.
On the community front, our indefatigable voyage management trainee has this morning launched the V2 Ice Berg Sweep, whereby expeditioners & crew attempt to guess the time of the first verified sighting of an iceberg. Stay tuned dear reader for the result.
Regards,
Voyage Management.
Map
A map showing Australia and Antarctica. The map shows the journey of one voyage that has occured in the season, with each route highlighted in a distinct colour.