Dispatch 10: Another Day, Another Ice Station!

Two members of the buoy team (Jeff O’Brien and Cory Beatty) in the man-basket to check out the ice.

The man-basket on the ice floe.

The TOP that was deployed in ice, as the ship backs away.

Ashley Arroyo

September 24, 2023

Dispatch 10: Another Day, Another Ice Station!

Today, we reached yet another ice floe that was suitable for an ice station/buoy deployment at about 79°N 145°W. This morning, the buoy team deployed a single instrument which was a Tethered Ocean Profiler (TOP). The TOP is a buoy with an ocean profiler that moves up and down a shallow tether (200 meters), providing upper ocean properties (temperature, salinity and pressure). Unlike the ITP, the TOP can profile right up to the base of the sea ice, so it can provide an estimate of sea ice thickness. The buoy team was swift and efficient, and the whole deployment was wrapped up in about 2 hours.

Tomorrow, we will have our third and final ice station of the expedition. Ice specialists and science members will be on the hunt tonight for a big floe at around 79°N 150°W, so that the buoy team can get started bright and early tomorrow morning. At this station, three buoys (an ITP, a TOP, and a Seasonal Ice Mass Balance Buoy - SIMB) will be deployed. In addition, some other members of the science team will be busy doing other ice work, including taking ice cores, under-ice water samples, and thickness measurements.

On Tuesday, we will continue with CTD rosette/bongo net operations, as we steam towards one of the Beaufort Gyre Observing System (BGOS) mooring sites (Mooring B). During our transit to the mooring site, the buoy team will have some time to rest up before the mooring recovery and re-deployments which will take place on Wednesday. We are making great time and getting lots of science done! More updates to come.