ITP 32 Deployment Operations

After a 4.5 hour recovery operation of ITP 8 (https://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=41519) from an ice floe that it had been deployed on 2 years earlier, ITP 32 was deployed in the 3 foot diameter hole through the ice previously occupied by ITP 8. Most of the deployment gear was already on the ice, so that transportation of the remaining items proceeded rapidly and within one hour after the recovery operation ended, the deployment of ITP 32 began. As the ice hole was already drilled, the equipment could immediately be lowered into the seawater, and only 1.5 hours later the ITP was fully installed and the inductive modem circuit successfully tested. Thirty minutes later, everyone was back onboard the ship, after swapping ITPs within a 7.5 hour time span.

Ship's carpenter, Gary Morgan, receives the ITP deployment winch at the end of the helicopter sling and guides it into position near the plywood covered hole in the ice formerly occupied by ITP 8. (Rick Krishfield)

Kris Newhall hangs the block from the tripod in preparation for the deployment. (Rick Krishfield)

While the last slingload is prepared in the background, Brian Hogue finishes kicking snow around the base of the ITP on the plywood sheets on which the buoy rests. (Rick Krishfield)

Due to the limited visibility due to the approaching darkness, the helicopter hovers just above Gary Morgan as he attaches the last slingload of gear going back to the ship. (Rick Krishfield)