Polar Explorer Pen Hadow Sets Date for Ground-Breaking Scientific
Survey of Arctic Sea Ice
Leading polar explorer Pen Hadow today confirmed the go-ahead for a
major scientific expedition to measure the thickness of the remaining
permanent Arctic Ocean sea ice.
Pen had originally intended to set off in February 2008 but his departure
date was delayed to complete additional technical and scientific work
to ensure the project will deliver the most comprehensive range of observations
and value to the scientific community.
|
|
| Polar bears |
Catlin Arctic Survey |
This pioneering survey, which starts in February 2009, is a collaboration
with leading scientists to help them more accurately assess the state
of the rapidly receding Arctic sea ice in a fragile region already affected
by climate change.
Current estimates as to how long ice will be a year-round feature around
the North Pole vary considerably, with scientific predictions ranging
between five and 100 years. More accurate data, measured at the surface
itself, is essential if scientists and decision-makers are to fully
anticipate the potentially devastating impacts of near total sea ice
loss each summer on millions of people across the world.
The project, Catlin Arctic Survey, has amassed substantial financial
backing for the £3m survey despite the gloom currently surrounding the
world economy and has secured support from UNEP (United Nations Environment
Programme), WWF International and the Royal patronage of HRH The Prince
of Wales. Hadow and his technical team have developed new equipment
specifically designed for the project, including an ice-penetrating
radar and a data uplink system to transmit its findings to scientists
direct from the ice via satellite.
On completion of the scientific project, the findings will be made
available to inform international decision-makers gathering at the United
Nations Climate Change Conference of Parties, at Copenhagen, in 2009.
The team of three highly-experienced explorers - Ann Daniels and Martin
Hartley as well as Pen Hadow - will be travelling from mid-February
to late-May, taking millions of readings of the thickness of the floating
ice over a 1200 kilometres (750 miles) route. They will be pulling sledges
and swimming between ice-floes from their start-point 470 miles offshore
of northern Canada to the North Geographic Pole in temperatures from
0°C to -50°C.
Pen said: "Our physical efforts hauling the equipment over the
surface will amass data in unprecedented detail. I have come to recognise
by working with our scientific partners that the Arctic Ocean is not
only an astonishingly beautiful place but a globally unique environment
of immense significance to the balance of the Earth's whole eco-system."
The science programme was developed with some of the world's leading
experts and institutions studying the status and future of the Arctic
Ocean's polar pack ice including the US Naval Postgraduate School, the
NASA ICESat Mission and the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical
Physics at the University of Cambridge. It will help fill the current
gap in existing measurement studies by satellites and submarines, which
cannot differentiate between ice and snow layers.
Professor Wieslaw Maslowski, from the US Naval Postgraduate School
said: "We'll be integrating the survey's actual observations with
same-day weather data to obtain near real time model estimates of sea
ice conditions on a daily basis."
"In this way we can test the accuracy of our modelling of the
ice's thickness and re-assess our projections as to how long the surviving
thicker ice is likely to last as a perennial feature".
The survey programme the team will undertake during their trek will
includes:
- 10 million surface measurements of the sea ice using a specially-built
radar;
- Measurements of the water column under the sea ice and density
measurements of the snow and ice;
- Taking samples of the water, snow, ice and air;
- Supplementary measurements of the thickness and density of both
the ice and overlying snow layers by manually drilling through the
sea ice.
In advance of their departure, the team has begun a rigorous physical
and psychological training programme that includes exercise sessions
in a -50 degrees centigrade climate chamber, recreating Arctic conditions.
Pen, who was the first, and only, person to ever trek solo and unsupported
by aircraft from Canada to the North Pole, said: "Experienced explorers
are the only people who have the expertise to undertake a survey of
this magnitude and help science in this way."
Back to Catlin Arctic Survey page...