Trip Journal: Martin and Kim visit Minto

18-19 November 2003

We returned to Minto on Tuesday 18 November, a week after our previous visit. In the interim, the weather has been cold, as low as ­35°C at our home in Fairbanks, and we expected the ice at Minto to be in much better condition and safe for setting up the ALISON observatory. The ice did not disappoint, although it gave us a few exciting moments as it creaked, groaned and fractured beneath our feet.

Under overcast skies we pulled our equipment-laden sleds for the twenty minutes it takes to reach the observatory site. It was about -25°C with just the slightest breath of wind, but we barely noticed as we grew warm and toasty inside our many layers of clothing.

We decided to install the ice thickness gauges first, and failed. Installing an ice thickness gauge requires a 30-40 cm long slot to be cut all the way through the ice with a chainsaw. We had two chainsaws with us and both froze up in the cold weather. Cutting through the ice brings a lot of water to the surface and into contact with the cold chainsaw. It wasn’t long before each chainsaw had accumulated so much ice that they became inoperable.

Not being able to install the ice thickness gauges was frustrating, to say the least. We’ve never had so much trouble before. It would be easy to blame it all on the cold weather, but the operator probably should share some of the responsibility: chainsaws are not one of Martin’s favourite tools.

After that minor debâcle we had better luck measuring the snow depth and ice thickness, and installing 21 wooden stakes to mark the sampling transect. As we did that the sun came out and cheered us up a little. That task was soon completed and we packed the sleds for the pull back along the slough to Minto. The ice thickness gauges were left behind on the ice in the hope that we would have better luck installing them in the morning.

At 9 am on Wednesday 19 November we were on the trail again, pulling those sleds back to the observatory. We went ahead of Joan Jones and the students hoping to install the ice thickness gauges and have them ready for a demonstration once they arrived. We enjoyed greater success than yesterday, managing to install one ice thickness gauge before the chainsaw froze up in the ­20°C weather. We were more than pleased to achieve that, because the chainsaw did not cut as effectively as it should and we barely managed to cut a slot of sufficient length. The chainsaw will have to go back to the dealer tomorrow for some work to improve its performance.

Joan and the students arrived at about 10 am and we immediately began making measurements and collecting snow samples. This was the students’ first visit to the observatory, to put into practice what they had practiced at school a week ago. They did very well, contending with three dogs and cold weather to complete the work by 11:20 am. Then it was back to Minto in a hurry to get lunch.

Later, discussing the morning’s events with Joan and looking ahead to their next visit to the observatory, Joan said that in future they will have to be accompanied by someone carrying a gun. Apparently, wolves were seen during the last 18 hours at the observatory site; that is, between the time we left yesterday afternoon and before we returned this morning. And we thought that those were fox tracks that we saw in the snow this morning as we walked out to the observatory!

By 1 pm we were back on the road heading to Fairbanks, pleased with another successful trip to put in an ALISON observatory. Chainsaws willing, we should have the Aurora Pond, Fairbanks, observatory installed tomorrow, Thursday 20 November.