Don's Journal:
The
crew piling onto the bigger plane to go to Atqasuk (pilot, Anna, Jim O'Brian
[boarding], Fritz, Sam and Jim Bockheim
Up at the break of dawn to go to the ARCSS grid in Atqasuk (English name
Meade River). Atqasuk is about 60 miles to the south of Barrow so we had
to once again board Cape Smythe Air to get there because there are no
roads to the place. The grid is about a mile south of the runway over
a mixture of tundra types I have experienced so far. There were high and
low center polygons like those seen on the coastal plains AND (they're
back) tussocks! There was also a stream that ran near the grid that was
narrow, but incredibly deep. Fritz tells me it is because it probably
runs over the ice wedges that form the polygons and is called beaded drainage.
What it looks like is narrow stretches with pools over the intersections
of the polygons. From the air it looks like beads on a string. In this
stream were Grayling, which look sort of like a trout (Arctic style).
The
weather was also very cooperative and gave us sun, clear skies, and a
cool breeze to work in. I really needed the weather to recharge my batteries,
even though there was no chance for a sunburn (TOY). After probing the
site Anna, Javier, and I walked the mile or so (it seemed like 20) into
town and looked around. The population must be around 50 to 100 people
from the number of houses we saw. It was really warming to see children
playing in front of the houses and in the school's playground. It has
been such a long time since I have seen people other than adults, I had
almost forgotten about the innocence of youth.
Ptarmigan just sprouting their winter plumage (check out the white feathers growing in).
The flight back to Barrow was in a single engine plane and the pilot never got above 100 feet so we were able to see a lot of detail on the ground.
Don
and Claire Gommersall working in the National Science Foundation lab in
the former Naval Arctic Research Laboratory (NARL) in Barrow.
I saw a herd of caribou running across the tundra, many polygons, and the meandering of the Meade River, all while being buffeted by the winds. If the weather was like this up here all the time, people would be flocking to Northern Alaska by the thousands.
After dinner, it was a night in the lab, entering data and trying to stay awake. We have been going like gangbusters since early August and our time is nearing an end. In fact tomorrow we should be done with our data collection. This will give us a whole day to visit the sights around Barrow on Tuesday. I can hardly wait!
The lake at the southern end of the ARCSS grid near Atqasuk on one of the most beautiful days of the year.