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Wednesday 5, September 2012

Return: Mountain Views. (Photo: Max Heikenfeld, Alfred Wegener Institute)After eight weeks on "our" island we yesterday said goodbye. The last days were once more stressful because we had to do so many things before leaving.
We needed to ensure that our field measuriement equipment was ready for the long polar winter, both regarding the power supply and the memory cards, so that they would hold out until the arrival of the next expedition team next spring. In addition, of course, we needed to pack the boxes for shipment back to Germany and do a very thorough inventory of what was left to the station for the the coming year.
 
On our last night, the island was once again at its best: the now already autumnal gold Tundra was dipped from a beautiful sunset in a golden light. For most of us, it offered again a good opportunity for a longer or shorter walk across the island.
We were notified of our departure later in the evening: the ship that would take us the next day back to Tiksi planed to our coastline and chimed in nicely timing the sound with the diesel generator of the new research station.
 
Waldemar looks at our logistics, Samoilov. (photo: Max Heikenfeld, Alfred Wegener Institute)The next morning we all quickly loaded the remaining cargo on the ship. Unlike recent departure scenes where other people still remained on the island, this time there was really no one we could wave to - execpt the station dog Grey, who remained on the island.
The five hour boat ride back to the mainland passed unexpectedly quickly. We drove through the main channel of the river Lena, which once offered beautiful views of the islands and the adjacent mountains. Upon arrival, we dragged the duffel bags and boxes to the truck that was waiting for us and drove a bumpy road back to Tiksi, from where we had left almost eight weeks earlier.

At this point I would like to express a very big "Spasibo" ("thanks") to Luba who stayed here in Tiksi, for the culinary treat over the several weeks. For everyone else there was still a little more travelling before getting back home to St. Petersburg, Berlin and Hamburg.

We are gradually getting again used to the "normal life" here in Tiksi, like having bills in our hands or listening to the news, which have been almost completely absent form our lives in Samoylov. I'm sure I have missed out of a lot of things that have taken place back home this summer.
 
But before I take a closer look at the newspapers, I will finish one of the last expedition postings under the northern lights making my first expedition experience in Samoilov complete.
 
Greetings
Max
 
 
Friday 07 September 2012


Northern Lights. (Photo: ThinkStock)While still on Samoilov, we told you about our first sunset few weeks ago. Right now, it is already dark at night for several hours, which gives us an opportunity to see the Northern lights, another thing apart from the polar night, that we really wanted to see. 

During our five hour cruise to Tiksi we had some sunny intervals, but it has mostly been cloudy since our first night here in Tiksi, except yesterday when we could enjoy a cloudless sunny day. First in the morning we were very diligent sorting crates in the warehouse, but in the afternoon we chose a bit less strenuous carco, berries on the tundra. Towards the evening the tension started to rose, when we observed almost all bright rainbow colors without any clouds in the sky and got assured that the weather would be good tonight!

Finally, it was the smokers in our group, who, during one of the regular breaks on the doorstep, called us out of the kitchen to the outside in the cold. And there they were, the whole sky covered with white-greenish light mist. At first it could have been perhaps confused with thin veils of clouds, but since for most of us it was the first time observing this phenomenon, it was just overwhelming. Sometimes for a few minutes at the same place, then quickly changing into strips directly over our heads. A couple of times the light swelled to really an impressive dance in the sky that had a slight glow in different colors.

And even if you know that all this can now be explained as reaction of particles of the solar wind with the molecules of the atmosphere - the greenish color in this case being nitrogen - we felt probably as overwhelmed as people centuries ago or even millennia.  We closed those discussions pretty fast to be able to focus on the spectacle in the sky without interference of science.

Today, while there are some thin clouds in the sky, I think we will enjoy the spectacle again. This time we will take with us a thick pair of socks and a thermos of hot tea, in order to be better prepared for the freezing temperatures. In addition, we plan to prepare ourselves well for the time shift of eight hours while travelling in the direction of Germany.
 
Greetings from us for now with polar night and northern lights!
 
Max
 
 
Friday 14, September 2012


The two stations in Samoylov. (Photo: Max Heikenfeld, Alfred Wegener Institut)It's been a little over a week since we said goodbye to the Samoilov island in the Siberian Lena Delta. It has thus come to the end of this blog. We would like to thank all those who have followed our work here on the website in recent weeks. We found writing the blog a lot of fun, allowing for the world "out there" to grasp in words andimages what we have been up to. I certainly hope you have had as much fun as we have and have been able to get an idea of ​​what has kept us busyfor the past weeks.
 
For me, a newcomer, this Arctic expedition was of course a very special experience. First, there were many new experiences, like the polar night, the northern lights and the fascinating landscape of the Lena Delta. The expedition meant to me the first "real see and touch" to what I had previously been studying for several months more theoretically or in the form of digital data in Germany.  I was also from different scientific area than many of the other expedition members, which kept me busy with learnign about new impressions, ideas and research results.  I could always be sure that between our scientific tasks, during the very rare free time, I would not get bored.

After our return, I used the first day to adapt to life in Germany. I also had a huge jet lag. Now we are in a period of evaluating the results obtained during the expedition. So, now the time will be spent primarily in front of the computer desk or in the laboratory. That's quite a change after havinmg spent the last two months in the fresh air.

I personally, will in the coming months be developing a model for the heat transport in the polygonal tundra. In addition I have determined this summer the characteristics of the soil, which are crucial for the energy exchange at the soil surface. These are, for example, soil moisture, surface temperature and albedo, which describes how much of the incoming sunlight the vegetation is reflecting back into the atmosphere. Also, I use the data as recorded by our station in recent years on the permafrost.

Our station will slumber quite lonely until next spring, when the first expedition will come and move into the new research station next door. The term "spring" is perhaps a bit misleading: while in Germany we have usually first warm days in April, on Samoilov the temperatures will still be well below freezing mark. The tundra will  be looked at from a completely different perspective than we have explored in the last two months. The expedition team will have to wear thick thermal suits instead of boots and mosquito shirt and to be prepared for snow and ice instead of soggy tundra. 
 
So this is the final blog message from me. Thanks for your interest!
 
Max
(Photo: Birgit Heim) On one of the days when we had no boat, Antonia (Tonia) Antonina guided us around the lakes on Samolov. Elin and Tonia.Monday, 26th of August 2013
 
Dear readers, as I told you last time, we were expecting the new group, traveling from Scandinavia, to come last Monday or Tuesday.

But as it turned out this week became a week of waiting.

For several days, the weather conditions were too rough and it would not have been safe to land in Tiksi. So, every day we waited and hoped for good weather and news from Tiksi, the Scandinavians waited in Yakutsk and we waited here.
 
We were all impatient for them to come, for the pleasure of their company.
 
I knew half of the group from before, from fieldwork and from studies back in Uppsala and Stockholm, so it is always nice to have the opportunity to meet again.
 
(Photo: Elin Högström) The day after the arrival of Stockholm/Copenhagen team we had a meeting in the conference room to plan our workdays together.The other reason that we were eager for them to come was the boat, without which we could not go to Kurungnakh for fieldwork.
 
There is more than one boat around here. But with strong wind it is not safe to the small ones that were here.

At last, the saviors arrived! On Thursday night, as I was preparing for bed, there was a phone call and the message that the boat had already arrived at the beach. Yes!
 
We ran down there to welcome them and help with the luggage. Then Regina, our wonderful chef, had prepared a big pan of french fries and a chocolate cake for everyone. I had a second dinner and went to bed later.

The next couple of days we could go back to Kurungnakh again.

I installed two out of the five planned soil stations. There was also time to do manual measurements and finalize some parts of the existing subsidence stations: programming, reading out data and installing sensors.

(Photo: Birgit Heim) Elin and the station on the way to the Yedoma plateau – the stations home for the coming year.With a couple of kilometers between us, Birgit me and Sascha kept in contact with the walky-talkies throughout the day, and met up for lunch or for hiking back together.
 
One can say much about the looks of the orange AWI outfit.
 
But I'll tell you one thing: in the middle of the huge tundra landscape, it is easy to find each other. Orange dots in the distance.

That is quite good for safety, I would say.

From the Yedoma plateau in southern Kurungnakh, the view is astonishing!

Now, when also temperatures are quite a lot lower than at the beginning of our stay here, one really feel the strength of the wind up there. It is hard to believe that we were sweating like pigs only some 10 days ago here.

Gustaf, Christian and the others also came with us in the boat to Kurungnakh. They had lost many days of field work when stuck in Yakutsk and were now really glad to be able to start as soon as possible.
 
 
 
Written by Elin
 
 
 
 
 
 
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