Update 0: Whats the Plan Man?

[Paul Summers]

Hello All! 

Thank you all for bravely signing up to be subject to my emails for the next few months. I will aim for roughly weekly updates, but it is possible I'll miss a few weeks if things get busy or I fall out of internet access, so don't be worried if I fall off the schedule. 

For background I am a part of a research project called "Thwaites Interdisciplinary Margin Evolution - The Role of Shear Margin Dynamics in the Future Evolution of Thwaites Drainage Basin" but that is a mouthful so we call it "TIME" for short. This is part of a larger collaboration called the "International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration" or ITGC for short. You can read all about our project here (https://thwaitesglacier.org/projects/time) and the overall collaboration here (https://thwaitesglacier.org/about/itgc). 

The TL;DR on our work is that Thwaites Glacier is a very large glacier in Antarctica that is rapidly adding to sea level rise, with the potential to contribute significant amounts towards rising sea levels in the coming decades. Our work is to learn more about this glacier in hopes of better understanding the ongoing and future changes of this glacier to better predict future sea level rise. I'll add more context on this as we go, but for now I hope that helps motivate why I'm headed to Thwaites Glacier. Personally, my PhD will not depend on any of the data we collect this season, but the models I am building for my PhD can be extended to incorporate the things we learn about Thwaites Glacier through this fieldwork. 

So, now for a quick run through of the expected plan with dates and locations. 

Nov 1 -> Depart SFO and fly to Christchurch, New Zealand. I will travel with Danny, a fellow PhD at Stanford, and Christchurch is where we will meet up with about half of our team of 14. 

We'll be issued some cold weather gear and do a few trainings with the United States Antarctic Program (USAP, you'll hear about them a lot)

Nov 6 -> Fly to McMurdo Station, Antarctica (MCM). This is the main US base in Antarctica and where we will meet up with the other half of our team who arrived earlier. We'll be here for a few weeks for training, testing of scientific equipment, and packing our camping and science equipment for our field camp. I will have internet access here, so expect emails!

Nov 25 (ish) -> Fly to the Western Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide (WSD). This is a seasonal camp with over-winter storage sites. We will again spend a few days here collecting and sorting gear that has been stored here for the winter. We also may calibrate scientific equipment here as it is our first time on deep ice, over 2 miles deep in places! Dates get fuzzy here and delays are not uncommon, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for Thanksgiving in WSD! I will have no internet access here, but can text via inreach and call on satellite phones (details on this in future updates). There will be a pause in email updates here most likely.

Dec 2 (ish) -> Fly to Thwaites Glacier field site (TIME2 or T2) This is our final field site where we hope to be doing weeks worth of science: radar and seismic surveys of the glacier. Lots of detail on this to come, but this is the main goal of our project and is years in the making to have this opportunity! I don't know why google calls it the "Ice Shield" though that does sound cool. The red marker is T2, and the white marker is WSD.

Jan 20 (ish) -> Fly back to WSD and then MCM after a successful season of science! We again spend some time re-packing cargo here and cleaning up after our season. I will spend a few extra weeks in MCM on the way home doing a follow up science project on a glacier near McMurdo as well. I will also post updates again once I'm back in MCM with lots of photos and fun stories of success (only successes I'm sure). 

Feb 15 (ish) -> Fly back to Christchurch and then SFO. After everything is all packed up, science is saved to multiple hard drives in duplicate, and I've finally seen a penguin, I'll be back on my way north! Sometimes there is an opportunity to spend a few days in New Zealand for personal time, so it's possible I'll do that, but that is distinctly a 'later' decision for now. 

How do I contact Paul?

Great Q! You can reply to these emails or comment in the online group, and it comes right to me while I have internet access. When I am out of internet access, I will post my location and give short updates from my InReach device. You can see those updates and also message me from the InReach website (I'll share details later). 

You can also send me mail, like snail mail! It is military mail so it is standard domestic postage and fairly reliable. I would estimate it takes 2-4 week for flat mail to get there, and longer for packages so I'd recommend letters if you'd like to send something. When I leave MCM I will set up mail forwarding, so I will receive letters even if they arrive after I leave MCM in Feb. 

Paul Summers
Grantee, C-446
PSC 769 Box 700
APO AP 96599-9998

That's all for now. I'm working on wrapping up all my real-world obligations and packing up my stuff here. As ever it is a bit of a crunch to get it all done in time, but I hope to have at least one more update for you all before I depart.

Best,

Paul