Some groups have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars using helicopters and gyrostabilized cameras, to peer into the inner maw of Greenland’s mysterious Moulins, places where surface water plunges deep within the ice cap.
The Dark Snow Project, lacking those resources, made due with a scrap aluminum pole, an improvised drone vehicle, and a couple of GoPros.
Jason Box on DarkSnow.org:
Camp Dark Snow spanned the 2014 Greenland melt season, with 59 days camping, 17 June to 14 August. We had very few logistical snags and our science objectives were met. We had strings of clear sky days, followed by rain, sometimes heavy, to evaluate the time evolution of ice reflectivity.
We managed 26 UAV missions that fill the intermediate scale between our point measurements and that from satellite. Marek delivered a heavy box of ice samples to Copenhagen. On camp for most days, Karen developed a regular 2 day routine that has delivered for example 2,262 spectral reflectance point measurements as part of 29 surveys. The count of microbiological cell counts is staggering.Coptering over moulins produced some video useful in communicating a video we call “follow the water” I presented at the AGU in 2013 and that will appear soon as a from Peter Sinclair. Several videos are in production to be shared in coming days, weeks, months.
Awesome shots.
Using satellites, the Greenland ice sheet’s net ice volume loss is measured to be 375 (+-24) cu km per year.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-28852980
The microphones on the GoPros seem to be missing the intensity of the water flow. I’d think there would be more of a roar.
Seeing how the moulins cut through the ice, they look like the way that Niagara Falls has cut its way back from the edge of its escarpment over time. They chew slots into the ice, making bigger and bigger passages. What effect this has on drainage is obvious; beyond that is unclear to me.
go pro’s have a default waterproof, and somewhat sound dampening, enclosure.
I have some more video coming that has better sound.
moulin bleu – not a hole i would like to fall into….
Extremely beautiful, extremely scary.
BTW, if you missed it:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/jul/24/dark-snow-soot-accelerating-greenland-ice-melt
thanks, we did see that just before leaving. Press has been generally good.
Thanks for sharing those videos, the state of the snow in that little corner of the world is staggering, and no doubt reproduced in many other locations. Easy to see where the slow but steady sea rise is coming from (even discounting the expansion due to warming).