Another successful OIB flight as we completed the “Foundation Academy IS2 A ” mission in sunny clear conditions. All DC8 OIB remote sensing instruments reported collecting good data again today. Some scenery today as we flew in the vicinity of the Patuxent Range again.
We’ll check weather tomorrow and continue hoping conditions clear in the western Antarctic region where mission opportunities been very limited due to persistent clouds.
Wiki items:
The Patuxent Range (84°43′S 64°30′W) is a major range of the Pensacola Mountains, comprising the Thomas Hills, Anderson Hills, Mackin Table and various nunataks and ridges bounded by the Foundation Ice Stream, Academy Glacier, and the Patuxent Ice Stream. Discovered and partially photographed on January 13, 1956 in the course of a transcontinental nonstop plane flight by personnel of U.S. Navy Operation Deep Freeze I from McMurdo Sound to Weddell Sea and return. Named by Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names (US-ACAN) for the Naval Air Station Patuxent River (at Cedar Point, Maryland) located on the south side of the mouth of the Patuxent River. The range was mapped in detail by USGS from surveys and U.S. Navy air photos, 1956-66.
Rambo Nunataks (83°57′S 66°20′W) is a loose chain of nunataks which lie northwest of Patuxent Range and extend along the west side of the Foundation Ice Stream for 17 nautical miles (31 km) in the Pensacola Mountains. Mapped by United States Geological Survey (USGS) from surveys and U.S. Navy air photos, 1956-66. Named by Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names (US-ACAN) for William L. Rambo, geophysicist in the Pensacola Mountains, 1965-66.
Note: You can work in environmental science and waste your life for 18 years and never have anything named after you, but you can work for one year as a geophysicist and have shit named after you for that one year. Go figures.
Wide view of today’s flight path
Detail of today’s flight track
Ushuaia as we passed by on our ramp calibration track.
Some deep crevasses
More deep crevasses
Patuxent Range mountains
Interesting refrozen melt feature and soil and snow patterns in the Patuxent Range
Patuxent Range mountains
Another refrozen melt pond in the Patuxent Range
one of the Rambo Nunatak peaks and a nearby refrozen melt pond. A ground based GPS station is nearby.
ATM T6 wide scan elevation plot of crevasses
ATM T6 wide scan elevation plot of crevasses in detail showing depths of about 16 meters
ATM T6 wide scan elevation plot of crevasses in detail showing depths of about 25 meters
NASA 817 taxiing in tonight