Hannah's Best Day of Science, Ever

Yesterday was a banner day for Hannah!

First, she had the TRUE Antarctic field work experience! We were able to go back to Carlini to finish our transect from a few days ago. But... it was snowing the entire time!

First we find the moss, and then we count the species that are living there!

It is difficult to be a soil scientist when there's snow on the ground. We had to search for our plant and soil samples beneath the snow, all while getting snow blown in our faces! It was wet and cold, but we managed to complete all of the work! Success!

Dr. Becky and Hannah sampling under the snow.

After we completed our sampling, the Argentinians at the base were very kind and fed us a warm lunch. They even gave us each a super cool Base Carlini sticker! That was the first super fun extra thing to happen that day. Stickers are very popular in Antarctica, because they are a great, lightweight souvenir to trade with people. I gave Arizona stickers to the people at Carlini who helped us, and we received Carlini stickers!

On the boat ride home, we got to witness something special close-up. A large part of the glacier fell off into the bay. This is referred to as the glacier "calving", and it's how many icebergs are born. This is a regular occurrence in the mid and late summer, because as the temperatures warm during the season, the ice on the edge of the glacier starts to melt and crack. That makes the edges unstable and they start to break off. (The problem, of course, arises when the summers are warmer than they naturally would be, so you get more calving than would naturally happen. That's how we see the overall amount of ice decrease on the continent.) At first, we only saw small bits of ice roll out of the cave in the glacier. Then, suddenly, this happened:

That was very exciting, including the rapid retreat away from the big wave that was coming from the splash! At this point, the weather was better than the snowy morning of work, and we had a scenic journey back to Escudero. And, finally, as we were pulling into the dock at Escudero, who should come visit the boat but a leopard seal!

Leopard seals are one of several species of seal that live here, but they are the only species known to attack humans. They don't particularly want to hunt humans... really it's just that they have mistaken human divers for seals. The wet suit and flippers can make a human look an awful lot like a smaller seal that the leopard seals would normally prey on. They also eat penguins and other marine animals. Because their only predator is the orca, they are not generally afraid of anything on land and will follow boats with curiosity, occasionally sticking their head up above water to see what's going on. This one came right up to the boat to say "hi" to Hannah!

So, a couple of cool sightings, some rugged field work, and a new sticker. A good day! Today we have been busy in the lab processing the samples that we collected yesterday. And it's still snowing!