16 August, 1997

August 16, 1997

We are now in Barrow and have visited the beach and the main store in the city. The group flew in by Cape Smythe Air and we arrived at about 3:30 pm and discovered that some of our equipment was left behind by the airline. Fortunately, there are some probes here and we will be able to go out and work tomorrow. As we flew in, I tried some pictures through the front window of our plane. We were able to see the ice pack a few miles off shore. It is cooler here than at Dead Horse. Today there were snow flurries before we arrived and there has been rain and sleet since we arrived.

On our tour of the area we stopped at the beach and checked out the ocean. One of the oddities as far as we are concerned, is the dead gray whale washed up on the beach in town and as you head out of town there were also seals who had washed up. At two points there were barges unloading materials at the beach as well. Near the DEW Line station there were several whale skulls on the beach from the whaling this year.

Our group is staying at Ilisagvik College and will be working out of the N. S. F. Lab at the campus. Tomorrow the groups will split up again into a group of soil scientists and our physical geographers. The plan is to visit sites that include some that have been observed since 1947 and hence they have some of the longest running records in the U. S. The lab we work out of just had its 50 th anniversary this year.

Most of the group of soil scientists have gone off to bed so that they can get an early start tomorrow. Our group has been in the lab discussing some of the hypothesis that are currently being examined concerning global warming. That conversation has ended and some of the people are trying to get on telnet with no success so far. We have been having trouble so far with getting on line. Maybe tomorrow. Good night.