Life on the Ice
Take a look inside the day-to-day existence of three scientists collecting data on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.
Transcript
00:00:03 [Music] [Music] ah I'm going to the bottom of the earth you know big fast Frozen continent Antarctica stepping off the plane for the first time is an experience that I don't think there are words for it's really coold to come down here my first time it was you know it's still it's
00:00:46 still the same every time it was really like going from a dream into reality while for the most part you forget where you are all you need is like that one good storm to remind you that you are sort of living out on the edge of where humans find it comfortable so we're at waste divide collecting an ice core each ice core is like a little time machine if you will
00:01:12 or a little history book what we do know from Ice cores is that climate has varied over time we're basically getting into size core to see what's happened in the past so perhaps we can infer what may happen in the future one of the main reasons that we would want to understand or be able to put the present or the future in context with the past is so that we know how humans can adapt to
00:01:33 changes that might impact our food supply or our water supply basic fundamental needs for life if you step back and you look at in a big picture it's a really important project and we're all down here because we're invested in one part of it but the work can be monotonous we have to be detail oriented and that's important but doing that for 3 months day in and day out
00:01:55 often without a break requires that we insert a little bit of fun and creativ into the [Applause] job left hand blue you're in a camp with you know 30 40 people and those are your newest best friends for that amount of time I mean I think the overarching story with Antarctica is the fact that Community is
00:02:25 such a integral part of having fun we tend to instill a lot of laughter into our work because it's pretty much required to stay sane but also because we just established such great relationships being here and being in such Close Quarters with one another I don't know once every probably 8 9 days
00:02:47 [Music] maybe thing about taking a shower here is to shower or do laundry or you know even have water to drink you have to shovel and melt snow what is it like a 5 minute shower one 30 gal garbage can of snow or something like that you're really just always hustling you get off work and there's still work
00:03:08 to do just for everyday Necessities but it's worth it because we get such good data and such valuable science out of the sccore being at waste divide is a different level of intensity I would say compared to other experiences in my life this is one of the best ones I've ever had it's fantastic every day when I wake up I look outside of my and I look at
00:03:31 nothing but the ice sheet before me and every day I take a deep breath and know that more than anything it is a real privilege to be a part of this [Music] project for