Palmer Station
This morning brought fog and low cloud, almost a relief after yesterday’s intense sunshine. Antarctica is especially mysterious in this light, when ice cliffs rise from the sea and disappear into cloud. As we entered the Neumayer Channel the cloud began to lift and the vastness of Anvers Island was revealed.
During lunch our anchor plunged into Arthur Harbor, just off Palmer Station on the south shore of Anvers Island. This, the smallest of the United States’ three permanent Antarctic research stations, is named for Nathaniel Palmer, a sealer from Stonington, Connecticut. Beginning in the summer of 1819-20, Palmer made numerous voyages to the Antarctic Peninsula and surrounding islands in search of fur seals. In command of the tiny shallop Hero, Palmer found land on 16 November 1820, becoming one of the very first people to lay eyes on the mainland of Antarctica.
Several personnel from Palmer Station came out to Endeavour to give us an introduction to the US Antarctic Program. The National Science Foundation operates Palmer primarily as a biological sciences station, while McMurdo Station and Amundsen-Scott Station at the South Pole focus more on upper atmospheric science, meteorology, astronomy and glaciology. Palmer houses up to 42 personnel in the summer; the winter crew may be only 10 or 12. In contrast, McMurdo often has well over 1000 people in summer, and the Pole station about 200.
We spent the afternoon visiting the station and nearby Torgersen Island, where an Adelie penguin rookery has been monitored for over 30 years. A stunning 50-60% decline numbers has been documented over the past decade. The Long-Term Ecological Research program at Palmer has demonstrated that the Antarctic ecosystem is much more complex than was once thought, and these researchers could provide no simple causes for the changes they have witnessed. A compelling hypothesis is that rising temperatures documented in the peninsula have resulted in less annual sea ice and greater snowfall; the former affecting food supply and the latter reducing available nesting sites. Antarctica gives us mystery, not simplicity. We felt privileged to have spent the day with some of the continent’s finest detectives – the scientists of the US Antarctic Program.
This morning brought fog and low cloud, almost a relief after yesterday’s intense sunshine. Antarctica is especially mysterious in this light, when ice cliffs rise from the sea and disappear into cloud. As we entered the Neumayer Channel the cloud began to lift and the vastness of Anvers Island was revealed.
During lunch our anchor plunged into Arthur Harbor, just off Palmer Station on the south shore of Anvers Island. This, the smallest of the United States’ three permanent Antarctic research stations, is named for Nathaniel Palmer, a sealer from Stonington, Connecticut. Beginning in the summer of 1819-20, Palmer made numerous voyages to the Antarctic Peninsula and surrounding islands in search of fur seals. In command of the tiny shallop Hero, Palmer found land on 16 November 1820, becoming one of the very first people to lay eyes on the mainland of Antarctica.
Several personnel from Palmer Station came out to Endeavour to give us an introduction to the US Antarctic Program. The National Science Foundation operates Palmer primarily as a biological sciences station, while McMurdo Station and Amundsen-Scott Station at the South Pole focus more on upper atmospheric science, meteorology, astronomy and glaciology. Palmer houses up to 42 personnel in the summer; the winter crew may be only 10 or 12. In contrast, McMurdo often has well over 1000 people in summer, and the Pole station about 200.
We spent the afternoon visiting the station and nearby Torgersen Island, where an Adelie penguin rookery has been monitored for over 30 years. A stunning 50-60% decline numbers has been documented over the past decade. The Long-Term Ecological Research program at Palmer has demonstrated that the Antarctic ecosystem is much more complex than was once thought, and these researchers could provide no simple causes for the changes they have witnessed. A compelling hypothesis is that rising temperatures documented in the peninsula have resulted in less annual sea ice and greater snowfall; the former affecting food supply and the latter reducing available nesting sites. Antarctica gives us mystery, not simplicity. We felt privileged to have spent the day with some of the continent’s finest detectives – the scientists of the US Antarctic Program.
