>>11241351There were several groups in board, from all around the world. The main goal for all of them was climate research. Two guys measured fine dust concentration (there's not enough of that going to Antarctica right now, it is needed for initiating ice condensation), two people measuring impact of waves on the ship (because of a miscommunication, that ship was actually built for the arctic and reacted like jelly to heavy waves), two guys measuring wave dynamics (freak waves especially), one girl measuring ice coverage and prevalence of different sorts of ice, one huge group measuring concentrations of nutrients, salt, oxygen etc in water up to 7.5km depths, a huge group trying to get samples of antarctic ice to investigate its mechanical thermal properties (antarctic ice is very different from arctic ice, see for example pancakes), an artist on board for conveying to the public why such an amount of money was spent and a few birders (absolute fun people).
Ice formation in the antarctic is very complex. The salty water forms brine channels in the ice, which alters its mechanical features. While we do have quite nice simulations of how arctic ice behaves, we lack even a basic understanding of antarctic ice.
This was a winter mission, so the weather was completely unpredictable. We had two storms combine the second or third day, which we had to evade, 17m of waves during a storm, one guy almost being swept over board by a wave hitting the poop deck, and a snowstorm while I was out getting samples of ice, all while the ice sheet moved up and down roughly 11m. I'll see if I can find some pics if someone's interested.
