North Pole Drifting Station NP35 Project: A Russo-German Collaboration
23.07.2007 - Logistics, Other
A joint Russian-German expedition to the North Pole is planned at the end of August, as part of the North Pole drifting station NP-35 project. Within the framework of the International Polar Year, the expedition aims to gather further data concerning the Arctic's role in global climate change.
The Russian research vessel "Akademik Fedorov" will board its 36 participants and leave the harbour of Tiksi at 128 degrees east, in Yakutia, East Siberia on August 29, 2007. In the proximity of Wrangel Island, between 80 and 85 degrees north and between 170 degrees east and 170 degrees west, researchers will determine a stable ice floe to base the drifting station.
For the first time in the history of Russian research using drifting stations, a German researcher has been included on the trip. Jürgen Graeser, from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, will proceed in collecting atmospheric measurements. He will investigate two topics: the meteorological parameters in the planetary boundary layer, the lowest layer of the atmosphere, through recordings of carbon dioxide using a captive balloon system, and the ozone layer in the stratosphere by using ozone sensors. His Russian colleagues will investigate the upper ocean layer and sea ice, along with the snow cover.
The ice floe will drift in the Arctic Ocean and across the North Pole. During the drift, the station's measurements will provide current climate change data. While the duration of the project is initially planned for eight months, how long the expedition will actually last is not certain. It all depends on how stable the ice floe turns out to be.
Led by the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI) in St. Petersburg, this project intends to identify key processes in the atmosphere and alterations of the sea ice cover, in order to examine how the sea ice and atmosphere interfere.
