One Last Trip to the Ice

Today I took one last science trip to the ice. Chris Shuman was headed to Camp Raven to take one last snow sample. He asked me to go along and help. It was supposed to be another turn around flight where we would get off a plane and get back on about a half hour later.


We were scheduled to leave at 10:00 but the plane was holding for better weather. We sat on the tarmack for awhile and finally took off. We landed at Raven. Raven is the camp where the 109th Air guard trains. There are two Veco staff there that groom the runway.


Our plane landed and we got off to take the samples. The plane was supposed to take off and land again. The plane took off but it did not land again. Instead it went back to Kanger with a broken radar. We were left to be picked up by a second plane schedule to land and do some maneuvers about a half hour later. This was great because we got to see Camp Raven.



I think Raven was my favorite camp. It is very simple, two weather port, a sauna and an emergency shelter. It is staffed by Lou and Mark who are married. It felt like walking into a little cabin on the Ice Sheet. We were given tea and soup for lunch.

Raven also is the site of the Dye-2 Structure. This is a huge building built by the military as part of the Detection and Early Warning system. It was designed in the late 1950’s early 60’s to detect missiles that may be headed towards the US. It was abandoned over night in the early 1990’s. We did not go in the building but it was huge from the outside. Before it was drifted in it would have been about 60 to 80 feet above the ice. I believe there were 5 more of these sites in a transect across Greenland.





We signed the Raven guest book. There is a guest book at Raven because it is on the route that most people take when traversing Greenland by skies. Mark and Lou told us briefly about all the interesting people that pass by.

On the ride home we flew first class again. This time we got to see a few Musk Ox out the plane window. I love flying with the 109th. Definitely the best flights of my life.







In the afternoon, Meredith and I went for a final trip around Kanger. We road bikes up to Lake Fergeson. It was 6 km round trip and a nice afternoon outing with only a few mosquitoes. We are going to make dinner tonight and go to bed early for the flight south (this means to NY) tomorrow.