By Tom Metcalfe – Live Science Contributor 3 days ago Planet Earth
It’s studying the interactions between the Arctic and the global climate.
The RV Polarstern will soon set sail and deliberately trap itself in Arctic sea ice. Hundreds of scientists from 17 countries will study the ice, oceans, and atmosphere during the expedition across the Arctic Ocean.
(Image credit: Stefan Hendricks/Alfred Wegener Institute)
The German icebreaker RV Polarstern will spend about a year adrift in the Arctic Ocean, surrounded by thick floating sea ice.
The Polarstern is the most advanced research icebreaker in the world, and the expedition leaders calculate it will be unharmed by being stuck in the Arctic sea ice.
(Image credit: Mario Hoppmann/Alfred Wegener Institute)
One of the world’s most indestructible ships will depart Norway in a few weeks, bound for the Arctic Ocean, where it will spend the winter deliberately trapped in sea ice, drifting wherever the winds take it.
The powerful icebreaker, called the RV Polarstern, has an ambitious goal: to determine how climate change is reshaping the Arctic. The 13-month-long, $130 million expedition, called Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAIC), has been planned for years and will require more than 600 scientists and technical staff.
The ship sets sail Sept. 20 from Tromsø, in northern Norway, and it will head eastward along the coast of Russia. Expedition leader Markus Rex, of the Alfred-Wegener Institute (which operates the Polarstern), said the ship will likely enter floating sea ice in mid-October, and then will drift across the Arctic, surrounded by ice, until next summer, before returning to its home port in Bremerhaven, Germany, in the fall.
Getting stuck in floating sea ice would spell the end for most ships, but Rex said the Polarstern is tough enough to handle it.
Related: Images of Melt: Earth’s Vanishing Ice
“Our ship is one of the most powerful and most capable research icebreakers that exist,” Rex told Live Science.”There could be huge pressure from the ice … but we know the strength of our vessel. We are not in danger of losing our ship.”
HT/Yooper
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Hooboy, Ship of Fools.
Nansen’s Fram expedition 1893-96 comes to mind. Modern technology allows us to repeat that triumph. May there be always enough Schnapps on board!
Didn’t they say the same thing back in Apr 10 1912 about a certain unsinkable ship built in Belfast
Honestly…
Perhaps they’ll screen season 1 of The Terror while they hang out Ice-Fasted over the long dark winter
With the thinness of the ice these days you’d be fine in a dinghy.
Not that the ice is any thinner, but when you are paid to believe otherwise …
So thin that a Norwegian Ice Breaker traveling north from Svalbard had to turn around as it couldn’t get through that meager 1st year ice scrim.
https://www.iceagenow.info/icebreaker-headed-for-north-pole-turned-back-by-thicker-ice-than-expected/
Loydo, I will buy you the dinghy is you’ll go. Come on, prove your statement true! Here is your chance.
If you read the linked article all the way through it does reference the Fram expedition, starting shortly after the part quoted here. Nonetheless, my attention was drawn first to this:
How can anyone determine something is “…reshaping…” something is if one knows what it was like before the event in question. And if this proposed expedition is taking “Measurements […] at depths down to 13,000 feet (4,000 meters) below the surface and at altitudes of more than 114,000 feet (35,000 m).” much (most?) of that was outside the range of 1890s instruments. Furthermore, all climate is cyclical, do we know for sure where on the cycle(s) the Arctic was in 1893-6? My first guess would be No.
But maybe this is way too much detail, from the 30,000 foot perspective, can you imagine how many ways this could go wrong? What if the hull isn’t strong enough? If the late 19th century ship builders could do it, maybe modern ships can do it? Though we’re certainly talking about different materials. The planners say summertime next year will set them free, but what if it doesn’t? The Fram expedition needed 3 summers before they could sail home.
But concerns aside I applaud the data gathering, even if I’m certain this is establishing the baseline, rather than providing any evidence of “reshaping”.
Climate change reshaping the Arctic! Good point. Shouldnt we start by seeing IF it is ‘shaping’ it at all? All these research projects start with a foregone conclusion to support, sometimes going through Excel’s bundle of stat tricks to squeeze out the answer they want. Some resort to inventing “novel” stat manipulations when Excel fails to produce their hockeystick.
They are setting out to quantify what they already believe. The question of “if” doesn’t arise.
They are spending $130m so they have to come back with something. If they cannot find something they will find something.
here are some questions
“What are the causes and consequences of an evolving and diminished Arctic sea ice cover?
What are the seasonally-varying energy sources, mixing processes, and interfacial fluxes that affect the heat and momentum budgets of sea ice?
How does sea ice move and deform over its first year of existence?
Which processes contribute to the formation, properties, precipitation, and maintenance of Arctic clouds and their interactions with aerosols and boundary-layer structure?
How do interfacial exchange rates, biology, and chemistry couple to regulate ecosystems and the major elemental cycles in the high Arctic sea ice?
How do ongoing changes in the Arctic ice-ocean-atmosphere system impact larger-scale heat and mass transfers of importance to climate and ecosystems?”
Like most climate science, they “know” the answers and are setting out to find the proof. The acronym MOSAIC is revelatory. A mosiac is technique to construct a preconceived image by collecting fragments and assembling them at will.
A great metaphor for what has been going on in climatology for the last 40 years.
“All these research projects start with a foregone conclusion to support”
Forgone conclusion much?
Steven – the science is settled. Answers to all your questions are already known (not to me, I’m afraid). No need for a scientific expedition. 🙂
@Steven Mosher September 6, 2019 at 9:28 pm
All very good questions, and ones to which I hope the researchers are seeking answers! My point remains, how can they tell if some force (real or mythical) is “reshaping” anything if you don’t know what shape it was beforehand? So I guess you could says we, or at least I, aren’t panning the expedition so much as panning the over-the-top hubristic press release to announce it. I wish them well, and of course if anything goes wrong I’m sure no one, government, NGO or private individual would spare any expense trying to help them.
My next question, though, will they release raw data? Or will it have to be “homogenized” first? I guess the answer to that tells us whether they are really researchers or merely headline seeking activists.
Is climate change reshaping the Arctic? Of COURSE it is – trust us! In fact, climate change is happening twice as fast in the Arctic as anywhere else… or is it three times? I keep forgetting, and it changes every week; could be up to four times by now.
To quote Bernie Sanders on a related matter, “Duh”.
Dynamic sea ice will always change shape. So by definition – reshaped.
Today reanalysis models and climate models have certain data holes.
Fill those holes and you have a better idea of what may happen in the future.
Example: there is a huge spread in the prediction of ice loss.
here is more you wont understand
https://www.mosaic-expedition.org/about-mosaic/the-science.html
The Arctic sea-ice is changing dramatically, with rapid declines in summer sea-ice extent and a shift toward relatively more first year ice and less multi-year ice. Ultimately sea-ice decline is linked to broader global climate change, but at a regional scale many interdependent processes and feedbacks within the atmosphere, ocean, and sea-ice contribute to the broader observed changes.
The primary objective of MOSAiC is to develop a better understanding of these important coupled-system processes so they can be more accurately represented in regional- and global-scale models. Such enhancements will contribute to improved modeling of global climate and weather, and Arctic sea-ice predictive capabilities.
‘Fill those holes and you have a better idea of what may happen in the future.’
This “better idea” being of what value? We can’t predict the future. Speculation as to “what may happen” is still just speculation.
“Today reanalysis models and climate models have certain data holes.”
Ignoring the bigger problem: we don’t know enough about the atmosphere/sun/oceans to codify their behavior. Modelling what you don’t understand IS NOT MODELLING. The problem is the software, not just the data.
But it is refreshing to hear “if we only had better data” than the monotonous “if we only had bigger computers.”
“The Arctic sea-ice is changing dramatically, with rapid declines in summer sea-ice extent and a shift toward relatively more first year ice and less multi-year ice. ”
No. It has been remarkably stable for the last 12 years since 2007.
Fram and Sedov both took 3 years (1893-96, 1937-40), but they drifted all the way across the Arctic ocean from the New Siberian Islands to the Fram Passage.
where it will spend the winter deliberately trapped in sea ice….murphy
How are they going to see how global warming is reshaping the Arctic…when no one has done this before?
Latitude,
Never done before so compare to what? Good one. But still meritorious. As you imply they’ll need more funding to do it again….often.
maybe not….we’ll see…I firmly believe in Murphy
..and it seems every time they think the ice is gone…it’s worse than we though
How are they going to see with 120 days of darkness?
Would any real Scientist draw any overall far reaching world climate conclusions by taking data at ONE stranded location for ONE winter and assume this applies worldwide?
They are just measuring WEATHER which even changes dramatically from year to year.
“How are they going to see how global warming is reshaping the Arctic…when no one has done this before?”
It has been done, before, twice. By Fram (1893-96) and Sedov (1937-40)
Wikipedia says it is planned to replace this ship with Polarstern II sometime in 2020.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/RV_Polarstern
Maybe someone knows something?
Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men…
Here’s to the men of the Franklin expedition, may this venture be more fortunate.
Funny, I had the SAME idea reading this story. The Franklin Expedition has food supplies for 3 years. No one counted on the tinned meat being tainted.
The tin cans of the day were not the greatest quality. They’re much more reliable now.
They used lead solder to seal the tins.
Are they taking canned foods?
Or are they bringing frozen and fresh frozen foods.
And supposedly water, fuel and sufficient food for 600 scientists.
Will they be allowed one minute of water for showers? Or none?
They could scare the polar bears away; or at least put them off eating for months.
Let’s hope so.
They ‘estimate’ the hull can withstand the pressure of the moving ice !
Because this has worked before ?
Being stuck for a week in Baltic ice wont even come near what they will face.
I hope they dont ‘extrapolate’ the standard hull strength computer models because they believe models can predict anything ?
Pack ice pressure ridges get REALLY thick and strong. They better hope they get lucky and don’t happen to be in the middle of one. These ridges can push a big ship up out of the ice and lay it on its side. Good Luck and hope the rescue helicopters can fly and have somewhere to land nearby.
Quick check. Fram had a retractable propeller. It had a round bottom with no chines, meaning that under pressure of sea ice it was pushed up.
Can’t see that on the Polarstern. Lovely flat sides to start with.
Please publish follow up.
I foresee a meme next spring with polar bears surrounding a sinking ship. The text reading:
Go to the Arctic and Study the Sea Ice, They Said
We are Not in Danger of Losing Our Ship, They Said.
Wish I was a cartoonist.
Regards,
Bob
Or how about a banner over the sinking ship …
“Join the Rex Expedition!
Explore the Arctic!
See the Sea Ice!
Feed the Bears!”
I could see these people trying to take a selfie with a few polar bears. After all, there are “pictures” of Russians feeding a mother bear and her cubs with condensed milk, because everyone knows that polar bears will forgo hundreds of pounds of meat for 8 oz. of condensed milk.
Only if they’re thirsty, not hungry.
Ouch!
May he not be forced to eat his words.
… nor his crewmates!!
How many Polar Scientists does it take to feed a pack of Polar Bears??
My God, look at that one!
He’s using that rib as a toothpick.
better check to see how many swedes are on the crew list in that case..after reading the other article
Of course , if events mean that it doesn’t break free from the ice in a years time, no one will laugh. Snigger.
My thoughts exactly, what happens if it drifts into an area that doesn’t thaw next year? Oops 13mnths turns to 13yrs.
Gilligan’s Iceflow ?
“Ship will trap itself on purpose in Arctic sea ice. Here´s why.”, and, in a related story, I will smash my thumb with a hammer on purpose and I have no idea why.
One hopes that these folks are familiar with Erebus and Terror.
We’re not in danger of losing our ship. Here, hold my beer and watch this.
Nansen did this in the Fram, beginning his voyage in 1893, so there should be some interesting comparisons:
https://explore.quarkexpeditions.com/blog/nansens-fram-expedition-bold-north-pole-exploration-in-the-1890s-3
In would appear that the present expedition has gotten off to an impropitious start by describing their vessel with every adjective except unsinkable. That adjective was used up in 1912.
https://youtu.be/fTr-ANTj1i0?t=224
Thanks for the link, Steven. As expedition leader Markus Rex noted, “The central Arctic is going to be a busy place in 2020.”
I like the slide presented at 1:15 regarding RCP 8.5 (BAU) global temperature profile projection of up to a 14.5C Arctic Temperature increase projected from 2090 to 20100. AOC and Al Gore were wrong after all. We have 18000 years until we roast
To restate the bleedinglyy obvious…. The only ship that is unsinkable is the one that is never launched.
Or made of solid plastic and floating in a bathtub
“The Polarstern is the most advanced research icebreaker in the world, and the expedition leaders calculate it will be unharmed by being stuck in the Arctic sea ice.”
Expedition Leaders calculated this ?
What could possibly go wrong ?
If it sinks they’ll blame it on climate change. The warming planet made the ice thicker.
I wonder if they have a spill management plan.
And if it doesn’t sink, they will blame it on climate change…..
Yes,Yes they do, The Captain is responsible for the ship!
I suggest that the owners have confidence that the vessel will survive, otherwise they would not have signed the charter party. I think the owners have a better idea than the “Expedition Leaders”, whatever that means.
I would be interested to see what the Underwriters had to say about the whole thing, though, always assuming the vessel is insured. Many shipowners carry their own insurance.
Oldseadog September 6, 2019 at 1:42 pm
It looks like the Institute that is sending the expedition is the owner of the ship.
deep pockets, they are also building a second icebreaker bigger and better, to a cost of 650,000 euros. Before overruns. Probably includes a lovely Ball Room.
michael
Michael, I looked at the Intitute web site and it looks as if they have a good idea of what they are doing. As you say, though, deep pockets.
I guess the Master will have more problems with the scientists doing what they are told than with the ice, and unlike the one in Antactica a couple of years ago he will have the advantage of Plar Bears to help him maintain discipline.
Ah. THIS time it’s on purpose.
Can they turn anything into a publicity stunt, or what?
Hope they don’t burn any fossil fuels while they’re up there.
They will probably need a constant supply of 2MW, so they bring along a 6MW wind turbine anchored to the ice and hope for the wind to blow favorable all the time. So no, they will not need a lot of gas oil or heavy fuel oil./SARC
They will. The Polarstern is diesel powered (four engines, 14,000 kW power), which makes it far from the most advanced icebreaker in the world. The Russians actually dominate the icebreaker field with 11 nuclear powered icebreakers, and more under construction.
It’s probably got better appointments than any Russian icebreaker. Here’s the library:
I have more books than that, just on my Kindle.
My dream, having a library like that.
I have a question: Do they mean just plain old ordinary climate change – or do they mean AGW climate change?
Yes, they mean AGW climate change.
CAGW (Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming) is a better description, since the AGW they are talking about is claimed to change the weather and climate in unprecedented ways, that will result in one catastrophy or another, therefore CAGW describes it perfectly.
People who predict climate catastrophies are called alarmists because they spread alarm. Just thought I would throw that in there. 🙂
Too much of our money, and too much time on their hands.
“….ambitious goal: to determine how climate change is reshaping the Arctic….” Not “if” but “how”. Whatever they find out I’m sure it will be catastrophic.
Conclusions already written up, just making the trip to justify the funding.
How’s that? . . . I have it on the authority of Nobel Prizer winner Al Gore that there should be no ice in the Arctic to trap anything, much less an icebreaker ship.
One of the deserving Nobel (peace) Prize winners, Fred Nansen, did the same thing with his ship, on purpose, 125 years ago.
Compare Nansen with Gore. What the hell happened to the Nobel Peace Prize.
Hmmmm… There was another ship, can’t recall its name that was supposed to be “unsinkable” and that “God himself could not sink this ship!” Had some sort of argument with an iceberg, and lost.
But that was then, this is now. Right?
That ship had a fire in one of the coal bunkers before it left northern Ireland. Most of the stoker’s left the ship in England before it sailed the Atlantic.
A quick internet search does not show that to be true, although one stoker jumped ship at the last stop before leaving for the Atlantic crossing.
If you have anything definitive regarding the stokers, please post it. Just curious.
Truly a Titanic undertaking.
Nansen did the same thing in a wooden schooner 125 years ago.
He wasn’t successful, as he didn’t float to the north pole, but the ship and crew came out fine … a few years later.
(Amundson applied to be part of the expedition, but his mom wouldn’t let him go)
Well, I guess if we’re gonna send men to the moon….
hows it to be refueled?
I see some cold times ahead for people on it…
Fuel Depot
https://youtu.be/fTr-ANTj1i0?t=326
depot is for copter isn’t it?
generators/heat/etc going to need lot of fuel and fuel bladders really not great idea for that.
They probably have already written the conclusion to the report. They need to go up there looking for data that is ‘worse than we thought’ to support the thesis that we only have 11 1/2 years to turn the great thermostat knob in the sky back to a cooler time in history.
how climate change is reshaping the Arctic
Assertion, assumption, consensus.
How climate change reshapes the Arctic in a limited frame of reference (i.e. scientific).
The climate in the arctic IS changing. It always has, and always will. More ice less ice, slightly warmer, slightly cooler.
That’s right. Climate change is not reshaping, but rather shapes the Arctic on a regular (e.g. seasonal) and recurring (e.g. decadal) basis. The claim that climate change is “reshaping” the Arctic is a bit of disinformation distributed by proponents of anthropogenic carbon dioxide as a first-order forcing of global warming a.k.a. climate change.
Climate change. Were any other two words every rendered so stupid when put next to each other as these two? It changes. Of course. Otherwise it would not change. So the climate by definition changes. Yet we are supposed to take it as activation codes for a complete apocalyptic freakout. I blame Twitter.
It doesn’t say how it is powered. I assume it is a diesel. I hope it can carry enough fuel for a year or more stuck in ice or they will do a ‘Franklin’.
The greens are using solar panels 😉
See above … Nansen’s Fram worked.
(but with the exception of a sweed that lied about who he was, they were all Norwegian, so they had an advantage)
Since they are all Vegans, they will power the ship with natural gas. So … no worries.
Ex vegan stories on YouTube paint a unpleasant picture of this way of eating…lots of gas!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2Ef1IhBE2I
Do they grow vegetables on board? As you know, a real Green does not eat meat!
Fun aside, I worked fora short while on a frigate intended for 200 men staff. One day I was asked to check the alarm system for the cooler and freezer compartment. It was two empty rooms behind one another, about the size of a small apartment. After the check, I asked one of the officers how long supply would last,if totally filled. As I recall he said 2 month.
On this expedition they are 3 times more people, and they need supply for 6 times longer. This gives a cooler and freezer size like 18 apartments. – I am baffled.
I just looked at the ship’s specs. and saw this:
Range 19,000 nautical miles /
80 days
Doesn’t that seem a bit odd if they are planning on spending 365 days+ frozen in the ice? How are they going to get refueled? They should be using a Russian nuclear icebreaker.
Should just be running their generator so they’ll get more than 80 days. The big question is will they have enough diesel to run the generator for 13 months. While I assume the planners say yes, I bet there’s a lot of assumptions in that calculation they may not work out the way they think.
The way the ice moves, stability may be a bigger issue if the ice piles up on one side and it can heel over? Once they are locked in the ice they cant adjust the direction of the bow – stern.
This was one of the issues with the Fram during its drifting .
The main result maybe that the idea of an ice free arctic can be demolished for good…not that they will say that.
Four other ice breakers are committed to meeting up with them and transferring supplies fuel and people.
Also a couple of aircraft are suppose to be dedicated for support.
Their plan is to complex, to many vessels and planes that most be ready and able to meet up with them.
This is not a climate conference were weather is nice with the finest of food and drink.
michael
so those other icebreakers would be breaking ice to get TO them
thereby negating any truth about how the ice reacts when left alone around a stuck ship
instant FAIL!
Tinfoil Hat Time
===============
Let’s say you’re a climate alarmist trying to convince people that the Arctic ice is going away. But, it’s not. What better hack than to send up a whole bunch of icebreakers to the Arctic “for research”. In the process you cut up the icepack into pieces and set the ice fragments to float south, and melt. See… I told you the icepack was disappearing!
/Tinfoil
Maybe we should require environmental impact statements and approvals for these missions. How much CO2 will all the ships and aircraft emit? How much impact on the sea ice will the icebreakers have?