Day 4 in Antarctica

Dawn marking a coaxial cable for the drop camera with duct tape and a sharpie.

November 30, 2013
After settling in the prior evening, it was time to get down to work.  I marked out 3 lines at 5 meter intervals so that we would know how far we were lowering our equipment into the lake.  We drilled some holes in the ice and collected our first conductivity-temperature-depth profiles.  We got our first scientific result: Lake Vanda was a meter higher than it was in 2010!  We also got started on melting the dive hole.  And it was warm - most of us were down to one layer on top.

We drilled 3 holes in the ice with a Jiffy drill and then lowered a copper coil filled with antifreeze into the hole.  The equipment shown here heats the antifreeze and pumps it through the coil to melt the hole.

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