SCIENTISTS RETURN FROM ARCTIC EXPEDITION WITH WEALTH OF CLIMATE DATA
Group brings back ice cores, water, snow samples
BERLIN — An icebreaker carrying scientists on a yearlong international effort to study the high Arctic has returned to its home port in Germany carrying a wealth of data that will help researchers better predict climate change in the decades to come. The RV Polarstern arrived Monday in the North Sea port of Bremerhaven, from where she set off more than a year ago prepared for bitter cold and polar bear encounters — but not for the pandemic lockdowns that almost scuttled the mission halfway through.
“We basically achieved everything we set planet over the course of a whole year. out to do,” the expedition’s leader, Markus Much of the information will be used to Rex, told The Associated Press by satellite improve scientists’ models of global warming, phone as it left the polar circle last week. particularly in the Arctic, where change “We conducted measurements for a whole has been happening at a faster pace than year with just a short break.” elsewhere on the planet.
The ship had to break away from its position As part of the expedition, known by its in the far north for three weeks in May acronym MOSAiC, the Polarstern anchored to pick up supplies and rotate team members to a large floe last fall and set up a camp on after coronavirus restrictions disrupted carefully the ice, creating a small scientific village protected fully laid travel plans, but that didn’t cause from wandering polar bears by alarms signi significant problems to the mission, he said. and scouts.
“W “We’re bringing back a trove of data, along “We went above and beyond the data wia with countless samples of ice cores, snow
collection we set out to do,” said Melinda and water,” said Rex, an atmospheric Webster, a sea ice expert at the University scientist at Germany’s Alfred Wegener of Alaska, Fairbanks, whose work is funded Institute for Polar and Ocean Research by NASA. that organized the expedition.
Webster, who led a team of 14 scientists More than 300 scientists from 20
during the fourth leg of the trip, said it will c countries, including the United States,
Br Britain, France, Russia and China took likely take years, or even decades, to sift par part in the 150-million-euro ($177-million) through the data. expe expedition to measure conditions in one “This is an extremely exciting time to get of the most remote and hostile parts of the into Arctic science because of the changes that are happening,” she said. “We need to get all the help we can because it’s important to understand what’s going on and the more people help out, the better.”
Rex, the expedition leader, noted that the ship encountered unusually thin and mushy conditions in the region above northern Greenland this summer that allowed them to make an unplanned detour to the North Pole.
“We are watching the Arctic sea ice die,” said Rex, adding that he thinks it’s possible there may be no summer sea ice in the Arctic soon. This would cause not just significant disruption to indigenous societies in the region but also interfere with the planet’s cooling system.
“We need to do everything to preserve it for future generations,” he said.
“We are watching the Arctic sea ice die. We need to do everything to preserve it for future generations.” —Markus Rex