October 5 – Anchoring to ‘DreamFloe’

The ship is now at her final destination, the so-called ‘DreamFloe.’ This afternoon, the expedition participants were invited to set foot on the ice. I went with Marcel Nicolaus and David Wagner to drill a large auger hole through the ice at a somewhat tall ridge area for Polarstern’s anchor. The anchor consists of about a 3 meter long railroad iron inserted vertically into the hole. For safety we also inserted a piece of wood, about 2 meters long into a hole roughly 10 meters beyond the railroad iron. A rope goes from the ship to the railroad iron, then a steel cable connects to the wood safety.

It is foggy and cloudy here, but quite warm. My beard does not even freeze. Beardcicles form at about 14°F and below, depending on wind and humidity.

Now that we have found ‘DreamFloe,’ I transferred to Polarstern. It is a nice change, with a great improvement in terms of food. It is quite cozy, despite having a smaller cabin. Earlier in the week, we also moved cargo from the Federov to Polarstern before sailing to the ‘DreamFloe.’

*Feature photo taken by Alfred Wegener institute/SebastianGrote.

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