Polar patterns - The Polar Seas from a Bird's Perspective
Ever-changing and ever new: In the Arctic and Antarctica, frost and the sun, waves, water and the wind create perpetually changing tints and shades, shapes and patterns. In order to capture the beauty of this interplay, one must take-off and take a bird’s eye view on the polar landscapes. A perspective that only polar researchers like AWI sea ice physicists on their routine survey flights above the ice are lucky enough to slip into. On each of those flights, one or two photographic cameras keep record of the landscape at the scientists’ feet. Pointing vertically downwards, the camera is mounted in the hull of the research aircraft or installed in the torpedo shaped body of the EM-bird – a sea ice thickness measurement device that can be dragged by the research aircraft or a helicopter. The past years of research did hence not only result in new scientific knowledge about sea ice, but also in truly fascinating images, picked by AWI sea ice physicist Stefan Hendricks.
News
Less Ice, Fewer Calling Seals
For several years, a team of researchers from the Alfred Wegener Institute used underwater microphones to listen for seals at the edge of the Antarctic. Their initial findings, just released in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, indicate that sea-ice retreat has had significant effects on the animals’ behaviour: when the ice disappears, areas normally full of vocalisations become very quiet.
Record low sea ice cover in the Antarctic
There is currently less sea ice in the Antarctic than at any time in the forty years since the beginning of satellite observation: in early February 2023, only 2.20 million square kilometres of the Southern Ocean were covered with sea ice. Researchers from the Alfred Wegener Institute and the University of Bremen analyse the situation for the Sea Ice Portal. January 2023 had already set a new record for its monthly mean extent (3.22 million square kilometres), even though the melting phase in the Southern Hemisphere continues until the end of February. The current expedition team on board RV Polarstern has just reported virtually
Sustainable collaboration: Using the AWI’s polar aircraft in the Harz
In Germany, the Harz is a region particularly hard hit by climate change: storms, arid conditions and subsequent bark beetle infestations are causing unprecedented damage to the forest. Sea-ice experts from the Alfred Wegener Institute are now helping to quantify the damage and contributing to the success of reforestation efforts – from the air. To carry out essential equipment tests for an upcoming Arctic campaign, they are engaging in survey flights over the Harz, during which they're putting their new, high-resolution camera systems through their paces.
