Initiation of the NEEM 2011 Shallow Core 2 (S2) drilling

Friday night celebration of the termination of the S1 bore hole at 411.83 m depth

Yesterday night the drilling of the S1 ice core was terminated and this morning drilling of the S2 core was initiated.  This core is also recovered in the sauna tent using the same pit and drill tower setup, but it is drilled at an initial inclination of 4 deg so that the bore hole will not be vertical. The main purpose of this drilling is to perform a replicate drilling, that is to drill into the wall of the borehole (Vostok style), and for this the inclination is needed. This test will be performed below the firn at 120-150 m depth. The obtained ice core is logged and packed as a full core without further processing.

The CFA lab is now processing ice from the central part of the main core brittle-zone. The sample quality is now so terrible that most of the sample cannot be analyzed. Over the last 24h only 6.7 m out of 200 m sample could be put on the melthead. We can expect some improvement of sample quality with depth, but in any case the CFA main core analyses will soon be terminated.

What we have done today:
1.  NEEM S2 drilling depth 32.5 m. Initial borehole inclination: 4 deg.
2.  CFA of brittle zone: bag 1547 – 1914 (850.30 - 1052.70) 6.7 m analyzed. 3%
3.  NEEM S1 ice core processing: bag 692 – 717 (380.05 - 394.35 m)
4.  Finished AWI radar grid measurements. Re-measuring sections of data loss
5.  Moving 120 kg heavy bailer box from drill trench to drill tent
6.  Labeling of new DK ice core boxes # 5816-5819. Next box should be 5820
7.  Celebrating Saturday Night with delicious German/Swiss CFA cooking

Weather: Mostly overcast, but blue sky in the afternoon. Temp. -7 °C to -10 °C, wind 6-12 knots from S.

FL, Anders Svensson

Saturday night glühwein in from of Main Dome before Culinary Food Adventure (CFA) dinner