Drifting ice station
Drift station (Russian: дрейфующая станция ) is one developed in the Soviet Union method to explore the Arctic, are deducted from the research stations on drifting ice floes. The first drift station was " North Pole-1 " (Russian: Severny Polyus abbreviated as SP) led by Ivan Papanin, which was established on 21 May 1937 in the vicinity of the North Pole. They drifted 274 days 2500 km wide in the Greenland Sea.
The Second World War at first prevented further undertakings. Wrangel Island at 76 ° 02 'North, 166 ° 48' West It was only in April 1950 " North Pole -2" Mikhail Somov northwest discontinued. After more than a year, the station was opened on April 11, 1951 at 81 ° 45 'N, 167 ° 48' West closed. In this period was " North Pole -2" 2600 km wide drifted. 1953 took two stations at the same time their work on, and since then the research program was continued without interruption until July 1991, so that long-term observations were possible. A total of 31 Soviet Eisdriftstationen in the Arctic were from 1937 to 1991 on the way; 40,000 times radiosondes were launched carried out on 50,000 jobs depth measurements.
The research program was able to demonstrate that there are two main streams of ice drift in the Arctic. The Trans- Polar Drift runs from Siberia to Greenland, the Beaufort vortex rotates clockwise as seen from above from the northern coasts of Greenland, Canada and Alaska. Most Eisdriftstationen moving in the field of Trans polar Drift and had to be canceled after two to three years. Contrast, five stations were working in Beaufort vertebrae and were usually completed after a round trip. Only " North Pole -12 " worked after the closure with a fully automatic weather station further, while the position was determined with radio direction finding. The results were used among others in the "Atlas of the Arctic Ocean " (1980) and the "Atlas of the Arctic" (1985). The total of 200,000 weather observations were used by the Soviet and international weather service.
A unique record is held by " North Pole -22 " with a lifetime of nine years. She was started at 76 ° 16 'North, 168 ° 31' West on September 13, 1973, covered a distance of 17 069 kilometers, first back through the adjoining Arctic Canada and Alaska and then on the Trans- Polar drift over the North Pole towards Fram Strait. She was born on April 8, 1982 at 86 ° 10 'North, 00 ° 00' closed.
The Eisdriftstationen were usually sold with aircraft, until 1961, icebreakers have been used for this. Last comprised a typical station a dozen prefabricated houses and a dozen tents that could accommodate 15 to 17 people. The houses were also used as living space and scientific laboratories. Your foundation consisted of runners, so that a house could be moved out of the danger zone of crevasses. To a station also included a dining room, kitchen, infirmary, radio room, diesel generator, steam room, garages and provision stores. For emergencies Notdepots were set up around the station.
Again and again there were incidents of the ice breaking, so Eisdriftstationen had to be evacuated. The crew from " North Pole 9" moved within eleven months nine times with the entire camp around. The drift station " North Pole -14 " even came on January 27, 1966 issue with the Jeannette Island, the ice floe broke into two pieces.
Nowadays icebreakers can reach any area of the Arctic, where the researchers can work comfortably from your boat. On the other hand, affects the ice as a natural basis, the results of scientific work less than a ship, so that the data obtained from Eisdriftstationen are more reliable. Recently, Russia has therefore taken up the tradition of Eisdriftstationen again. In September 2007, 36 members of the expedition were looking for a stable ice floe in the field of Wrangel Island. With " North Pole -35 " they wanted a year drift through the Arctic Ocean - that overwinter in the polar night - and hoped thereby, the North Pole to cross. In the expedition for the first time a German scientist from the Alfred Wegener Institute participated for seven months. As the floe began to break, the expedition members were taken from the research vessel Mikhail Somov from 7 to 9 July.
A modification of the drifting technique is to be frozen a ship with a round body in the ice so that the hull is lifted from the ice and comes to rest on the ice. This technique has been first in 1893, used by Fridtjof Nansen in his attempt to reach the North Pole to the Fram. From 2006 to 2008, the French research vessel Tara drifted in this way through the Arctic Ocean.