NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Mission: Support Force / Upper Blackwall IS-2
Priority: Low
 
This new flight is designed to survey the channel of Support Force and upper Blackwall Glacier, mostly along ICESat-2 ground tracks. For these tracks, we specifically target the strong beam of each beam pair. The cross-flow lines also address gaps in Bedmap-2 coverage. 
 
We were yet again faced with very challenging weather west of the Antarctic Peninsula and at the pole, and poor conditions for our one remaining baseline mission east thereof (West Weddell). We thus selected one of two low-priority missions with clear skies and a good forecast, opting for the one that most tightly constrained. We performed a ramp pass at 1200 ft AGL. We transited over the Antarctic Peninsula at high altitude and observed cloudy conditions on the north end of Larsen C, but otherwise excellent views of most of the Antarctic Peninsula. Clouds returned across most of the Ronne Ice Shelf, but conditions were clear as we descended and throughout our survey. While surveying Support Force Ice Stream, we passed in between the sub-ranges on the northern end of the Pensacola Mountains. Those four tracks proceeded quickly and uneventfully. To cross the two fluxgates across Blackwall Ice Stream as straight as possible, we performed 270º turns prior to surveying those fluxgates. All instruments performed well, except for the SWIR channels on the Headwall imaging spectrometer, for which an issue was experienced mid-flight and data collection was limited.
 
Thomas Prior, a National Geographic photographer, joined us again for this mission, and Adrian Uzubiga from a local Argentinian television station (Canal 13), also joined us, conducting multiple interviews and collecting footage.
 
For the six ICESat-2 RGTs we surveyed today (4 Support Force, 2 Blackwall), their latencies were:
 
RGT / Latency (days, positive = OIB underflight ahead of ICESat-2)
1198 / +37 days
817 / +12
314 / -21
1320 / +45
466 / -11
1167 / +35
 
Finally, here is an example of the data volumes collected during today’s three hours of survey time:
 
ATM on/off UTC                                 17:25–20:25
ATM T6                                               54 GB
ATM T7 green                                     71 GB
ATM T7 IR                                          67 GB
ATM percentage                                 100%
CAMBOT                                            87 GB
FLIR                                                    7 GB
Headwall                                             60 GB
MCoRDS                                            778 GB
Snow radar                                         606 GB
AIRGrav                                              4.0 GB
 
Attached images:
1. Map of today’s mission (John Sonntag / NASA)
2. Panorama of outlet glaciers on western flank of northwestern Antarctic Peninsula (Ray Perigo / CReSIS)
3. DC-8 shadow over Support Force Ice Stream (Joe MacGregor / NASA)
4. Conically shaped sastrugi on the surface of Support Force Ice Stream (Joe MacGregor / NASA)