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Blog Tundra Stories: What would we do without technology?
Thursday, 2 August 2012
Reading the data on the tower with the eddy covariance system and weather station, photo: Max Heikenfeld, AWIThe time flies by here on the island. Today is already Thursday and in a few hours, we expect the participants of the second stage to arrive, which will quadruple the population in our hut.
As Max has already reported, our continuous monitoring stations survived the winter very well. Honestly speaking, we were getting quite nervous during the last days just before the first reading of the stations: Is there data? Has the power been steady? Have we perhaps made some mistakes? We were relieved to find out that we could insert the data to my hard drive without any resistance.
To ensure less nerve-wracking first days on the island next, I've spent the last few weeks preparing the stations as well as possible for the winter. This has mainly included a thorough check of the power supply and a detailed inspection of the sensors for scratches, blemishes and obvious damage, nibbled by animals or by leaning cables fittings. The list of things you want to double check is never ending.
Each year, after the field season, certain sensors (such as those that measure humidity and temperature) are taken back for calibration purposes to Germany. Sensors, that for example measure methane, carbon dioxide and water vapor concentrations are very sensitive, and it would be too risky to leave them over winter out in the field. The sensors could be damaged since there is only little or no experience with these devices in such extreme environmental conditions.
This means that we have to take into account that we have certain sensor data gaps in our records for the winter months, since we will be measuring only over the summer time.
But there is still some time before we take the sensors down and pack our bags. Now we wait for the arrival of our colleagues and hope for better weather so that we can begin the second stage in good conditions and successfully complete the planned activities.
Best regards from the North,
Karoline
______________________________________
Main page of the English translation of the blog "Tundra Stories": http://page21.org/blogs/59-samoylov
Original blog in German: http://www.awi.de/de/go/Tundra-Stories
Reading the data on the tower with the eddy covariance system and weather station, photo: Max Heikenfeld, AWIThe time flies by here on the island. Today is already Thursday and in a few hours, we expect the participants of the second stage to arrive, which will quadruple the population in our hut.As Max has already reported, our continuous monitoring stations survived the winter very well. Honestly speaking, we were getting quite nervous during the last days just before the first reading of the stations: Is there data? Has the power been steady? Have we perhaps made some mistakes? We were relieved to find out that we could insert the data to my hard drive without any resistance.
To ensure less nerve-wracking first days on the island next, I've spent the last few weeks preparing the stations as well as possible for the winter. This has mainly included a thorough check of the power supply and a detailed inspection of the sensors for scratches, blemishes and obvious damage, nibbled by animals or by leaning cables fittings. The list of things you want to double check is never ending.
Each year, after the field season, certain sensors (such as those that measure humidity and temperature) are taken back for calibration purposes to Germany. Sensors, that for example measure methane, carbon dioxide and water vapor concentrations are very sensitive, and it would be too risky to leave them over winter out in the field. The sensors could be damaged since there is only little or no experience with these devices in such extreme environmental conditions.
This means that we have to take into account that we have certain sensor data gaps in our records for the winter months, since we will be measuring only over the summer time.
But there is still some time before we take the sensors down and pack our bags. Now we wait for the arrival of our colleagues and hope for better weather so that we can begin the second stage in good conditions and successfully complete the planned activities.
Best regards from the North,
Karoline
______________________________________
Main page of the English translation of the blog "Tundra Stories": http://page21.org/blogs/59-samoylov
Original blog in German: http://www.awi.de/de/go/Tundra-Stories