So I recently signed up to be a Pressure Ridge tour guide. Pressure Ridges are upwellings in ice created when sea ice meets ice shelf or ice shelf meets land (much in the way mountains are formed when two plates come together). There is a set of impressive pressure ridges right behind the Kiwi base created by the sea ice running into Ross Island. Tour guides are required because there tend to be a lot of cracks and melt pools around pressure ridges and when people were left to their own devices in the past to explore them, they tended to abuse the privilege (by for example climbing the ice or harassing seals) and then post the evidence of their behavior on the public I drive. So tour guides make sure people don't hurt themselves and makes sure they stay on the path. So I don't actually have to know a thing about pressure ridges to be a tour guide which is good...because I know very little about them.
I took all these pictures while someone else was a guide (it would probably look bad if instead of watching out for the people on my tour, I instead choose to take hundreds of pictures...it would also make for a very slow tour given that I was often lagging behind on both of my introductory tours). I also don't know how good of a tour guide I will be given on one of my tours, within the first hundred yards of the tour, I stepped right in a melt pool and went shin deep in ridiculously cold water and had to walk around with wet boots for an hour and a half. Luckily it was warm so not miserable with wet boots.
To get good pictures of the pressure ridges, you have to have a nice day because if it is gray and cloudy, you pretty much end up with grey on grey...luckily I had some blue skies.
We had had some warm weather so a lot of the pressure ridges melted and refroze forming giant icicles like these. As I turned back to the trail after this picture was taken, the ear of my raccoon hat hit and broke off one of the icicles...probably some sort of violation of the Antarctic treaty.
With melt pools like these, you could often get classic "Antarctica shots" where it looks like you are surrounded by iceburgs.
Seals love the pressure ridges because there are plenty of holes in the ice around for them to come up/ dive in again. This one was really cute and put his flipper up to cover his mouth when he yawned.
So I recently signed up to be a Pressure Ridge tour guide. Pressure Ridges are upwellings in ice created when sea ice meets ice shelf or ice shelf meets land (much in the way mountains are formed when two plates come together). There is a set of impressive pressure ridges right behind the Kiwi base created by the sea ice running into Ross Island. Tour guides are required because there tend to be a lot of cracks and melt pools around pressure ridges and when people were left to their own devices in the past to explore them, they tended to abuse the privilege (by for example climbing the ice or harassing seals) and then post the evidence of their behavior on the public I drive. So tour guides make sure people don't hurt themselves and makes sure they stay on the path. So I don't actually have to know a thing about pressure ridges to be a tour guide which is good...because I know very little about them.
I took all these pictures while someone else was a guide (it would probably look bad if instead of watching out for the people on my tour, I instead choose to take hundreds of pictures...it would also make for a very slow tour given that I was often lagging behind on both of my introductory tours). I also don't know how good of a tour guide I will be given on one of my tours, within the first hundred yards of the tour, I stepped right in a melt pool and went shin deep in ridiculously cold water and had to walk around with wet boots for an hour and a half. Luckily it was warm so not miserable with wet boots.
To get good pictures of the pressure ridges, you have to have a nice day because if it is gray and cloudy, you pretty much end up with grey on grey...luckily I had some blue skies.
We had had some warm weather so a lot of the pressure ridges melted and refroze forming giant icicles like these. As I turned back to the trail after this picture was taken, the ear of my raccoon hat hit and broke off one of the icicles...probably some sort of violation of the Antarctic treaty.
With melt pools like these, you could often get classic "Antarctica shots" where it looks like you are surrounded by iceburgs.
Seals love the pressure ridges because there are plenty of holes in the ice around for them to come up/ dive in again. This one was really cute and put his flipper up to cover his mouth when he yawned.
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