Preparations

Lots has happened over the past couple of days. On Wednesday we drove down to Ice Warrior in Windsor to meet with Jim McNeill who provided us with a full set of polar clothing - from boots to jackets to extreme thermals. The clothing should keep us warm and functioning down to temperatures of -50C (see here for the climate we are going to be up against - average temperatures between -33C and -27C in March, not including the wind chill). One of the major challenges of the campaign is going to learning to deal with fiddly components in the extreme cold, wearing up to 4 pairs of gloves! Even things like typing become very difficult in those conditions.

We built the frame that goes on the back of the sled, which holds the radar antennas. You can see it at the back of the room in this picture - you'll also notice that the office has become incredibly cluttered...

On Thursday ex-CPOMer Rosie Willatt came into UCL to work with us on setting up and using the radar. In 2011, Rosie did a very similar experiment to the one that we are going to attempt this year (you can read her blog here). It was a very productive day, Rachel and myself got a lot out of it and we feel much more comfortable going into the field knowing a bit more what we're doing! There was a hair-raising moment when I thought I'd knackered one of the (very precious, non-replacable) antenna cables, but we managed to fix it in the end.

Then yesterday evening Rachel and I took a van to north-west London to collect the CPOM Komatiq - a sled that we have had custom built by Snowsled. It's a fantastic piece of work, beautifully made, and the perfect thing for the job.

The sled was the last piece of kit that we were waiting on so I've spent the day sorting, weighing and packing all of the items that we are having shipped to Greenland. It came to about 160kg in total - I hope the handlers are feeling strong. That'll all get collected Monday hopefully and it'll be a big relief to see it off, hopefully to be met in Qaanaaq in a couple of weeks!