Dr. Audrey Limoges, associate professor of earth sciences at the University of New Brunswick, is no stranger to the call, or the chill, of the arctic.
For the past decade, Limoges's research has taken her to the waters of the Arctic Ocean, where she works to understand how microscopic life has responded to changing climates over timescales ranging from a single season to multiple millennia. In early September, she headed back North as part of a special research expedition onboard the Canadian Coast Guard Ship Amundsen.
The expedition is organised by Amundsen Science, a nonprofit organization hosted at the Université Laval, responsible for the scientific mandate of the research icebreaker CCGS Amundsen. They have organized annual expeditions for more than 20 years, but this year marks the first time the cruise will take them to the Queen Elizabeth Islands. These Islands are the northernmost group of islands in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago and are home to about 14 per cent of the world's glaciers and ice caps.
Curious about life and work onboard such an expedition, we've been keeping in touch with Limoges throughout her journey. Today, she offers a peek into the first part of her trip onboard CCGS Amundsen, which began on Sept. 4; we will also be following up on her story later in October with a compilation of her Arctic highlights.
Working aboard a research vessel in the High Arctic is as thrilling as it is complex. Months of planning and coordination go into every cruise. Amundsen Science, the University of Manitoba and Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) joined forces to make it happen, and invited scientists from a wide variety of disciplines to undertake a comprehensive sampling of the area.
My day began before dawn in Québec City. Around 6 a.m., nearly 40 scientists and 40 crew members gathered at the airport for a charter flight to Resolute Bay, a small Inuit community which is the northern gateway to Canada's Arctic Archipelago.
By mid-afternoon, we touched down on the gravel runway at Resolute, where a helicopter was waiting to ferry us, as well as our cargo, out to the Amundsen, which was anchored offshore.
By 10 p.m., and just a few hours after stepping aboard, we were already in our first science meeting in the officers' lounge, mapping out the days ahead.
Every hour counts on a ship like this. Ship time is a limited commodity, and schedules have been carefully, and tightly, made. Being slow or late could mean that our science doesn't get done, or cause someone else to miss their window.
After the briefing, teams immediately began setting up their labs, unloading gear from shipping containers, and scheduling safety orientations with the crew.
From that moment on, the ship is transformed into a 24-hour-a-day research hub. Sampling operations run around the clock, and every group must be ready to spring into action the moment we reach a station.
It is an intense rhythm, but it is also what makes Arctic fieldwork so rewarding: a mix of careful preparation, teamwork, the beauty of the landscape, the excitement of collecting samples that may answer key scientific questions and the thrill of discovery in one of the most remote regions of our planet.
Together with colleagues from the Geological Survey of Canada, my goal on this leg of the expedition is to collect marine sediment cores and surface samples to reconstruct climate-driven environmental changes over millennial timescales. In collaboration with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, I will also deploy sediment traps designed to capture sinking particles throughout an entire annual cycle. These will provide important and scientifically valuable data on the timing and dynamics of phytoplankton production in the Tuvaijuittuq Marine Protected Area.
Curious about what the rest of the expedition will include, and what the science will reveal? Check back in October, when we follow up with Limoges upon her return to a warmer - and firmer - environment!
A few hours after boarding, we already encountered polar bears in the Penny Strait Region.
