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The Planetary Society Weblog

By Emily Lakdawalla

Borup Fiord Pass Field Report: Sulfur everywhere, and a gushing spring

Weblog Archive

I just got off the phone with both Stephen Grasby and Damhnait Gleeson from the Europa analog field site on Ellesmere Island. Modern technology is great -- it wasn't much less clear than a typical cell phone call, yet they are standing at about 80 degrees north as they call. Amazing.

I did my best to scribble notes on what they said:

Stephen Grasby: "We got here yesterday, set up camp, and walked to the glacier. There's sulfur everywhere. There's a free-flowing spring on the front slope -- we haven't measured it yet but it's probably a couple of liters per second, very much stronger discharge than we've ever seen before." He said that this was due to their arriving earlier in the season than previously -- his past trips have all taken place in July. "It's just gushing out."

He said that there is a ton of spring activity, but it's in a different place than it has been in the past. "The sulfur has moved off to the east; there's a whole new system from previous years. There's also a much stronger H₂S smell than before.

"We reconnoitered yesterday; it's raining today, so we spent most of the day in our tents. But we're seeing the clouds lift up off the fiords, up toward the peaks. We should be able to do some sampling tomorrow.

"We also found some filamentous bacteria where the stream is coming out; we'll sample that as well. Hopefully the rain will clear up and we'll be able to get some work done!"

Damhnait Gleeson: She spoke much faster than Steve -- clearly very excited to be there! "There is spectacular scenery here. We came in on a really small plane over the glacier -- the helicopter ride was great, flying up the fiords! The springs are in different places from past years. There's always a risk there's gonna be none; it was great to see all this activity." The sulfur could be spotted all over the ice from the air, she said.

Damhnait went on to say that they've planned their aerial helicopter survey for Monday, which is the same day that they'll be getting multispectral image data from a satellite overflight. "Hopefully it will be a pretty straightforward thing to pick out the sulfur on the satellite imagery. It's really exciting to be here, and we're really looking forward to getting out tomorrow and getting some work done!" Her doctoral dissertation will be, in part, on this work -- I wish her luck, lots of good weather, and easily interpretable data!