Amundsen Polynya in Antarctica
Quoting Silke Severmann, “Polynyas are areas of open water surrounded by ice, that open up every summer. We study them because there is very high biological productivity in these ecological hot spots, which means that they provide a lot of food for the fish, penguins and whales, and they also suck up a lot of carbon dioxide from the air.”
I can’t imagine the stink she describes any more than I can imagine such colored water. “Here’s an amazing picture of an insane phytoplankton bloom that we encountered in the polynya. There was, “quite a stink in the water, which was accompanying us for much of the cruise.”
“The sediment I sent you was taken right in front of the Dotson Ice Shelf as it meets the ocean. The sediments are mostly made up of fine clay particles that are falling to the seafloor as they are released from the melting ice. The ship’s position was 74°11.14′ S, 113°15.06’W, about 870m deep.” People there were particpating in the ASPIRE project (Amundsen Sea Polynya International Research Expedition)
I can’t imagine the stink she describes any more than I can imagine such colored water. “Here’s an amazing picture of an insane phytoplankton bloom that we encountered in the polynya. There was, “quite a stink in the water, which was accompanying us for much of the cruise.”
“The sediment I sent you was taken right in front of the Dotson Ice Shelf as it meets the ocean. The sediments are mostly made up of fine clay particles that are falling to the seafloor as they are released from the melting ice. The ship’s position was 74°11.14′ S, 113°15.06’W, about 870m deep.” People there were particpating in the ASPIRE project (Amundsen Sea Polynya International Research Expedition)
Marker buoy for a drifting sediment trap in the central polynya. The organisms causing the green water are called phao-cyctis.