TIGER Questions and Answers
about Antarctic Sightings
Dr. Eric Christian of NASA GSFC was in Antarctica for the launch of the balloon-borne instrument, TIGER. He answered questions about Antarctica and the mission while there and since.
- Do you see the Southern lights?
No. Southern lights are very dim and you can only see them when the sky is dark. It won't get dark here for months.
- Did you see many animals or birds?
I'm very disappointed that I didn't see any live penguins (I did see two dead ones, who had come onto the ice shelf but had starved before they got back to sea). The only animals I did see were skuas and seals (see the wildlife special report).
- Is there any new, enlightening information you have discovered about Antarctica that people would be interested to know?
The most enlightening things I've discovered are that Antarctica is amazingly desolate, no bugs, no plants, even algae is uncommon here, but it is also quite beautiful. Even after three weeks, I look out across the ice shelf, or up at Mt. Erebus, and am awed. (more on wildlife...)
- Were any of the 2001 Leonid meteors bright enough to see where you are?
No, the day was too bright and I don't know anyone down here who saw any Leonids. Plus, closer to the equator would be much better for seeing more and brighter meteors.
- Has there been a new "crop" of Leonid meteorites found down there recently?
Not very likely. Antarctica is a good place to look for meteorites, not because it gets more, but because there are places where glaciers push thousands of years worth of meteorites up against the mountains. And there are so few rocks in the snow, that nearly every rock that you find is a meteorite. For more info, check the Antarctic Search for Meteorites (ANSMET) web site.
- Has wildlife been a problem? Have attacks occurred at any time during the project? What do you have to protect yourself?
Wildlife is rarely a problem down here. The seals, penguins, and skuas (large seagulls with oversized bills) will tend to avoid you rather than attack you. We did have a skua try and walk into our galley (kitchen), but I suspect it was our T-bone steaks he was interested in attacking. We shooed him away without any incident.
- What kinds of plants and animals have you come into contact with?
Plants: algae. Animals: South Polar Skua (a seagull). That's it so far, although I'm hoping for more. In the sea, under the ice, is where most of the life is. The continent is AMAZINGLY desolate. [See Eric's later report on Wildlife.]
- Have you seen any polar bears?
No, polar bears are only found near the North Pole, not the South Pole. But even when I was launching balloons up in northern Canada, I didn't see any polar bears. There have never been polar bears in Antarctica.
- Are the signs of global warming visible to you (or others that have been there before) in Antarctica? If so, what are the signs that you see?
I've never been to Antarctica before, so I have nothing to compare with. But I know that those who study global warming see shrinking of the icecap and glaciers.
- Has global warming had any effect on your experiment or on animals that live there?
Our instrument measures cosmic rays above the atmosphere and is completely unaffected by global warming. I know that several species (Emperor Penguins for example) are now breeding farther south than they were 30 years ago.
- Can you see any stars or planets at all?
The Sun isn't going to set the entire time I'm down here. It's possible that Venus might be visible, but I haven't seen it.
This page was last modified on January 5, 2003
|
|
|
