The duo kite-skiing 4000 kilometres across Antarctica for science

In the endless white space, a small hill crossed the horizon. As a researcher Mathieu Torder and glaciologist Heidi Sevestre Approaching him, they saw a golden head appearing from the snow. It was a bust of Vladimir Lenin, left by a Soviet expedition at the southern pole of inaccessibility, the farthest point from any coast in Antarctica.

This surreal experience was the first milestone in expedition 4000 kilometers long across the continent to collect data that could shed light on its future in a warming world.

“I almost had tears in my eyes,” says Sevester in a conversation with New scientist by satellite phone from Antarctica. “We felt very humble, very, very small, and it was just nice to see Lenin alone here, in the middle of nowhere.”

Since November 3, the couple has been skiing with kites that can pull them at speeds of 35 kilometers per hour or more. This is the first kite ski expedition to collect data for polar science. The pair are carrying a sled equipped with ground penetrating radar that can scan snow and ice at a depth of 40 meters.

Scientists were trying to find out whether increased snowfall in the interior of East Antarctica would offset greater snowmelt along the coast. Satellite measurements can provide some information, but Sevestre and Torder's data could help provide more accurate estimates, he says. Martin Siegert at the University of Exeter in the UK.

“There will be no one for a thousand kilometers in all directions,” he says. “So it's rare to get that kind of information, but since we're interpreting satellite data [to work out whether] The ice cover is growing, we really need it.”

The pair have three months to travel from Novo Air Base in East Antarctica to Hercules Bay in West Antarctica before the Antarctic summer ends and there are no flights from there.

In 2019, at the age of 27, Torder became the youngest person to ski to the South Pole alone and without assistance. He decided that if he returned, he would try to combine adventure with science.

“It was much better to use kites because we could travel much further and do science much further inland where scientists don’t often go,” he says.

While most subsurface mapping is done using airplanes, researchers also tow ground penetrating radar behind tractors to get more detailed data. But this kite ski expedition will be one of the longest ground penetrating radar surveys ever.

From the South Pole, Torder and Sevestre will tow a more powerful radar capable of penetrating to a depth of 2 kilometers. British Antarctic Survey researchers want to see if they can trace ancient layers of ice from East Antarctica to West Antarctica. If so, it suggests that West Antarctica, which contains enough ice to raise sea levels by 5 meters, did not completely melt during the last interglacial. a very debated issue.

“This is important because it will show whether the ice sheet is resilient to the climate impacts it currently faces,” says Hamish Pritchard at the British Antarctic Survey.

Torder and Sevester had to ski nearly 1,000 kilometers of sastrugi—ripples of hard snow created by the wind that shake and break equipment in the sleds.

Sevester maintains a sense of perspective by listening to audiobooks, including Worst trip in the world Apsley Cherry-Garrard's account of the harrowing winter crossing of the Ross Ice Shelf in 1910–1913 and his failed attempt to rendezvous with Robert Falcon Scott's party, who froze to death a few kilometers away.

“They talk about -65°C in their tents,” she says. “I thought, OK, I’m not going to complain about -28C in our tent.”

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