Mission: Jakobshavn-Eqip-Store (priority: baseline)

This is a modified version of the 2011 Jakobshavn-Lake mission, whose main purpose is to extend the ICESat-1 grid begun with Jakobshavn 01 farther upstream. We also densify the ICESat grid over the Eqip Sermia catchment area north of Jakobshavn, and we refly the centerlines of Eqip Sermia, Kangilerngata Sermia, Sermeq Kujalleq and Store Glaciers. Finally we refly the Rink and Kangerdlugssup centerlines.

Weather in the southeast of Greenland remained very poor today, while the far south experienced scattered to broken clouds, some of it quite low.  The west-central (Jakobshavn Basin) area also had some cloud cover, but these clouds were all several thousand feet above the surface, which we knew from this morning's satellite imagery because they were casting long and distinct shadows on the ice sheet surface.  High winds along the west coast north of Ilullisat were a bigger problem, however, since we hoped to operate inside the glacier valleys there, and these valleys could experience moderate turbulence with such winds.  The winds were forecast to diminish considerably during the afternoon, so we re-arranged this mission to work the inland lines first, and the coastal lines in the afternoon.  In the event, we enjoyed a smooth ride on the inland lines, and mild to occasionally moderate turbulence in the coastal glacier valleys.  We successfully obtained data over 100% of the planned lines.

All instruments performed normally today, with the exception of the increased coherent noise for snow radar we noted yesterday.

Data volumes:
Accumulation Radar: 1.4 Tb
ATM: 163 Gb
CAMBOT: 53 Gb
DMS: 111 Gb
FLIR: 17 Gb
KT19: 12 Mb
MCoRDS: 2.0 Tb
Narrow Swath ATM: 31 Gb
Snow Radar: 1.5 Tb

total data collection time: 8.2 hrs