EAIIST - in the virgin snow...

After a pre-route stage from Dumont D'Urville to Concordia, the team was able to stay 4 days on the Concordia base. This allowed them to embark the Italian colleagues and their scientific equipment, but also to make the last checks of the loads, the equipment and the configuration of the convoy before the big departure.

On December 7, the EAIIST caravan weighed anchor to begin "the heart" of the EAIIST crossing towards the South Pole. It won't go that far, but the road ahead in this unexplored area is still long: 1318 km in 50 days (not counting the pre-route stage). On this road, which is not groomed by the passage of the logistic raid, one encounters more difficulties; after a few kilometres, a tractor gets stuck. The raid experience of the technical team fortunately allows to continue the progress.

The science around the project is done during stops, during the day and in the evening:

- Core drilling
- Surface snow sampling.
- Installation of measuring stations (seismo, GPS, weather, etc.)
- Snow sampling
- Albedo measurement
- Aerosol collection
- Measurement of snow grain size
- ....

but also continuously:

- Continuous radar measurement.
- Video shots for roughness.
- continuous particle concentration measurement.
- Continuous aerosol collection.
- Continuous isotopic measurement of water.

The press release of the EAIIST project (visible on the CNRS press area) reminds us of the interest of these many measures.