We flew to From Halifax to Goose Bay on a Dash8. From Goose Bay to Nain some of the crew flew on a twin otter, while the remaining six of us got to fly on a little 7 seat Navaho. Since we did not have a co-pilot and being the only girl around, I got to sit in the co-pilot's seat for the flight! This was the highlight of the trip for me. It was a beautiful day and I had the best seat in the house. (The flight home was a different story; not such a nice day)
This is somewhere around Voisey's Bay, which is home to the largest nickel mine in Canada.
Nain is the northernmost community in Labrador and it is only about half way up the coast. I'm not sure what the population is, but you can walk from one end to the other in about 15 minutes. There is one store and one taxi in town and the airport is a small gravel strip.
After arriving in Nain, we got situated in our new homes and prepared to sail out of the harbour.
A few days into the trip we were at a nice fishing spot on a calm day, so the Chief Scientist was nice enough to give us all the day off to go fishing or just to go ashore and check things out. I didn't fish, but I went ashore to explore and take my turn at polar bear watch (ie. carry the rifle) While posing for this picture, the bugs were so thick that I could barely stand still. In the background the Matthew can be seen.
The thing that kept me busy on this trip were the hydrographic launches. They are small boats that are carried on the ship and launched over the side to survey in shallow waters. They often came back with problems and I would then have to board the launch and get them fixed up. Here I am making sure the multibeam system is happy.
We continued all the way up to the northern tip of labrador to continue our work. Once we started to head back down the weather started to change. On Sept.7 we had a huge blizzard. This is the view I woke up to the following day.
And here I am learning how to stear the ship!
3 comments:
awesome photos, Julie. You have the coolest job ever!
Very cool, supergirl. (yay for science-geeks!)
Mr Moe almost did a postdoc on arctic hydrology/biogeochem, and would have had to do the rifle/vehicle training etc. But he got a job before that could happen. Oh well.
That's the best job ever!
Did you see a polar bear?
Catherine
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