9 March 2011
A good day for everyone!
Today was quite a successful day. With clear skies and working instruments,
the team obtained a full day of measurements. These measurements will have
sampled the vortex, which is currently centered over the pole in a circular
formation. Also, we should expect to see lower values of ozone from today's
measurements since Environment Canada the region of the lowest total column
concentration of ozone over the pole includes Ellesmere Island.
The FTSs were in full swing by 9 am today and measured until it was time to
head down to the weather station for dinner (around 4:30 pm). PARIS-IR
obtained 52 MIR solar measurements today while operating under batch mode
(automatic measurements). The Bruker 125HR measured in the MIR and NIR
regions today, obtaining 60 MIR and 25 NIR solar measurements today.
Today, the UT-GBS continued to operate in ozone/NO2 mode. The PEARL-GBS
tracker was calibrated and the 2011 measurement schemes were programmed into
the software. It is now taking direct-sun, zenith-sky, and MAX-DOAS BrO
measurements. Just in time!
It was a very quiet-waiting-testing day for the SPS and the Brewers. The
last software changes had to survive more than a day to be declared good.
And they did! The SPS laptop has not been touched for 2 days now and
everything is working. **knock on wood** One of the Brewers, #021, has been
a guinea pig for some software testing for the last few days and it too is
happy. Tomorrow Volodya will likely be afraid to touch anything to avoid
ruining the harmony in the UV-VIS lab on the last day!
Since the team has worked pretty hard on the second-to-last day, making sure
all the instruments are working for the extended phase of the campaign, they
took a bit of time for fun this evening. After dinner, taking advantage of
the -43C temperatures at the weather station, threw boiling water up in the
air and watched it sublimate! Afterwards, most of the team gathered to
watch a movie after dinner and enjoyed another good pick by Paul.
Felicia