From the ice: An Update from Robyn, Feb 4th.

No launches again today due to high surface winds. Payload 2A was terminated at 1730 UT.  For those of you who haven't seen it, here's a link to an article about BARREL on the NASA website. There is also a video that Alexa put together. I can't view it myself but have heard it's great!

http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/nasa-funded-science-balloons-launch-in-antarctica/

Also, some of you have been asking about our travel plans. Our SANAE team leaves around February 9th. They'll fly to Novo and then on to Cape Town from there. The Halley team will board the ship somewhere between February 17 - 20 and will sail to the Falkland Islands. We expect to depart from the Falklands on March 1st to return via South America. As such, the last possible launch date for the SANAE team is February 9th and the Halley team a few days later (we have to have our cargo on the line by February 15th at the latest). Although we've now launched 20 balloons, we'd very much like to replace the two that came down shortly after launch. So, each team hopes to be able to launch one more before departing. So far, surface conditions do not look great for the next few days. We have a possible launch opportunity from both stations tomorrow.


Robyn