An update from Himadri, the Indian Base Camp in Ny Alesund
Yes! Finally I am here. Myself along with my other team members left from Oslo at 10:00 am and reached Ny Alesund by evening time, precisely 5:00 pm. The flight from Oslo stopped in Tromso enroute to Longyearbyen. We were greeted with a major snow storm in Tromso and had to wait for a while. From there we flew to Longyearbyen. Throughout the journey the views have been magnificent. No words to describe! As you can see from the picture we were frequented with the snow cap mountains, frozen coastal waters with evidence of phytoplankton bloom at times (yes even in this cold weather the phytos are blooming!) as well as frozen fjords. After reaching Longyearbyen we had to change our flight and took a special aircraft that flies the scientists to Ny Alesund. The temperature yesterday hovered around -25 to -30C. Today it is better. Scientists from 10 countries have their bases including India with the Norwegian base the biggest amongs all. Multidisciplinary research activities ranging from geotectic measurements to marine biology is being conducted here. I will write more on the science component later. The facilities in the Indian base 'Himadri' is at its best. I will update with more photos of Ny Alesund, our base camp and others soon. So keep an eye on the blog!