Location:Lat:76 41.648 NLong: 170 27.27.949 W
Today, I got dressed up in my flight gear three times in preparation to go out in the helicopter. Twice, I was all dressed up, but then had no where to go - the bears just weren't cooperating. The research team had gone out to look for bears, but all the ice was again too slushy to safely work on. However, they decided to go out in the evening to look for a bear that is part of the USGS study. They simply wanted to visually identify the bear and determine if she still had her cub with her. Since, it was a straightforward mission, they decided to send along the photographers and myself! Yea!!!
I'm ready to take off in my flight gear.
As we took off and I looked back at the Polar Sea, I was reminded by how miniscule she is compare to the power of the ocean around her. While the boat feels large while aboard and is very powerful, watching her fade into the distance as we flew away was humbling.
The view of the Polar Sea from the window of the helicopter
Watching the Polar Sea as we left in the helicopter, it started to sink in how just far in the middle of nowhere we are. We are just a speck in a sea of ice.
I was so excited to finally get to go out in the helicopter and have a chance to see the sea ice and a possibility of seeing a polar bear. We searched the area where her collar gave off the last signal, which was about 7 hours prior. However, the bear was no where to be found. We looked about 10 miles north and south of the location as well.
While aboard the helicopter, I was awed by the beauty of the sea ice and the vistas in every direction. The patterns that were in the sea ice reminded me of the patterns you would see while flying over land in an airplane.
Patterns in the sea ice were beautiful from the helicopter.
The thin layers of ice show all the cracks and overlapping areas and almost look like veins.
While searching for the polar bear, we crossed several sets of polar bear tracks. It was wonderful to see so many tracks and evidence of numerous bears who are able to live on what seems to be such thin ice. We decided to follow one set of the tracks to see if it would lead us to a bear.
Polar bear tracks that we started to follow.
Before you knew it, there he was - a beautiful young bear sitting on the ice edge right outside the window. We dropped down closer to the ground to get a better look. This bear had probably never seen a helicopter before, so he didn't know what to make of us. He stood up on his hind legs to challenge us. It was AMAZING! He was so beautiful and strong looking. We circled around a couple of time to get a closer look. I just stared in awe for the first few moments to let the experience sink in, and then remembered to turn on my camera. Thank goodness there were professional photographers with me in the helicopter or I might have completely forgotten to take pictures as I sat there astonished by his beauty. I frantically started snapping pictures and taking video hoping to get at least one shot of the bear.
This bear had likely never seen a helicopter before because he tried to charge at us and stood up on his hind legs.
This bear had likely never seen a helicopter before because he tried to charge at us and stood up on his hind legs.
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On the way back to the boat we were blessed enough to continue to get beautiful views as the sun began to set and reflect off the water.
As the sun began to set, the reflection off the water and the ice around it became mesmerizing