Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 10/29/2009 - 10:14
Forums
Antarctic Undersea ROV 09

First of all, thanks for cool videos that we've seen with the help of Henry. Our class loves them!

Our first grade class would like to know:

  1. How cold is the water?
  2. Have you seen any icebergs break off?
  3. How long of a video can SCINI take? How many pictures can it take?

Mrs. Hall's Class

Thu, 10/29/2009 - 18:39

Michele Cross

Hey guys!I can answer the water temp question but will save the rest for Dr. Kim as she is already there and working. The water temp. is just above 28.5 degrees F....BRRRRR, huh???
The next time you hear from me I'll be in NZ and then on to the Ice!!!
Take care!!
Mrs. Cross 

Thu, 11/05/2009 - 13:30

Stacy Kim

Hi Mrs. Hall's Class,You have great questions!
1. The water temperature is minus 1.9 degrees C. It can be that cold
because it is salty seawater, and the salt keeps it from freezing at
zero degrees like fresh water would do.
2. We have not been lucky enough (or unlucky, depending on your point
of view) to see any icebergs break off. It is a catastrophic event
that creates a huge wave of water and it would be a little dangerous
to be in the nearby area. The icebergs we have seen have all been
trapped in a frozen ocean.
3. SCINI can keep taking video as long as her computers on the
surface have hard drive space to store the images. And if we fill one
up, we can switch to another hard drive to keep recording. That is
one of the advantages of ROVs, they can keep working forever, and you
just switch pilots on the surface as people get tired. Our video is
actually a series of individual images taken 20 times per second, with
that update rate it is as continuous a view as video, but we can still
look at individual images in as great detail as pictures.
Looking forward to your next questions!
Best, Stacy
On Oct 30, 2009, at 7:14 AM, webmaster@polartrec.com wrote: