Risky Arctic expedition sets out to tackle twin mysteries: the distant past and the blue future just ahead

On our rapidly warming planet, what effects will a future ice-free Arctic have on global climate and human society? Researchers at the iC3 Polar Research Hub in Norway are hoping to soon be able to look far into the past to predict what the near future may hold.

Next week the research ship RV Kronprins Haakon will set course for the dangerous waters off northeastern Greenland and try to collect samples of water, marine life and sediments.

The scientists waiting for these samples are on tenterhooks because it is unsure whether local sea ice conditions will allow the GoNorth cruise to draw close enough to the coast.

If the ship’s crew manages to overcome Arctic storms and floating ice, the samples collected on the Greenland shelf and in two of Greenland's northernmost fjords will provide unique insights into how ice distribution and ecosystems are evolving as our climate warms, and how they evolved during past greenhouse periods even warmer than today.

“Much about the dynamics of changes in ice sheets and floating sea ice and their feedback with the wider environment and global climate remains unknown,” said Dr Monica Winsborrow, assistant director of iC3, who specialises in investigating the polar climate of the distant past. “Getting a close look at what happened during previous periods when the world was much hotter than today would help us to better understand what the Arctic and the wider world will look like ten or twenty years from now.”

If the ship manages to secure the samples, they will be frozen, shipped ashore and later analysed in laboratories in Tromsø, Bergen, and Bremerhaven by a team of researchers working together to unlock the mysteries of the distant Arctic past under the umbrella of iC3 and the Into the Blue project.

“We already know that the Arctic is increasingly going to turn from icy-white to ocean-blue over the coming years as the global climate continues to heat up, but we are still largely in the dark about what the exact impacts of those changes will be,” said Dr Jochen Knies, a lead investigator on the Into the Blue project who also works at iC3.

“We are keeping our fingers crossed. If the ship gets through, we will be able to better predict what a melting Arctic will mean for the global climate, ocean ecosystems and human societies,” Dr Knies added. “Hopefully, this will allow governments and societies to better prepare for what, sadly, lies not far ahead of us.”

In addition to exploring the past to predict the future, iC3 scientists are also hoping to gain insight into changes that are happening beneath the waves of the Arctic Ocean today. A team of biologists and chemists is waiting for the expedition to bring back water and sediment samples from hard-to-access Greenlandic fjords.

“The ongoing melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet means that a lot of freshwater is pouring into the adjacent fjords,” said Dr Philipp Assmy, an iC3 team member who works for the Norwegian Polar Institute. “If this expedition succeeds, we will better understand how fjord ecosystems in polar regions are responding to these rapid changes in their environments.”

Media alert: Daniel Albert from SINTEF will be on board and can provide media outlets with daily updates on the ship’s progress, photos and video. Please contact him at daniel.albert@sintef.no. For expert interviews, please contact iC3 researchers directly.

The GoNorth cruise sets out on 29 August from Longyearbyen, for a three-week voyage. GoNorth’s wide-ranging, multidisciplinary research programme aims to acquire new and essential knowledge about the Arctic Ocean, from the sea floor and subsea geology to the sea ice, via the water column. The iC3 Polar Research Hub in Tromsø is a partnership between UiT The Arctic University of Norway, the Norwegian Polar Institute and NORCE that brings together over 50 scientists to investigate how the links between ice sheets, carbon cycles and ocean ecosystems are impacting life on earth. iC3 is funded by the Research Council of Norway. The partners in i2B - Into the Blue are from Norway (UiT/NORCE) and Germany (Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research). The i2B - Into the Blue project is funded by an European Research Commission (ERC) Synergy Grant. Image credit: Daniel Albert (SINTEF / GoNorth).