Today, a lot of meetings are taking place – between workgroup leaders, between all members of a workgroup, in the labs and others. Apart from that, we are receiving an important and necessary component of our methane work: 3 large tanks with a total of 1000 litters of liquid nitrogen! Liquid nitrogen has a temperature of -196 degrees Celsius! We will use that for cooling methane traps for methane extraction. For each sample, we need a few litres, but then we also have to consider that a large part of it will just evaporate during the expedition – even the colder Arctic temperatures can’t prevent that. So we bought some extra, and for the worst case we have an electric cooler as a backup (though not as effective).

While we wait for the boat to arrive with our liquid nitrogen, my colleagues Marc and Henry are test-flying our remotely controlled drones that carry small cameras to use during the expedition. The purpose is to capture images of the Oden in the Arctic and the scientists working on it. Another event today is the safety training for those who haven’t done that yet. Departure from Tromsö is scheduled after lunch and then we will be on our way to the Arctic!