Date: Mon, 24 Feb 1997 02:19:02 +0000 (GMT)
From: Jason Goodman <sci5@knorr.whoi.edu>
To: seadiary@MIT.EDU
Subject: Ice edge
Message-Id: <Pine.SUN.3.91.970224020225.4588N-100000@mike.knorr.whoi.edu>
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55 28' N, 55 25' W
Temp -7 C, Winds 18 m/s
Seas: moderate

  We spent most of the last day moving southeast along the ice edge off
the Labrador coast, moving toward the head of our next northeastward
station line.  We rarely saw the edge of the pack ice, because our way was
impeded by long ribbons of small icebergs, ranging from trashcan-size to
eighteen-wheeler size.  Most had their tops eroded by the waves, with a
flat base just beneath the surface, and spires and arches emerging from
the base.  They were pale blue-white, though the part below the surface
appeared deep electric blue.  The sculpted shapes above the water tempt
the brain in the same way clouds do: I saw an alligator, a mermaid, and a 
polar bear sculpted in the ice.  The alligator was particularly cool: 
about thirty feet long, riding low in the water with a long slot cut in 
one side, which was dripping with icicle-teeth.
  We're now leaving the ice area in our third transect of the Labrador 
Sea.  We did one cross from southeast to northwest; the chief scientist 
made a cross-sectional view of that data and decided where to place a 
series of perpendicular sections so as to get the best three-d view of 
the ocean interior.

						J