Arrival in Barrow!

Nearly 24 hours and three flights later, we finally arrived in Barrow, Alaska on Monday! The long journey included a nearly five hour flight from Detroit to Seattle, a three hour flight from Seattle to Anchorage, an eight hour layover in Anchorage, and a three hour flight from Anchorage to Barrow with a quick stop in Prudhoe Bay.  In the upcoming week, Nate, Alicia, and I (Claire) will be snow-machining across the tundra and sea ice to collect snow samples for the Fall 2016 offering of CHEM 125/126- Snow (General Chemistry Laboratory- Authentic Research Experience in Snow Chemistry).  Last fall, Alicia and I were students in this class, and now we have the amazing opportunity to see where the snow samples we analyzed just a few months prior came from and how they were taken.  In the upcoming week, Alicia and I will post updates about our adventures on the ice, but in the meantime, here are some photos I took along our journey to reach the northernmost point in the U.S.

We had to get up at 5:30 a.m. for our final flight, but it was worth it to see this sunrise.

 Image of the mountain range just outside of Anchorage.

Our plane began its descent into Barrow right over this open water which quickly turned into sea ice just a few seconds later. The sea ice lead is really, really close to shore!

Image of NARL (the old Naval Arctic Research Laboratory) at sunrise.

Here are some of the huts at NARL, one of which we will be staying in for the next week.