Martin Siegert

摘要

Why do you want to drill through 3 kilometres of ice to tap Lake Ellsworth, which has been undisturbed for half a million years? We are trying to test two hypotheses: that life exists in ancient deepwater subglacial lakes, and that sediments on these lake floors contain important climate records, potentially revealing the history of the West Antarctic ice sheet. Why did you have to stop the pioneering hot-water drilling on Christmas Day? Our procedure was to drill down 300 metres with a short hose, and pause it there to create a cavity of water, which would then be pumped to the ice surface and used to supply water to the main hose, 3400 metres in length. Once the cavity was established, the main hose was drilled to 300 metres and should have connected to the cavity. This is necessary as the pump in the short hose could then be used to regulate the pressure in the main borehole - vital prior to lake entry. The problem was that the main hose did not connect to the cavity. Our attempts to do this reduced our fuel supply to the point where we could no longer reach the lake even if we did connect to the cavity.