Add to collection
  • + Create new collection
    • Rights: The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato
    Published 22 June 2014 Referencing Hub media
    Download

    NIWA scientist Dr Katja Riedel travels to Antarctica to collect 300-year-old ice samples. She studies the ice to learn how our atmosphere1 has changed over the centuries.

    Transcript

    Dr Katja Riedel

    We collect ice cores2 by drilling for the ice. So the first thing is we travel to Antarctica and then we build up a big drilling rig. And there are two ways of drilling. One is you either use heat3, and that is melting – you simply melt the ice – or the other way is you just drill like your dentist will drill into your teeth with a little diamond drill. But our little diamond drill would have 20 centimetres in diameter and would weigh several tonnes.

    We want an ice core4 as long as possible. And one thing here is that the ice is a kind of liquid and very slowly it flows. And at some stage, all the ice pressure5 around your drill hole will actually close your drill hole. So you bring down your drill, drill 1 or 2 metres6, bring the whole drill up, take out the ice core, and then feed the drill back down again. So you do it piece by piece.

    Acknowledgement
    Dr Katja Riedel, NIWA
    Cath Samson

    1. atmosphere: 1. The layer of gas around the Earth. 2. (atm) A non-SI unit of pressure equivalent to 101.325 kPa.
    2. ice core: A core sample, typically removed from an ice sheet. Ice cores are long cylinders of ice recovered by drilling with a hollow bit. Ice cores contain information about past climates.
    3. heat energy (heat): Heat energy: the transfer of energy in materials from the random movement of the particles in that material. The greater the random movement of particles the more heat energy the material has. Temperature is a measure of the heat energy of a material.
      Heat: the flow of energy from a warm object to a cooler object.
    4. ice core: A core sample, typically removed from an ice sheet. Ice cores are long cylinders of ice recovered by drilling with a hollow bit. Ice cores contain information about past climates.
    5. pressure: The force per unit area that acts on the surface of an object.
    6. metre: The base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI).

    Appears in

    ARTICLE

    Working with water and ice

    Observing and asking questions are essential parts of what a scientist does. Through their observations, scientists try to build more accurate explanations of how the world works. The scientists ...

    READ MORE
    MORE
    Add to favourites
    Add to collection
  • + Create new collection
      • Go to full glossary
      Download all

      atmosphere

    1. + Create new collection

      2. 1. The layer of gas around the Earth.

      2. (atm) A non-SI unit of pressure equivalent to 101.325 kPa.

      pressure

    2. + Create new collection

      3. The force per unit area that acts on the surface of an object.

      ice core

    3. + Create new collection

      4. A core sample, typically removed from an ice sheet. Ice cores are long cylinders of ice recovered by drilling with a hollow bit. Ice cores contain information about past climates.

      metre

    4. + Create new collection

      5. The base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI).

      heat energy (heat)

    5. + Create new collection

      6. Heat energy: the transfer of energy in materials from the random movement of the particles in that material. The greater the random movement of particles the more heat energy the material has. Temperature is a measure of the heat energy of a material.
      Heat: the flow of energy from a warm object to a cooler object.

      Email Us

      See our newsletters here.