On board the voyage to Antarctica to learn why a massive glacier is melting

Geoff Bennett:

Scientists are worried about what's happening with the melting of the Antarctic's ice sheets and what it could mean for sea level rise and coastlines in many countries.

There's a two-month-long journey under way right now to conduct new research that will better explain what's happening and the role of climate change. But it's a journey that provides no guarantees that researchers will even be able to get the data they want.

Our science correspondent, Miles O'Brien, is on that ride and filed this report for our series Tipping Point.

Miles O'Brien:

So close and yet so far. After years of meticulous planning and three long weeks at sea, a Korean icebreaker carrying two helicopters and a team of world-class scientists has made it as far as we had dared to hope. On January 8, we moored in the shadow of the most consequential glacier on the planet, Thwaites in West Antarctica.

But the anchor leg, an 18-mile hop by helicopter onto the ice, has so far been an air bridge too far. Weather briefings in the wheelhouse of the Araon have offered little reason for optimism.

Dominic O'Rourke is the chief pilot.

Dominic O'Rourke, Helisupport International:

Hopefully, we can fly, scout the camp maybe tomorrow evening.

Miles O'Brien:

The helicopters have flown about as much as the penguins. And the marquee event of this expedition hangs by a thread. The ambitious goal? Establish a camp on the glacier to drill a small hole at the place where ice, land and the sea meet some 3,000 feet below, the so-called grounding line.

The instruments researchers hope to drop into the seawater would yield unprecedented data to help explain why no glacier is melting faster anywhere on Earth.

David Holland, New York University:

That ice is beginning to fall apart in certain places.

Miles O'Brien:

Abort the ship, mathematician and climate scientist David Holland of New York University.

Why all the effort for this one?

David Holland:

This is a special one that over the decades we have discovered is the most crucial to the future of sea level on planet Earth.

Miles O'Brien:

Full stop?

David Holland:

Full stop.

Miles O'Brien:

Thwaites has a floor-to-sized footprint and is on average more than half-a-mile thick. It contains enough water to lift sea levels the world over by 2.5 feet. And satellite images show it is melting at an astonishing rate, upwards of 300 feet a year in places, far faster than most Antarctic ice, where losses are typically measured in inches.

David Holland:

Undeniably, it's melting. Then the question is, why?

Miles O'Brien:

Researchers believe climate change has altered wind patterns around Antarctica, weakening easterly winds and allowing cold meltwater from glaciers to flow more freely out to sea. That in turn opens a pathway for deeper, warmer ocean currents to reach Thwaites' grounding line, where they erode the glacier from below.

David Holland:

This is the place where warm water is on your doorstep.

Miles O'Brien:

And the glacier appears to be acting as a keystone, buttressing two other large ice shelves.

David Holland:

These ice shelves and associated ice could go too, so now you're up to 10 feet globally, which is an enormous volume.

Miles O'Brien:

In 2015, the National Academies made predicting ice loss here the top Antarctic priority for the National Science Foundation. But the Trump administration cut the NSF budget by about 55 percent, the Antarctic program by roughly 70 percent.

The NSF can no longer afford to operate a research icebreaker and isn't funding any of the science on this expedition. South Korea, meanwhile, is steaming full speed ahead in the opposite direction, doubling down on polar science. It is building a next-generation research icebreaker nearly twice the size.

And its polar work is funded through 2031.

Won Sang Lee, Principal Research Scientist, Korea Polar Research Institute:

We are really grateful for having those kind of money for continuing our work, better understanding of global sea level wise.

Miles O'Brien:

Principal research scientist Won Sang Lee is with the Korea Polar Research Institute, KOPRI.

Help me understand why Korea has made polar research a priority.

Won Sang Lee:

My country is the kind of peninsula, so facing everywhere the ocean. So it's really vulnerable to kind of millimeter-wise kind of sea level change.

Miles O'Brien:

Our two-month voyage south began two days after Christmas. This is getaway day to Antarctica. We embarked from Lyttelton, New Zealand, southeast across the Southern Ocean for 3,200 miles to Thwaites.

By New Year's Eve, we saw our first iceberg.

Pretty darned amazing. All right, we must be going in the right direction.

On January 5, we reached sea ice.

It's thin and we're going through it like a knife through butter, but there's a lot of thicker ice ahead.

That was an understatement as I learned the next day. The Araon on was deep in a struggle to make headway.

The sea ice has gotten very thick and the ice breakers have been having a really hard time getting through it.

But our skipper is brave and sure. After two sleepless days navigating a winding route through the ice, Captain Gwang-heon Kim got us through. And on January 8, I woke up to this astonishing sight.

I can't even believe what I'm looking at. It's just beautiful. That's the face of the Thwaites Glacier.

On the journey south, science teams spent nearly every waking hour testing gear and refining plans. They aim to sample the waters around Thwaites, bore the sea ice and fly deep-penetrating radar over the glacier. Most of the gear belongs to the British Antarctic Survey, which pioneered hot water drilling into glaciers.

Keith Makinson, British Antarctic Survey:

So we're talking about 20, 25 tons of equipment and fuel and people as well.

Miles O'Brien:

Keith Makinson is an oceanographer and drilling engineer. He will help lead the effort to establish a hot water drilling camp, as they did on the Dotson Ice Shelf in 2022.

Keith Makinson:

It's really very simple. I mean, ultimately, we're creating hot water. We use a long hose. We lower it into the snow and we make a hole. The complication comes is that we're in a freezing environment. Nature's fighting back all the time.

Miles O'Brien:

No truer words have been spoken on this journey, as the helicopter pilots have been reminded. Flying over the sea ice and crevasses is not a problem.

But so having these little reference points on the surface obviously make the difference.

Dominic O'Rourke:

Yes, a massive, massive difference, yes, exactly.

Miles O'Brien:

But when we look toward the featureless place on the ice where they want to establish the drill camp, low clouds erase the horizon, creating whiteout conditions.

Dominic O'Rourke:

If we go charging off in there, you're just in the white. You don't actually know which way is up anymore.

Miles O'Brien:

O'Rourke and the team kept pressing. A brief break in the clouds let him drop a three-person safety crew onto the ice to check for hazardous hidden crevasses. They used a remote control vehicle to tow a ground-penetrating radar to see beneath the surface.

Mission accomplished, but the weather quickly went, well, south.

Dominic O'Rourke:

It looks very poor, very, very white.

Miles O'Brien:

As nervous plans formed for an unexpected overnight stay on Thwaites, O'Rourke spotted a sliver of blue, slipped in, and landed safely.

(Cheering)

Miles O'Brien:

The team returned to the ship to a hero's welcome.

As we waited for a break in the weather, the ship cruised near neighboring Pine Island Glacier, and the scientists did as much work as this harsh remote place would allow. Finally, after 10 long days of gray, the clouds dissolved and the sun broke through.

The hot water drill team wasted no time implementing an improvised plan to fit the narrow window on the ice. Their final possible workday is February 7.

Peter Davis, British Antarctic Survey:

Let's go check out the drilling kit.

Miles O'Brien:

Physical oceanographer Peter Davis is one of the team leaders.

By my count, 20 days...

Peter Davis:

Yes.

Miles O'Brien:

... between now and when -- the last possible workday on Thwaites.

Peter Davis:

Yes.

Miles O'Brien:

Is that enough time?

Peter Davis:

Fingers crossed, it should be.

Dominic O'Rourke:

I could maybe try and come with the sling load.

Miles O'Brien:

To reduce the number of helicopter flights carrying people and supplies to the camp, the team will leave behind some spare parts and some creature comforts.

Peter Davis:

If all goes well, if the weather is good, that's good and we can continue to work. That should be sufficient time.

Miles O'Brien:

So, no margin?

Peter Davis:

No margin anymore, yes.

Miles O'Brien:

Yes.

Peter Davis:

We have used that margin.

Miles O'Brien:

It's a last-ditch bid for data that has eluded scientists for years. Everything has to go right in a place where almost nothing ever does.

Geoff Bennett:

And Miles joins us now from Antarctica.

So, Miles, what's the latest on the effort to set up camp there?

Miles O'Brien:

Things are moving pretty smoothly here, Geoff. By my count, they're about halfway through all these sling loads, those nets filled with equipment, that they are flying 18 miles into the glacier to the sweet spot where this camp will be built for the hot water drill. They need to do about 40 of them to get all the equipment on the ice where it needs to be, so about halfway through.

I think, by tomorrow, they might have the job done and they can get busy with that drilling effort.

Geoff Bennett:

And we saw that weather conditions can make things pretty dangerous. How is the weather holding up?

Miles O'Brien:

Well, right now, it's 29 degrees, about a 10-mile-an-hour wind, and I got my sunglasses on because the sun is out. And, interestingly, it is still a little bit gray. There's kind of a little bit of ground cloud in the area where they're landing.

But as they add pieces to the camp, it gives the pilots more things to fixate on as a point of reference. So the bigger the camp, the easier it is for them to land in what would otherwise be marginal conditions. So I think they're kind of over the hump on this one.

Geoff Bennett:

And what can you tell us, Miles, about the other science projects being conducted on the ship there?

Miles O'Brien:

Well, there's several teams on here that have projects associated with understanding sea ice, understanding other aspects of the oceanographic condition in and around Thwaites.

There's a team that is going to find a ground-penetrating radar over the glacier to really try to characterize what is beneath not just the ice, but the terrain below. They're all kind of cooling their heels, waiting for this event to get under way so they can get some time on the helicopter.

So everybody here is taking sort of a team spirit approach to it, and everybody comes in with low expectations because of the environment they're in. But they're sort of champing at the bit to do their science, frankly.

Geoff Bennett:

Are you going to get to go to the camp?

Miles O'Brien:

You bet, Geoff. If I have to commandeer one of those helicopters myself, I'm going to that camp.

No, they have told us that, as soon as things settle down and the science gets a few helicopter rides, we will get an opportunity to go out there and really see what it's all about. And we will report back for sure on that.

Geoff Bennett:

Miles O'Brien with the exceptional assignment tonight, reporting from Antarctica.

Miles, it's great to see you.

Miles O'Brien:

Good to see you, Geoff.