The Impending Igloo

Many of you have asked me about the ostensibly silly claims that I was going to "sleep in an igloo" for a night. Granted, I had no experience to tell you that what I was claiming was not, in fact, insane, here is some proof!

An Earthwatch teacher currently on the expedition writes:

"Yes, we survived our night in the igloo. My teammate, Oonah (a college student from Wales) and I stayed toasty warm; but the smallest member of our team, Eunice (a doctor from Australia) was a little cold all night. All in all, it was a successful night. The temperatures outside were in the mid -20Cs with windchill of -35Cs. Of course we did not have to deal with a windchill since we were in the igloo and the great insulating properties of the snow probably kept the temperatures inside around the -10Cs."

See? Internal temp of -10Cs, that's no biggie. I mean, that's what like 14F? A walk in the park!

The -35Cs (-31F) external temp makes those thick globular snow walls pretty impressive eh?

Wonder how to build on for yourself, read more here.

Big Picture

So, Ive taken stock of all of my long underwear, hats, gloves, sweaters, and other warm sounding things. I like to trick myself into thinking that all of that fabric will make me comfortable.

I have fielded many questions about the purpose of the research I will be supporting in Churchill. For those of you looking for some more detail you can visit the recently added Arctic Team Landing Page to read more about the project and the scientists working there. You should also visit if you would like to check out the blogs of the teachers I will be working with.

So this upcoming adventure got me thinking about many of the larger concepts that are easily tossed around in daily conversation. It's simply amazing to think that the fact that the fuels we burn and the commutes we make to work impact ecosystems the world over. While that is inherently a "heady" concept - I will hope to bring some simple real world examples of what "Climate Change means" to each of you through this blog. Please comment on my daily posts with your own questions and insights.

That is in fact, what this adventure is all about. How else can we understand or own home, if we do not understand the global ecosystem it depends on?