An underwater robot owned by the University of Gothenburg
has mysteriously disappeared under the immense Thwaites Glacier
in Antarctica during a scientific expedition.
Called Ran,
it is one of three similar ones around the world
used for research and has contributed to important knowledge about Thwaites, also called Doomsday Glacier.
The project is led by Professor Anna Wahlin (Anna Wåhlin).
The seven-meter-long
Ran
was lost last weekend during an expedition with the South Korean icebreaker RV/IB Araon.
The project is led by Professor Anna Wahlin, one of six participants on board from the University of Gothenburg.
Ran is an unmanned underwater vehicle (AUV)
packed with modern technology and sensors
that can measure and document the environment in the water.
It has the capacity to carry out long missions under the ice and has been used successfully in Antarctica, among other places.
A monstrous glacier
"This was the second time we took Ran to Thwaites Glacier to document the area under the ice. Thanks to Ran, we became the
first researchers in the world to enter Thwaites
in 2019, and during the current expedition we have visited the same again Even if we see the melting and movements of the ice from satellite data, with Ran we get close-ups of the underside of the ice and information about exactly what mechanisms are behind the melting," Anna Wahlin says in a statement.
The Thwaites Glacier in Antarctica is gigantic and is sometimes called
the Doomsday Glacier
because it has the potential to raise global sea levels
by several meters if it were to melt completely
.
Ran's measurements received a lot of attention, not only among polar scientists.
The seven-meter-long Ran was lost during an expedition with the South Korean icebreaker RV/IB Araon (Anna Wåhlin).
During his dives under ice 200 to 500 meters deep, Ran has no continuous contact with the research vessel.
The route is programmed in advance and thanks to his advanced navigation system,
Ran can find his way back to open water.
What it looks like under a glacier is often completely unknown.
Therefore, a mission under a glacier is built in several stages, starting near the bottom and outside the ice to gradually increasing difficulty and finally getting very close to the ice and making measurements at the interface layer between the ice and water. .
During January of this year, Ran completed several successful dives under Thwaites, but
during the last
planned dive of the expedition, something went wrong.
Thanks to his advanced navigation system, Ran can find his way back to open water.
this time it didn't happen (Anna Wåhlin).
After a long trip under the ice, the AUV did not appear at the scheduled meeting point.
The RV/IB Araon ship aborted the return trip home and searches were carried out with acoustic search equipment, helicopters and drones, without success.
In the end it was just a matter of realizing that Ran had been mysteriously lost.
Ran was built in 2015 with a budget of almost
$4 million.
Europe Press.
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