Ice and the Sky Page #4

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...offering hundreds of

thousands of years...

...of climate history

to decipher.

The annual snowfall was light,

barely 10cm a year.

Thus the ice at Dome C...

...is a thick book of

many pages...

...written on fine paper.

Perfect for taking a journey

back in time.

We would attempt deep drilling

the following year.

On 15 January 1974, we closed

up the camp, raring to go.

At 7pm the temperature

was a mere minus 30C...

...as the C-130 smoothly flew

in to repatriate us.

We opted to leave all our equipment

on site for our planned drilling.

Once the boosters had been set up,

we'd be off.

My future plans were taking shape.

Luckily no one was hurt.

Back to camp to call for help.

Hours of waiting ensued.

A second C-130 came,

we boarded it.

The last two planes

in the Antarctic...

...came to fetch us.

One remained in the air

as cover.

I was convinced the Americans

would walk away...

...likewise the mission's

financial and scientific partners.

The accident deeply affected me.

I was afraid...

...and the weight of responsibility

became a heavy burden.

Supposing people had died?

Should we continue, given the cost

and risks involved in drilling?

Yet preliminary results

were extremely promising.

Which only depressed me more.

The reaction of my friends at the

National Science Foundation...

...in Washington astonished me.

Two aircraft out of commission

was collateral damage...

...and no reason to quit.

They regarded our drilling

as a worthwhile venture.

A series of missions ensued to

recover the two stranded C-130s...

...and we returned to Dome C

in December 1977...

...three years after

our first attempt.

For me,

a great deal was at stake.

Ten years' preparation had gone

into the three-month assignment.

We hoped to reach ice

from the last Ice Age...

...20,000 years ago.

I felt a strange mixture

of dread and excitement.

All my future research depended

on the successful operation...

...of this technological miracle:

the ice corer.

Drilling at one meter an hour,

we returned to the dawn of time.

Gathering fragments of time,

meter by meter.

The exhausting routine

went on for two months...

24 hours a day.

Preventing the corers from

becoming trapped in the ice...

...called for an amazing touch,

reacting to the

slightest anomaly...

...by reversing the

drill before the...

...tube became permanently trapped.

I tried as best I could...

...to hide my nervousness

from my companions.

We were exhausted by the cold

weather and incessant work.

The temperature in the lab

was minus 53C.

By the evening of January 1st,

we had reached 655 meters.

Our analysis showed

that we had...

...penetrated the ice of

the first Ice Age.

Two weeks later

we reached a depth of 900 meters.

We had to stop.

Our corer was unsuited

to such depths...

...and we were putting it

at risk.

We needed to design another...

...better adapted to working

in extremely deep ice.

Years of work were needed...

...before returning here.

A depth of 892 meters was

beyond our wildest dreams.

We were heading home...

...with 40,000 years

of climate history!

Before leaving...

...we played the world's most

southern football match ever.

The laboratory work

had barely begun.

For the first time we were able

to examine the composition...

...of the bubbles of air

trapped in the ice.

The CO2 was producing

a strange effect...

...when we reached the Ice Age.

We needed to go further.

And I knew where to go.

A whirlwind journey

to Vostok in 1974...

...had given me the germ of an idea

I had long secretly harbored.

Vostok.

Legend of the Antarctic!

The Earth's coldest,

most remote outpost.

A Russian base set up...

...in a Dantesque expedition during

International Geophysical Year.

Beyond the back of beyond.

During the crossing, the Russians

ventured 1,500 kilometers...

...into the continent...

...to reach the site

of the geomagnetic pole.

It was so cold, they had to

set fire to oil barrels...

...before it would turn liquid

enough to allow tanks to be filled.

One day in Vostok

the thermometer touched minus 90C.

Vostok was built on a huge dome,

one of the deepest.

Ice has been drilled

here ever since.

Yet another Cold War

trial of strength...

...being played out elsewhere

in the Antarctic.

I was 52.

Working on the Vostok corer

saved me five years...

...enough time to develop

our new ice corer.

While travelling

I made some very dear friends...

...both on the Soviet

and American sides.

I wasn't disoriented at Vostok.

It was like a pleasant return

to the Charcot of my youth.

No water,

a sauna every two weeks...

...bulletproof friendships...

We were all passionate

about our work.

The accumulation of ice here

is extraordinary.

But its thickness is but a barrier

between the greed of men...

...and the resources

buried deep below.

Fortunately men of science...

...had preserved the ice

almost as an act of conscience.

Despite the hateful Cold War

political climate...

...in 1984 we set up

an extraordinary mission.

I shall never forget it.

American logistics

for French researchers...

...in a Soviet base

in the middle of the Cold War.

In the world's

most remote region...

...we showed the contempt of

science for political divisions.

I had seen this ice stored

underground at minus 57C.

An ice corer pushed on to

a depth of over 2,000 meters.

The holy grail of glaciologists.

I hadn't forgotten.

The Russian drillers were amazing.

Deftly handling file or winch,

they were past masters...

...at extricating jammed corers.

It saved them from the need

to sink another hole...

...losing precious years

of drilling...

...should a tube become trapped

in the ice.

Two things I shall never forget

about the well room...

...the kerosene and the vodka.

The smell of kerosene

impregnated bedrooms, kitchen...

...clothes.

But it was indispensable

in making drill-holes fluid.

And vodka was the only cure

the Russians had found...

...for the altitude sickness

that overcame newcomers.

We work closely together.

The Russians have managed...

...a feat of engineering,

sinking a corer...

...to a depth of

over 2,000 meters.

This often calls for

an intense physical effort.

With my three colleagues,

Volodya, Michel and Jean-Robert...

...our routine was relentless.

We had twenty tonnes of ice

to take back to France.

Samples had to be sorted,

selected and packed.

Ten hours of work a day

at minus 57C.

Our first mission yielded

150,000-year-old ice.

Subsequent missions...

...produced ice samples

from 400,000 years ago.

The ice then undertook

an epic journey...

...a cold chain 15,000km long

on American plane...

...then Russian ship...

...then refrigerated French

truck to our lab in Grenoble.

At this point I must digress...

...to mention the Earth's

eternal course around the Sun.

Astronomers have showed us that

variations in this course...

...produce a 100,000-year cycle

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