CBC - Canadian Govt. To Abandon On-Ice Arctic Science Team Plans - Floes Too Thin, Mission Too Risky

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The Canadian government is abandoning plans to set up a remote scientific camp on the Arctic Ocean ice this year, citing dangerously thin ice conditions. Over the past five years, scientists have set up ice camps in remote areas of the Arctic Ocean as they gather extensive mapping data that could help Canada claim a greater area of the seabed under the Law of the Sea convention.

Canada and other Arctic countries are vying to claim more of the Arctic seabed, which is potentially rich in oil and gas resources. Canada has until 2013 to submit its claim. This year, 25 Canadian scientists were to conduct their mapping work from an ice camp about 400 kilometres offshore. Last year, a similar camp housed 12 researchers on an ice floe on the Arctic Ocean, about 250 kilometres offshore from Borden Island in the High Arctic.

But that ice floe started breaking up, said Jacob Verhoef, director of Canada's mapping program with the Natural Resources Department.

"That floe actually broke up, and so we had a new crack forming about a kilometre away from the camp," Verhoef told CBC News on Monday, adding that the camp was luckily not affected.

EDIT

http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2011/01/31/cda-arctic-ice-camp-dangerous.html?ref=rss