Today was the warmest day we’ve had in the past week, with temperatures warming into the upper 30’s during the day, under clear skies and calm winds. There was a bit more haze today however, especially concentrated in the BL when looking towards Provo Canyon.
The morning data check showed no issues, so we decided to take advantage of the nice weather to visit a handful of sites for soil samples. We were able to collect samples at SH, PC, UP, and DCS, although it was quite the challenge at DCS because of the hardness of the frozen soil. We managed to break the weld on half of the handle with the sledge hammer, but the corer is still usable. This does beg the question as to whether or not continuing to collect soil samples in the extremely frozen ground is worth the effort and breaking equipment. Despite this question, we did buy new rags for the soil kit and cleaned/organized both soil tool boxes, which was long overdue.
Liz also spoke to Sebastian today, who informed us that we will not need to remove the thermocouples from the telescoping towers due to the expected weakening of this week’s forecast weather system. Finally, Liz will be picking up John at the train station in Provo tonight and we will begin showing him the ropes tomorrow.