Antarctica Fiber Optics
1
Base camp on the McMurdo Ice Shelf floats on a 200-meter- thick ice shelf, which in turn floats on the ocean which is one kilometer deep at that point. (David Holland)
2
Nine hundred meters of fiber cable are being lowered to the ocean below (center right) through a just-completed borehole. A second borehole is just being started in the white drilling tent (far left). (Victor Zagorodnov)
3
The white tent houses the combination core and melting drill used to penetrate the 200-meter thick ice shelf to gain access to the ocean below. (Scott Tyler)
4
A sample of McMurdo Ice Shelf ice retrieved during the drilling of the access boreholes. (David Holland)