MOAT Heads South: Fieldwork on the Roi Baudouin Ice Shelf

After months of preparation, the MOAT field campaign is about to begin. The instruments described in our previous update, including the WISe snow moisture probe and the temporary automatic weather station, are ready to be deployed on the Roi Baudouin Ice Shelf.

The plan

• 19 November 2026: departure from Belgium to Cape Town.
• 23 November: flight to the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica station.
• First week at the station: testing all instruments, first measurements, and field training before heading out.
• About one month on the coast: fieldwork on the Roi Baudouin Ice Shelf, where the surface melt instrumentation will be installed, together with ApRES radars to monitor basal melt and the orientation of the ice crystals.
• Back at the station: additional measurements around the station.
• 14 January 2027: return to Cape Town.
• 19 January 2027: back in Belgium.

Why it matters

These measurements will give us direct observations of snow moisture and of the surface conditions during melt events, complemented by ApRES (phase-sensitive radar) measurements of basal melt and ice crystal orientation, at a site with nearly two decades of existing data. The surface observations will then be used to evaluate and improve how the MAR regional climate model represents surface melt over Antarctic ice shelves.

Stay tuned for updates from the field.