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38 SAMC
o
T • Annual report 2012
2012, is only 1/7th of the rate measured in 2011. These
changes in erosion rates are interesting in relation to
the average summer temperature of Spitsbergen. In the
summer of 2012, the air temperature was lower than
the average summer temperature in 2011. Observations
related to the presence of fjord ice between the summer
2011 and summer 2012 show extremely long periods of
ice-free sea, thereby leading to increased erosion activ
ity at Fredheim.
The work related to the Svalbard field sites has been
done by Jomar Finseth, Magne Wold, Håkon Tangen,
Maj Gøril Bæverfjord and Arne Instanes from SINTEF,
Emilie Guegan and Lars Grande from NTNU and Anatoly
Sinitsyn, Evangeline Sessford and David Wrangborg
from UNIS.
The Baydaratskaya Bay field site was established by
scientific SAMCoT partner Moscow State University
(MSU) in June 2012 as joint activity with SINTEF. The
field work was carried out with the following partici
pants from MSU: Prof. Vanda Khilimonyuk, Prof. Sergey
Buldovich, PhD candidate Daria Aleksyutina, PhD candi
date Alexey Usov, Vladislav Isaev and Sergey Grebenkin.
The 2012 study of Baydaratskaya included:
• Manual drilling of three boreholes, sampling of frozen
soils (undisturbed cores) and installation of the
thermistors strings
• Profiles for erosion rate monitoring
• Thermal conductivity measurements in the erosion
slope
• Laboratory tests of the physical properties of soils
(water content, density, grain size) both thawed and
frozen (performed in Moscow).
The field investigation shows that the abrasion (thermo
abrasion) mechanism is only a secondary factor of the
terrace bench destruction. Most of the destruction
seems to be due to thermo denudation and gravitational
processes. In 2012, PhD candidate Daria Aleksuytina
studied the thermal properties of the Baydaratskaya
permafrost soils, while PhD candidate Aleksey Usov
began studying the mechanical properties of thawing
permafrost soils. (Further details and visual aids under
Arctic Coastal Surveys on pages 49-51).
Understandingpermafrost soil behaviour inanengineer
ing perspective requires in-situ testing and also labora
tory testing on high quality soil samples. This requires
development of equipment able to perform such
sampling. For permafrost soil sampling on Spitsbergen
the SINTEF permafrost corers are used. The corers
consist of a cutting bit attached to a thick-walled, hollow-
core collecting auger, much like a modified CRREL core
barrel. This type of corer has proven to be efficient in
collecting cores in fine grained frozen soils. The perma
frost corers ensure penetration in most materials due
to the use of poly-crystalline diamond composite (PCD)
bit inserts. These inserts are very durable and can
even cut cores in rock. These coring barrels are used
without drilling fluids, a big advantage when operat
ing in cold climates where environmentally unfriendly
additives have to be used in order to prevent the liquids
from freezing. Frozen hoses and pumps become a major
concern when working in below-zero temperatures.
In the field work at Pesyakov and Varandey, coastal
studies were performed as a survey together with the
State Oceanographic Institute (SOI, Moscow) where
SAMCoT was represented by Post Doc Anatoly Sinitsyn
from UNIS. The summer survey lasted three weeks,
wherein approximately 50 erosion rate profiles were
Fig. 40. The SINTEF Permafrost Corer.