http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120087654
A NASA DC-8 plane equipped with lasers, ice-penetrating radar, and a gravity meter is revealing a dynamic and complex world beneath the massive ice sheet that covers Antarctica.
The plane is flying over Antarctica for six weeks as part of a mission to use airplanes to replace a dying NASA satellite that's been monitoring polar ice.
But the stopgap measure is providing a major scientific bonus: The DC-8 flies just 1,500 feet above the ice and carries instruments that let scientists see right through the ice.
Listen or read the whole story. A look at the landscape underneath the ice sheets of Antarctica is too cool for words.
It looks like Slartibartfast had a hand in designing Antarctica prior to putting the ice sheet on it--there is evidence there are fjords underneath all that ice!
Posted by Jvstin at November 4, 2009 4:53 PM