Scientific Research in the Beaufort Sea - Video
November 2011
Natural Resources Canada is involved in a number of projects in the Arctic and the Beaufort Sea. One project that I’m involved in aims to help industry and local authorities to develop the area safely and sustainably.
The oil companies will eventually be building pipelines, they’ll be dredging channels. They need to know the stability of the seabed that they’re building these on. One of the potential hazards could be a pipeline may be laid and then a wave or current activity in this very stormy environment scours underneath the pipeline and causes it to fail.
Natural Resources Canada is specifically looking at geo-hazards in the area.
One of the phenomena we’ve been looking at is called Strudel Scouring, this is when the flood water from the MacKenzie River overtops the ice and then the ice releases from the bed and rises up. Eventually, the water scours its way through the ice and now it’s lifted up, there’s a hydro-static gradient there, and the water penetrates through the ice in a big whirlpool structure and then scours the seabed below that.
This is something that the industry does have an interest in because if such a whirlpool where to occur on top of a pipeline, this would cause major problems.
One time during a winter survey we were flying over the Delta, we looked down to see a triginal crack in the ice, fresh water was basically bubbling up inside full of methane and full of minerals. This was a thawed spring basically in the middle of a frozen ocean. This is exactly the type of thing that can happen when you’re exploring an area such as the Beaufort Sea, that is vastly unexplored.
The difficulties of working in the Arctic are compounded by the bitter cold. We often have to work at temperatures below minus 30 so it’s very challenging, its very difficult to work in these conditions.
Natural Resources Canada are pioneers and world experts in Arctic research. This is a growing field as more and more countries become interested in Arctic science