Looking Back

As the team wraps up the diving research season, I am sifting through the trove of inspiration that I gathered under the ice. As I mentioned in my previous post, I last dove in McMurdo Sound 11 years ago, and it has been fascinating to observe the changes.

Dexter, Paola and Andrew preparing to dive at Cinder Cones

Of course, in collaborating with Andrew, I am particularly interested in the shifting methane seeps. The Cinder Cones seep has expanded and now shrunk over the past decade. As Andrew described in the Cinder Crack post, it now appears in the form of repeating tiger-stripe patterns that are very unusual. There is also a new, large seep at the Jetty dive site. I had the chance to observe this on my final Antarctic dive. It was amazing to see both mats so close up after years of painting them from a distance.

The "stripey" microbial mats at Cinder Cones

Andrew has also blogged a bit about the shifting visibility of McMurdo Sound. For decades, divers in McMurdo sound have observed that during the austral Spring, the visibility was roughly 1000 feet. This is about ten times greater than any other dive spot I've ever heard of. This unique clarity likely stems from months of round-the-clock darkness throughout winter, stifling growth in the water column.

Submerged Glacier (Evans Wall), 2016, Arylic on panel, 36x48 inches (I have been on a years-long quest to capture, through painting, the otherworldy experience of diving in McMurdo Sound's unparalleled clarity)

Diving in these conditions felt like I was not even in water; it was like being suspended in the air. However, in recent years divers have noticed the visibility decreasing, with a dramatic shift over the past two or three seasons. In addition to the plankton bloom occurring earlier in the year, as Andrew noted, the overall visibility was much reduced throughout this season.

Next to a huge brine channel at the Jetty. Photo by Andrew Thurber

However, much of the pristine beauty remains in tact. The sea ice, while smooth on top, has an underside full of exquisite formations, crystalline structures, and branching brine channels. Diatoms seem to make the ice glow with a saturated gradient of gold, green and turquoise. The volcanic seafloor starkly shows off a vast array of fascinating invertebrates-- nudibranchs, sponges, and isopods, to name a few. I am looking forward to another decade of painting from McMurdo Sound's icy well of inspiration, and in particular, highlighting the fascinating role of methane seeps in its unique ecosystem.

Painting in progress of an Antarctic clam based on specimens collected by the team and kept alive in our lab! Painting from directly life is a very special experience.

Commute to our dive site: Helicopter version!

Helicopter ride to our scuba diving site?

Not on our original plans either but here we go!

Cape Evans, one of our main study sites with a collaboration with scientists from New Zealand, became an open water site earlier in the diving season. Because of this, we could not drive our trusty Pisten Bully, Sheila, to our site, and instead planned to fly over!

An unexpected early break off the sea ice took the entire team by surprise. Here we can observe the study site completely covered by sea ice in late November in 2023 versus now in 2025.

Images by NASA Worldview Earth Data 2025. To the Left: Ross Island, Antarctica, November 30, 2023. To the right: Ross Island, Antarctica, November 30, 2025

While not new to most of the team, everyone shared Dexter and I’s excitement for our first helicopter ride!

The views are breathtaking; Antarctica truly does not stop surprising us - from the penguins diving into the water to the strong contrast of blues from the sea ice and seawater with icebergs shinning along. It was amazing to have our ride with Andrew and the rest of the dive team pointing out different features of the region along the way as the Antarctic continent welcomes them back as their second home.

After a 15-minute ride, we were welcomed by our New Zealand collaborators and amazing scientists led by Dr. Sarah Seabrook. More science to come!

Camping Cape Evans Experience

To round out our field season we did two overnight camping trips to Cape Evans. We went to collaborate with Andrew's previous student Dr. Sarah Seabrook and her team through the New Zealand Scott Base.

While the pancake ice and icebergs were beautiful, this is the first time Cape Evans has had open water this close during this part of the season; a reminder of our changing climate.

While we've been diving out of dive holes this year, at the sea ice edge we had to get creative. We spent hours sawing, chainsawing and ice picking a staircase down to the water edge and a hole to recover the kiwi lander.

The local Adelie penguin colony was very interested in our work, checking out our pop up dive tent, tripod and recovery lines for the lander. We do stop science to take pictures and hangout with the penguins, at least for a little bit.

One was particularly interested in our chainsaw, but he didn't have the proper training or PPE so we told him no. The chainsaw was also turned off and cooled for the record.

As divers we were there to support cleaning the lander, returning it to the shore for the kiwis and redeploying it after switching out their instruments for another year of sampling. We also took some opportunistic samples to study the microbial and animal communities surrounding the methane seeps here. Here Alex Brett, Andrew Thurber, and Steve Rupp get ready to dive.

I thought it was quite cool seeing the instrumentation used to study these seeps from sensors on a lander, lift bags and dry suit SCUBA divers, to even a small Remote Operated Vehicle (ROV) named Luna. Science in the 21st century is pretty awesome.

Overall I'd say it was a highlight of the season and the most memorable camping trip I've had. From waking up to an iceberg in front of my tent to penguins running through camp with home cooked meals, it certainly felt like a dream.