{"id":103,"date":"2013-06-28T21:14:21","date_gmt":"2013-06-28T19:14:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/?p=103"},"modified":"2013-09-01T20:02:06","modified_gmt":"2013-09-01T18:02:06","slug":"the-last-leg-almost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/2013\/06\/28\/the-last-leg-almost\/","title":{"rendered":"The last leg (almost)"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Inge Juszak<\/em><\/p>\n

Chokurdakh, June 28, 2013<\/p>\n

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Today we took the last plane of our journey to the research site, from Yakutsk to Chokurdakh. Compared to the flights from Zurich and Moscow this one was a real adventure in an Antonov AN- 24 PB with about 30 people and a lot of cargo.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\"From<\/a>

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From Zurich (Switzerland) to Chokurdakh (Russian Federation) (Map: Google Earth).<\/p>\n

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The airplane (it seems it is still the same since the first Siberia expedition in 2008 and many years before) is said to be robust, and keeps on going since decades. For those avionic freaks amongst you, check out the details for this Antanov AN-24<\/a>!<\/p>\n

\"Loading<\/a>

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Loading the aircraft on the taxiway in Yakutsk is a ‘do it yourself’ job … (Photo: I. Juszak, June 2013).<\/p>\n

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We were really lucky, the weather was great and we could see the Lena river, two mountain ranges, the taiga and the tundra with huge, partly still ice-covered lakes. I was most lucky as I had a window seat, so I stopped taking photos just for the lunch.<\/div>\n
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Chrebet mountain range as seen from the air between Yakutsk and Chokurdakh (Photo: I. Juszak, June 2013).<\/p>\n

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Landing in Chokurdakh was beautiful, we could see the last trees, little lakes, streams and the polygonal structure of the permafrost.<\/div>\n
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\"Approaching<\/a>

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Approaching Chokurdakh airport (IATA: CKH, ICAO: UESO), still 46 m above sea level (Photo: I. Juszak, June 2013).<\/p>\n

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At the airport grimy looking soldiers and airport officers kept me from taking pictures of the humpy air stripe or the firemen waiting in their\u00a0 cars with running engines, just in case something would happen. In Chokurdakh we are the main attraction and luckily Ivan from Wladiwostok is here and translates what happens.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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At the moment we are waiting until we can leave for Kytalyk. I saw the tiny boats already, and I wonder how we can fit all the luggage, our instruments we send by post weeks ago and ourselves. The weather is still beautiful and I’m looking forward to the boat trip.<\/div>\n
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\"Unloading<\/a>

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Unloading the baggage, again a DIY job (Photo: G. Schaepman-Strub, 2008).<\/p>\n

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Finally, arrival at the final air destination. Further travel is by boat to the test site in Kytalyk.<\/p>\n

\"House<\/a>

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House in Chokurdakh (Photo: G. Schaepman-Strub, 2010).<\/p>\n

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\"Leaving<\/a>

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Leaving Chokurdakh by boat on the Indigirka river (Photo: G. Schaepman-Strub, 2010).<\/p>\n

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We will be coming back to you once installed on the site. From now on, communication will be sparser, since we use a satellite phone with limited bandwidth to stay in contact.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Inge Juszak Chokurdakh, June 28, 2013 Today we took the last plane of our journey to the research site, from Yakutsk to Chokurdakh. Compared to the flights from Zurich and Moscow this one was a real adventure in an Antonov AN- 24 PB with about 30 people and a lot of cargo. The airplane […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-week1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/91"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":786,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103\/revisions\/786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uzh.ch\/blog\/gcb-siberia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}