Seeing Secrets in the Ice: A Drone-Based Radar Looks for the Future of Climate Change

I'm standing on top of 100 meters of ice, watching a drone crisscross the Slakbreen glacier on Norway's Svalbard archipelago, more than 600 kilometers north of the mainland. I'm part of a team testing Peregrine—a fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) equipped with miniaturized ice-penetrating radar, which can image the glacial ice all the way down to the bedrock below. It's −27°C, dipping below −40 °C with wind chill—well below the operating temperature of most of the commercial equipment we brought for this expedition. Our phones, laptops, and cameras are rapidly failing. The last of our computers that is still working is sitting on top of a small heating pad inside its own little tent. Harsh as the weather is here, we intend for Peregrine to operate in even tougher conditions, regularly surveying the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets. These great masses store enough water to raise global sea level by 65 meters should they melt entirely. Although neither ice sheet is expected to melt completely anytime soon, their incredible scale makes even small changes consequential for the future of our planet. And the data that Peregrine will gather will help scientists to understand how these critical areas will respond to climate change.