Recently in the Analog Studies Category

A scene that first played out on the Moon in 1972 happened again, years later, in Hawaii. While exploring the lunar surface, Apollo 17 astronaut and geologist Harrison Schmitt spotted some bright orange soil - an important clue about the Moon's volcanic history. You can hear the excitement in his voice in recordings, but mission control in Houston couldn't see what was so remarkable in the video beamed back to Earth.

One of the great attractions of the island of Santorini, in Greece, lies in its spectacular volcanic landscape, which also contains places similar to those of Mars. A team of European and U.S. scientists has discovered it after analysing basaltic rocks collected in one of its coves.

Researchers from the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics (UTIG) have helped discover the first subglacial lakes ever found in the Canadian High Arctic.

Dale Andersen sent this via inReach on December 6, 2017 2:47:47 AM EST "Heading back to Novo in an hour nice sunny day. I'm starting my traverse, follow along at my MapShare! https://share.garmin.com/DaleAndersen " Dale sent this message from: Lat -71.332995 Lon 13.45293.

Received via Iridium 29 November 2017 4:30:03 PM EST: "Hi Keith The earlier weather forecasts were spot on and we have had blowing snow and high winds most of the day forcing us to retreat into our various tents for the day."

This message was received via Iridium on 28 November 28, 2017 8:13:28 AM EST "We are in our last week of work here at Untersee before heading back to Novo on the 6th. Hope to get in a few more dives for sample collection and imagery beneath the ice, and we have to pull experiments that are ongoing in the lake right now. Unfortunately our weather is likely to change tonight and tomorrow and Thursday may not be great for work."

Dale Andersen sent this message on 26 November 2017 at :09:26 AM EST: "We are working pretty hard while taking advantage of the nice days we have had recently. I made a dive beneath the 3.5 m thick ice-cover yesterday afternoon to collect a few sediment cores at 17 m (depth) and make observations of the lake basin in the area around the dive hole."

Dale Andersen sent this message on 23 November 2017 at 4:08:18 AM EST: "Yesterday started very nicely with sunshine and little or no winds so the morning hours were pretty productive. But by noon, katabatics let loose a barrage of winds and blowing snow that shut us down for most activities in the afternoon."

Dale Andersen sent this message on 22 November 2017 3:00:56 AM EST: "We have a second day of nice weather with clear skies and light winds which is quite helpful to us."

Dale Andersen sent this message from: Lat -71.33293 Lon 13.45381 on 20 November 2017 5:22:14 AM EST: "Hi Keith: Looks like our weather is improving, but we still have strong gusting winds (25-30 knots and occasional 40 knot gusts) with blowing snow, but it is much nicer than yesterday so hopefully this afternoon and tomorrow it will settle down and we can get back to our field work.