Image of the Week — Looking back at 2016

Happy New-Yearcorn

I cannot believe that a full year has passed since this very cute pink unicorn wished you a Happy New Year.

Yet, over the past  12 months our blog has attracted more than 16,200 visits.  And the blog analytics show that you, our dear readers, are based not only in Europe but literally all over the world!

With 67 new posts published in only 52 weeks, it’s more than likely that you missed a few interesting ones. Don’t worry, today’s Image Of the Week highlights some of the most exciting content written, edited and published by the whole cryo-team during the year 2016!  

Enjoy and don’t forget to vote in the big EGU Blog competition (see below) !
(Remark: all the images are linked to their original posts)

Get the most of 2016

Last glaciation in Europe, ~70,000-20,000 years ago [By S. Berger].

The 82 research stations in the Antarctic [By S. Berger].

• Our two most popular posts of the year were both maps featured as images of the week. The “Where do people stay in the coolest place on earth” got 2,830 views while the “Last Glacial Maximum in Europe” has been visited 878 times.

• We also launched our new “for dummies” category that aims at explaining complex glaciological concepts in simple terms. The first and most read “for dummies” is all about “Marine Ice sheet instability” and explains why West Antarctica could be destabilised.

Marine Ice Sheet Instability [By D. Docquier].

Three other “for dummies” have been added since then. They unravel the mysteries behind Water Masses, Sea Level and Ice Cores.

• 

  Drilling an ice core [By the Oldest Ice PhD students]

  Another welcomed novelty of 2016 was the first “ice-hot news” post, about the very exciting quest for the oldest ice in Antarctica. In this post — issued at the same time as the press release —  the 3 PhD students currently involved with the project explain how and where to find their holy grail, i.e. the 1 million year old ice!

The list goes on of course, and I could probably spend hours presenting each of our different posts one by one and explain why every single one of them is terrific. Instead, I have decided to showcase a few more posts with very specific mentions!

The oddest place for ice : inside a volcano! [By T. Santagata]

The quirkiest ice phenomenon  : ice balls [By E. Smith].

The most romantic picture : Heart-shaped bubbles for ValentICE’s day [By S. Berger]

The creepiest picture: Blood Falls, Antarctica [By E. Smith]

The funniest post : April Fools “do my ice deceive me” [By S. Berger]

The best incidental synchronisation: The Perito Moreno collapsed the day before our the post went live [By E. Smith]

The “do they really do that? ” mention for ballooning the ice [By N. Karlsson]

The best fieldwork fail : Skidoos sinking into the slush [By S. Berger]

The most epic story : Shackleton’s rescue [By E. Smith]

The most puntastic title “A Game of Drones (Part 1: A Debris-Covered Glacier” [By M. Westoby].

The most provocative title : “What an ice hole” [By C. Heuzé]

The soundest post where science is converted to music [By N. Karlsson]

Good resolutions for 2017

The beginning of a new year is a great opportunity to look back at the previous year, and one of the logical consequences is to come with good resolutions for the coming year.  Thinking of a good resolution and then achieving it can however be tricky.  This is why we have compiled a few resolutions, that YOU dear cryo-followers could easily make 🙂

 Cryoblog stronger in the E(G)U blog competition

To celebrate the excellent display of science writing across all the EGU blogs, a competition has been launched.

Olaf the snowman begs you to vote for “the journey of a snowflake”

From now until Monday 16^th January, we invite you, the cryo-readers, to vote for your favourite post of 2016, which should be “journey of a snowflake” (second-to last option). I am obviously being totally objective but if you’re not convinced, the little guy on the right might be more persuasive. If you’re really adventurous, you could also consider clicking on other posts to check what they look like, after having voted for the cryo-one, of course.

Get involved

Hopefully by now:

1. You are convinced that the cryosphere is amazing and that the EGU cryoblog enables you to seize some of the cryo-awesomeness
2. You have read and elected the “journey of a snowflake”  as the best post of 2016
3. You would like to contribute to the blog (because you would like to be part of this great team or simply because you think your sub-field is not represented well enough).

Not to confuse you with a long speech, the image below explains how to get involved. We always welcome contributions from scientists, students and professionals in glaciology, especially when they are at the early stage of their career.

Thank you for following the blog!

PS: this is one of my favourite tweets from the EGU cryospheric division twitter account. What is yours?

Edited by Nanna Karlsson