在冰缘

那是2019年2月，伊丽莎白·拉什无法入睡。

It was February 2019, and Elizabeth Rush couldn't sleep.

当时正是凌晨时分，我感觉自己就像圣诞节早晨的孩子，不断醒来问：到圣诞节了吗？

It was really early in the morning, and I felt like a kid on Christmas who just kept waking up and is like, is it Christmas yet?

没有。

No.

不是圣诞节。

It wasn't Christmas.

伊丽莎白当时正乘坐一艘名为破冰船的特殊船只，位于南极洲西部边缘。

Elizabeth was aboard a special ship called an icebreaker at the Western edge of Antarctica.

大约凌晨四五点钟的时候，我醒了。

Sometime between four or five in the morning, I woke up.

要知道，每年这个时候南极其实没有真正的黑夜，但这个时段天色会稍暗些。

You know, there's not really night in the Antarctica at this time of year, but it's a little bit darker, at this time of day.

在海上航行一个月后，她即将亲眼目睹从未有人近距离见过的景象。

After a month at sea, she was about to witness something nobody had ever seen up close.

一座巨大冰墙的最前沿——思韦茨冰川。

The leading edge of an absolutely enormous wall of ice, Thwaites Glacier.

我唯一能找到的视觉参照物是，它有点像《权力的游戏》里的绝境长城。

The only thing that I have as a visual reference point is that it sort of looks like the wall in Game of Thrones.

这堵冰墙可能有船高的两倍，而我们的船有六层楼高，我确实被它震撼到了。

So, you know, this wall of ice that's probably two times higher than the ship, the ship's, like, six stories high, and I was really in awe of it.

那些在冰架地带待得比我更久的人，注意到了我可能忽略的细节。

Folks who'd spent more time along ice shelves than I had noticed things that I wouldn't have noticed.

他们说，它看起来要么是支离破碎的，要么是粗糙不堪的。

They said like, it looks mangled or gnarly.

看起来很糟糕。

It looks sick.

这里是《由外而内》，一档让好奇心与自然界碰撞的节目。

This is Outside In, a show where curiosity and the natural world collide.

我是内特·赫吉。

I'm Nate Hedgie.

我是贾斯汀·帕拉迪斯。

And I'm Justine Paradis.

今天，我们将揭秘一次前往世界未探索之地的国际考察幕后故事。

And today, we are sharing a behind the scenes look at an international expedition to an unexplored part of this world.

她告诉我，比起在你们等待时提供帮助，给空间站的人提供援助对我们来说更容易。

She told me it's gonna be easier for us to get help to folks on the space station than it is for us to get help to you while you're at the waits.

我们还将认识一座可能重塑地球上所有海岸线的冰川。

And we'll get to know a glacier which could reshape every coast on this planet.

风险涉及个人、财务乃至全球层面。

The stakes are are they range from the personal to the financial to, like, the global.

请继续关注。

Stay tuned.

这里是《由外而内》。

This is outside in.

我是内特·赫奇。

I'm Nate Hetchey.

我是贾斯汀·帕拉迪斯。

And I'm Justine Paradis.

伊丽莎白·拉什是一位作家。

Elizabeth Rush is a writer.

我们之前确实邀请她上过节目。

We've actually had her on the show before.

而她通往南极洲的旅程，早在登船之前就开始了。

And her path to Antarctica started long before she ever stepped on a boat.

我专门研究海平面上升的写作已有——大概超过五年了。

I had been writing about sea level rise in particular for, I don't know, over half a decade.

而我想要，亲眼去看看源头。

And I wanted to, like, see the source.

2018年，她获得了一个千载难逢的机会——一艘国际科考船上仅剩的一个名额，目的地是南极洲无人涉足的冰川地带——思韦茨。

In 2018, she got a once in a lifetime offer, a spot on an international research vessel headed to a part of Antarctica that no one had ever been to before, Thwaites.

他们今年将部署一艘破冰船，船上还剩一个铺位。

They're deploying an ice breaker this year, and there's one birth remaining.

我建议把这个名额给你。

And I recommended it be given to you.

能收到邀请真是梦想成真，真的。

It was a dream come true to be invited, truly.

为了接受邀请，伊丽莎白不得不暂停自己的生活。

To accept, Elizabeth had to put her life on pause.

她和伴侣原本正计划组建家庭。

She and her partner had been planning to start a family.

但是

But

我获知被录取后才发现，孕妇是不允许被派往冰原工作的。

I found out once I was accepted that pregnant people aren't allowed to deploy to the ice.

基本上是因为太危险了。

Because basically, it would be too dangerous.

那时我35岁。

I was 35 at the time.

你知道，这个数字常被提及，像是'三十五岁后生育能力会急剧下降'之类的说法。

And so, you know, that's like the number that's batted around as like, oh, your fertility starts to plummet in your mid to late thirties.

所以我感觉被这个'出发前不能怀孕'的规定给束缚住了。

So I felt sort of, like, squeezed by this mandate to not get pregnant before going.

但我也有些好奇，我会带着这种渴望登上这艘船，而这次任务将如何影响这种渴望？

But I also was kinda curious, like, I'm gonna carry that desire with me onto this boat, and how is this mission gonna shape that desire?

说实话，感觉非常冒险。

It felt very risky, to be honest.

这次南极之旅很特别，即使以科考任务的标准来看。

This trip was special, even for a mission to Antarctica.

你可能听说过斯韦茨冰川的绰号——'末日冰川'。

You may have heard of Thwaites' nickname, the Doomsday Glacier.

这么称呼是因为如果它崩塌，对全球海平面上升的影响将是巨大的。

It's called that because if it collapses, the implications for global sea level rise will be profound.

它的规模简直大得惊人。

It is just absolutely gigantic.

它的面积相当于佛罗里达州。

It's the size of Florida.

它的面积相当于大不列颠岛。

It's the size of Great Britain.

仅其自身所含的冰量就足以使全球海平面上升两英尺。

And it alone contains enough ice to raise global sea levels two feet.

我们认为，它同时还像瓶塞一样阻挡着整个西南极冰盖——要知道，那里面蕴藏着足以使全球海平面上升超过10英尺的冰量。

It also, we think, acts as a kind of cork to the entirety of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains, you know, upwards of 10 feet of global sea level rise.

尽管它如此重要，科学家们对思韦茨冰川的第一手资料却知之甚少。

But despite how important it is, scientists had very little firsthand knowledge about Thwaites.

大部分研究都基于卫星图像和其他冰川的数据。

Most of it was based on satellite imagery and data from other glaciers.

前往思韦茨冰川有多困难？

How hard is it to get to Thwaites?

这么说吧——

Well, I'll say this again.

我们是第一批抵达那里的人类，此后无人再至。

We were the first human beings to ever get there, and no one has returned since.

所以难度是极高的。

So it's extremely hard.

前往思韦茨冰川有点像攀登珠穆朗玛峰，只有在每年四到六周的短暂天气窗口期才敢尝试。

Getting to Thwaites, it's kinda like getting to the summit of Mount Everest in the sense that there's a short window of time when the weather is good enough to risk it, just four to six weeks.

在大多数年份，冰川周围的海面几乎全年都被冰层覆盖。

In most years, the sea around the weights is frozen over essentially all year.

我们前往的那年，冰川崩解边缘正前方有一片异常开阔的未冻结水域。

So the year that we went, there was a really exceptional pocket of unfrozen water directly in front of the glacier's calving edge.

他们启程时正值南极夏季，南极圈内二十四小时都是白昼。

They were setting off during the Antarctic summer when there's twenty four hours of daylight at the South Pole.

但南大洋的海冰状况可能瞬息万变。

But sea ice conditions can change quickly in the Southern Ocean.

最理想的情况下，抵达思韦茨冰川也需要数周时间。

And best case scenario, it would take weeks to get to Thwaites.

我的项目负责人在任务筹备期间说了很多耐人寻味的话。

My program officer said a lot of interesting things in the prep for this mission.

她告诉我：'比起在思韦茨冰川的你们，我们向空间站人员提供援助反而更容易'。

She told me, it's gonna be easier for us to get help to folks on the space station than it is for us to get help to you while you're at the waits.

这艘名为'伊丽莎白号'的船将成为她未来八周的居所——你可以把它理解为她的空间站。

Elizabeth's home for the next eight weeks, her space station, if you will.

它被命名为'RV纳撒尼尔·B·帕尔默号'。

It was called the RV Nathaniel b Palmer.

这是种被称为破冰船的特殊船型。

It's a type of ship called an icebreaker.

这是艘相当专业的船只，长度相当于足球场，高度足有六层楼。

This is a serious boat, about the length of a football field and six stories high.

她最先注意到的特征之一是其独特的配色方案。

And one of the first things she noticed about it was its distinctive color scheme.

船体是交通锥般的亮橙色，其余部分则涂着类似蛋黄的颜色。

The hull is the color of a traffic cone, and the rest is painted a kind of egg yolk yellow.

其中一个英国人看着我说，呃，这油漆是怎么回事？

One of the Brits looked at me and said, like, what's with the paint job?

橙色是打折促销还是怎么的？

Was orange on sale or something?

呃，这船的颜色真滑稽。

Like, it's a goofy color, this boat.

但我也在想，是不是因为亮橙色能让人们在景观中更容易注意到它。

But I also wondered, like, if it's bright orange so that, like, people could notice it against the landscape.

它确实很显眼。

It certainly stands out.

于是在那通电话几个月后，伊丽莎白发现自己站在智利蓬塔阿雷纳斯的码头上，准备登船。

So months after that first call, Elizabeth found herself on a pier in Punta Arenas, Chile, getting ready to board.

离港前，她和队友们领到了政府发放的御寒装备。

Before they left port, she and her crewmates had been handed their government issued cold weather gear.

我觉得特别搞笑。

I thought it was really hilarious.

瑞典的装备简直性感爆了。

Like, the Swedish gear was so sexy.

那些全身黑色星际战士套装让我嫉妒得要命。

It was, like, these, like, full body, like, black starship trooper outfits that I was, like, very jealous of.

英国人的装备非常实用主义。

The Brits were very utilitarian.

他们总让我觉得像汽车修理工，而且你知道，他们都有配套的刺绣徽章，像个小团队。

I felt like they regularly looked like car mechanics, and I was like, you know, they all had sort of, like, matching, like, embroidered insignias, and they were a little team.

美国装备真是简陋。

And The US gear was so scrappy.

太滑稽了。

It was hilarious.

我感觉自己像个橡皮鸭和捕龙虾渔夫的混合体。

I felt like sort of a mixture of a rubber ducky slash, like, lobster fisher person.

大多数这类科学考察都有特定研究重点，比如海冰范围或深海洋流。

Most scientific expeditions like this have a particular research focus, like sea ice extent maybe or deep ocean currents.

但由于思韦茨冰川如此重要，加上抵达那里既困难又昂贵，计划是尽可能多地收集直接观测数据。

But because Thwaites is so important and because of how difficult and expensive it is to get there, the plan was to gather as much direct observational data as they could.

船上有几个不同的科研小组。

There were a few different science teams on board.

有岩石组、沉积物组、潜艇组，甚至还有海象组。

The rock team, the sediment team, the submarine team, even an elephant seal team.

船上共有57人，约半数科学家，半数船员。

All told, there are 57 people on the ship, about half scientists, half crew.

科学家中性别比例均衡，约半数女性，半数男性。

Among the scientists, there was solid gender parity, about half women, half men.

船员中女性较少，两名健壮水手来自菲律宾。

Among crew, a fewer women, and the two able-bodied sailors on board hailed from The Philippines.

菲律宾人以航海闻名，但这与经济需求和愿望也有关。

Filipinos are famous sailors, but that also has to do with economic need and want.

对许多菲律宾人来说，在远洋船舶上工作是份收入丰厚的职业。

Become working on long range vessels is a lucrative profession for many in The Philippines.

我们船上有两名黑人男子。

We had two black men on board.

他们都是厨师。

Both of them were cooks.

而且，你知道，我觉得你可以看出，那些来自拥有数百年经济资源家族的人往往是在进行科学研究的人，而那些没有的人则往往在为科学家提供支持。

And, you know, I think you can kind of see that those people who hailed from families who had access to centuries of economic resources off the boat tended to be the ones conducting the science, and those who didn't tended to be working in support of the scientists.

当然，南大洋的条件极其恶劣。

Conditions in the Southern Ocean are, of course, extreme.

海水冰冷刺骨，如果你没有防护措施落水，几分钟内就会冻僵。

The water is so cold that if you fell overboard without protection, you'd stiffen and freeze in just minutes.

所以我们从智利最南端的蓬塔阿雷纳斯出发。

So we left from Punta Arenas, which is the Southern tip of Chile.

我们驶出麦哲伦海峡，几天内就穿越了德雷克海峡，这是世界上最狂野、最不可预测的海上通道。

We sailed out the Strait Of Magellan, and within a couple days, we were crossing the Drake Passage, which is the wildest reliably wildest ocean passage in the world.

有一股洋流环绕整个南极大陆，而德雷克海峡基本上是它最狭窄的瓶颈。

There's an ocean current that wraps around the entire continent of Antarctica, and the Drake Passage is essentially its narrowest choke point.

我们遇到了25英尺高的巨浪，导致船只连续几天来回摇晃。

We encountered 25 foot seas that basically caused the ship to roll, like, rolling back and forth for days on end.

所以我的大多数船员都晕船得很厉害。

So most of my shipmates got really sick.

你没晕船吗？

Did you not get sick?

我没有晕船。

I did not get sick.

我从来都不太容易晕船。

I have never been super prone to seasickness.

事实上，伊丽莎白喜欢去船上的小健身房。

In fact, Elizabeth liked to go to the ship's small gym.

有人带了《疯狂极限30天》健身视频，船身的摇晃让这些视频变得更有趣。

Someone had brought along Insanity Max 30 workout videos, and they were made even more interesting by the rocking of the ship.

你可能会在做开合跳时，船就在你脚下摇晃。

You could, like, be doing jumping jacks, and the ship would be, like, rolling beneath you.

这样你的开合跳就能获得更长的滞空时间。

And so you would get, like, way more airtime in your jumping jack.

实际上这真的非常有趣。

It was it was great fun, actually.

尽管参与这项史无前例的独特任务令人兴奋，但日常生活中的大部分体验其实并不像你想象的那么刺激。

As exciting as it was to be on this unique first of its kind mission, much of the day to day experience was actually not as thrilling as you might imagine.

许多科学家和船员告诉我，南极实地考察的真正挑战其实是无聊的挑战，因为你要经历极其漫长的运输过程，期间无法进行科研工作。

Many of the scientists and crew would tell me, like, the true challenge of Antarctic fieldwork is the boredom challenge because you have these extremely long transits in which you're not doing the science.

人们用相当普通的方式打发时间。

People pass the time in pretty unremarkable ways.

他们看电影。

They watched movies.

他们做填字游戏。

They did crossword puzzles.

他们读些俗气的爱情小说。

They read pulpy romance novels.

在破冰船上的生活中，有一个对全体船员士气至关重要的方面，那就是食物。

There was one aspect of life on the icebreaker which was particularly important for the morale of all souls on board, food.

所以船上每天有四顿饭。

So there are four meals a day on the boat.

早上7点、中午12点、下午5点或5点半，然后还有午夜配给，就是在午夜时分。

7AM, noon, five or 05:30, and then something called midnight rations, which is at midnight.

这四顿饭就像是支撑你一天的基础。

And those four meals, like, ground your day.

有位厨师对我说过一句我觉得很精辟的话。

One of the cooks said something to me that I thought was brilliant.

他说，我们努力每天提供四顿好饭，因为一旦饭菜质量下降，士气就会跟着下滑。

He was like, you know, we aim to put out good food four meals a day because as soon as you're putting crappy food on the line, like, the morale goes down.

大家都盼望着吃饭时间。

People look forward to meals.

我们会特别兴奋，我记得惠灵顿三文鱼上桌时大家都惊叹不已。

And we'd get excited and, like, you know, I remember Salmon Wellington was like, wow.

这可是个大日子。

This is a big day.

我们有位厨师来自新奥尔良。

One of our cooks came from New Orleans.

他做了国王蛋糕，我们还在厨房里举行了狂欢节庆祝活动。

He did a king cake, and we had, like, a Mardi Gras celebration in the galley.

除了纸牌游戏和公海冒险，这里也有美好的时刻。

Beyond the card games and the high seas, there are beautiful moments too.

鲸鱼，阿德利企鹅从浮冰上滑落，鳍肢张开，海洋每日相似却又不同，第一座冰山的幽蓝，以及随后出现的数百座。

Whales, Adelie penguins sliding off ice floes, flippers akimbo, the ocean, the same yet different every day, and the eerie blue of that first iceberg, and then the hundreds that followed.

他们在海上已航行三周，帕尔默号正逐渐接近目的地。

They'd been at sea for three weeks and the Palmer was getting close.

可能距思韦茨冰川还有十二小时航程。

Maybe twelve hours from Thwaites.

兴奋之情溢于言表。

The excitement was palpable.

然后呢？

And then?

然后...然后船调头返航了。

And and then the ship turned around.

接着我们全被召集到计算机实验室，被告知了这个消息。

Then we were all gathered in the computer lab and sort of told this news.

有位船员正面临严重的生命危险，我们必须尽快让此人获得救助。

One of our shipmates was in great physical danger and that we had to get this person to help as soon as possible.

具体细节被严格保密，直到航行结束数月后，伊丽莎白才得知完整经过。

The details were mostly kept under wraps, and it was only months after the voyage was over that Elizabeth got the full story.

一名船员怀孕了。

A crew member was pregnant.

这显然出乎所有人意料。

This was obviously unexpected.

要知道，怀孕人员原本是被禁止参与这次科考任务的。

Because remember, pregnant people weren't allowed on the mission.

但在这种情况下，她和丈夫都是船上的船员。

But in this case, she and her husband were both crew members on board.

伊丽莎白后来才就医疗后送事件采访了她，他们认为孩子可能是在离港前一天怀上的。

Elizabeth interviewed her about the medevac much later, and they think the child was probably conceived the day before they left port.

但现在，距离冰层仅几小时航程时，这个人正经历着剧烈的腹痛。

But now, just hours away from the ice, this person was experiencing extreme abdominal pain.

有人担心是宫外孕，这是一种危及生命的状况。

There were concerns that the pregnancy was ectopic, a life threatening condition.

坦白说，如果真是那样，她可能已经死在我们的船上了。

And quite frankly, if that had been the case, she would have died on our boat.

当然，船员的健康非常重要。

Of course, the crew's health is very important.

但抵达思韦茨，我知道每个人都渴望实现这个目标。

But getting to Thwaites, I know everyone wants that.

比如，这耽误了多少时间？会不会因此错过抵达思韦茨的机会？

Like, how much did that set the was it was there a risk of not getting to Thwaites because of this?

是的。

Yeah.

确实有。

There was.

我是说，当时海冰已经裂开，所有人都惊呼天啊。

I mean, it was the sea ice was open, and everyone was like, oh my god.

我们本可以现在就到那里的。

We could be there right now.

与此同时，我们必须确保船员们的安全。

And at the same time, it was like, but we have to get our shipmates safe.

是啊。

Yeah.

我们担心在进行医疗撤离时海冰会闭合，那样我们就无法返回，后果将相当严重。

There's just concern that the sea ice would close while we were on this medical evacuation, that we wouldn't get to go back, and that would have been kinda devastating.

但这也是一个珍视生命的选择。

But, also, you know, it's a decision you make to value human life.

时间仿佛慢了下来。

Time slowed down.

人们看恐怖片，互相教打桥牌。

People watched horror films, taught each other to play bridge.

伊丽莎白组织了国际阿蒙森海乒乓球锦标赛。

Elizabeth organized the International Amundsen Sea Ping Pong Tournament.

某个深夜牌局结束后，一头座头鲸在雾中喷出水柱。

Late one night after a card game, a humpback whale spouted in the fog.

每过去一天，他们就少一天研究冰川的时间。

Every day that passed was a day that they couldn't spend doing research on the glacier.

他们最终抵达一个偏远的英国基地，那对夫妇在那里被撤离。

They finally made it to a remote British base where the woman and her husband were evacuated.

然后他们再次调头，返回冰区，回到思韦茨冰川。

And then they turned around again, back towards the ice, back towards Thwaites.

我们即将在一分钟后抵达冰缘。

We arrive at the edge of the ice in just a minute.

欢迎回到《外部视角》节目。

Welcome back to Outside In.

我是内特·赫吉，与贾斯汀·帕拉迪斯一起继续伊丽莎白·拉什的斯韦茨冰川之旅。

I am Nate Hedgie here with Justine Paradis picking up Elizabeth Rush's journey to Thwaites.

当伊丽莎白决定要写关于南极洲的文章时，她第一站就去了图书馆，想看看关于这个地方的已有著作。

When Elizabeth knew that she'd be writing about Antarctica, her first stop was the library to see what else had been written about this place.

第一天我就借了一大堆书，抱着这摞高高的书回到办公室。

I took out a bunch of books that first day, and I brought this huge stack of them back to my office.

直到回到办公室我才意识到，在借阅的二十多本书里，只有两本是女性写的，没有一本是有色人种作者。

And it was only once I got to my office that I realized that, like, I don't know, of the two dozen books I took out, two were written by women, none were written by a person of color.

这就是我的第一个线索。

That that was my first clue.

几乎所有关于南极洲的书都在重复讲述同样的六个事件。

Almost every single book about Antarctica really retells, like, the same six events.

这些都是经典的——虽然有些老套的——男性探险家与自然搏斗的故事。

These are classic, if cliched stories of male explorers battling the elements.

阿蒙森征服南极点的壮举，斯科特试图超越阿蒙森却命丧途中，还有沙克尔顿与'坚忍号'的传奇故事。

Amundsen's conquest of the Pole, Scott trying to beat Amundsen dying in the attempt, Shackleton and the epic story of the endurance.

所以在研究进行几个月后，我开始感到非常厌倦。

And so, like, a couple months into my research, I started to grow really bored.

这些语言和隐喻都充满了性征服的意味。

The language and the metaphors are metaphors of sexual dominance.

比如'南极洲宽阔雪白的胸膛吸引着男性前往'，而'她难以企及的内陆则是终极奖赏'这样的描述。

So it's like Antarctica's broad white bosom draws men towards it, and her impenetrable interior is the ultimate prize.

于是我的无聊逐渐转化为一丝愤怒。

And so my boredom kind of gave way to a bit of rage.

老实说。

I'm not gonna lie.

这些关于男性英雄主义的故事显得如此不完整，因为实际上，没有人会独自前往南极洲。

These stories of male heroism felt so incomplete because, actually, no one goes to Antarctica on their own.

除了帕尔默号上的57人——科学家、厨师、船员、技术员和水手，还有家中的亲人、后勤团队。

Beyond the 57 people on the Palmer, scientists, cooks, crew, technicians, and sailors, there were families at home, support teams.

正是这个庞大的群体共同促成了这次航行。

This was a huge community that had contributed to make this journey possible.

当伊丽莎白书写南极洲和这次航行时，她意识到可以把所有这些都包含进去。

And Elizabeth realized when she wrote about Antarctica, about this voyage, she could include all of that.

破冰船抵达思韦茨冰川的那个早晨，她亲眼见证了这种协作精神。

The morning the icebreaker arrived at Thwaites, she got to see that collaboration in action.

就像突然打开了开关，大家立刻进入了科学狂飙状态。

It was like a switch flipped, and suddenly it was a scientific overdrive.

没错，突然间就变得非常务实高效。

And, yeah, it was just like we it became very no BS.

砰。

Boom.

砰。

Boom.

砰。

Boom.

轰。

Boom.

轰。

Boom.

我们现在真的是在争分夺秒地利用每一分钟。

We're making use of literally every minute we have at this point.

再也不打乒乓球了。

No more ping pong.

船上所有人都开始12小时轮班工作，12小时上班，12小时休息。

Everyone on board started working twelve hour shifts, like twelve hours on, twelve hours off.

再也不看恐怖片了。

No more horror movies.

天啊。

Oh gosh.

你知道，这其中的利害关系从个人层面到财务层面，甚至到全球层面都有涉及。

You know, the stakes are are they range from the personal to the financial to, like, the global.

对船上很多人来说，这是能成就他们科研生涯的关键时刻。

This is career making science for a lot of the people on board.

你只有一次机会。

You only get one shot.

对他们个人而言，这些数据将是他们未来多年都要研究的内容。

And for them at a personal level, the data is stuff that they're gonna work on for years afterwards.

所以，这真的是件非常重要的大事。

So, like, it's a really big and important deal.

实际进行的科学研究相当引人入胜。

The actual science being done was pretty fascinating.

沉积物研究团队正在采集海底的生物声学数据，这些数据将被存档供全球科学家研究。

The sediment team was gathering chorus from the seafloor, which would then be stored in an archive and studied by scientists all over the world.

与此同时，科考船本身持续不断地进行着声呐探测。

And meanwhile The ship itself is, like, constantly running sonar.

所以你们要持续生成海底地形图。

So you're constantly trying to get generate a picture of the seafloor.

这种探测是24小时不间断在后台进行的。

That's, like, happening twenty four hours a day in the background.

他们还招募了当地居民——海豹，协助获取冰架下的测量数据。

And they enlisted some of the locals to help get readings under the ice shelf, seals.

我们还派遣科学家登上浮冰，给威德尔海豹注射镇静剂，在它们额头安装环氧树脂应答器，让这些海豹能采集水温及盐度数据。

We also were sending scientists onto ice flows so that they could sedate Waddell seals and epoxy, transponders to their foreheads so that these Waddell seals could take temperature readings of the water, salinity readings of the water.

这样做是因为科考船只能短期驻留，而威德尔海豹常年栖息于此——即使在人类船只无法穿透冰层时。

The reason they did this is because while the ship could only be there in person for a few weeks, the Waddell seals live there year round even when the ice is impenetrable to human vessels.

瑞典团队主导的最雄心勃勃的项目，是向冰架下部署了一艘技术先进的自主水下潜器。

One of the most ambitious projects led by the Swedish team was a submarine, technically an autonomous underwater vehicle, that they deployed underneath the ice shelf.

这是项极其复杂、昂贵且精细的操作。

This was a very tricky, expensive, and delicate maneuver.

他们很可能损失这艘尖端潜艇。

They could potentially have lost to the state of the art sub beneath the ice.

而他们成功完成两次往返任务。

And they sent it out and got it back twice.

那么我们发现了什么？

So what did we find out?

我会尽量用最通俗易懂的语言，来谈谈我们这次任务中最重大的发现。

I'll try to, in the most accessible language I can, talk about, like, the biggest findings from our mission.

我们派往冰架下的潜艇带回了海底的详细图像，显示出数百道褶皱脊，看起来有点像海底的拖拉机轨迹。

So that submarine that we sent under the ice shelf came back with really detailed images of the seafloor that illustrated hundreds of corrugation ridges that looked kind of like tractor tracks on the seafloor.

这些脊线记录了思韦茨冰川过去几个世纪的运动轨迹。

These ridges are a kind of record of how Thwaites has moved over the past couple centuries.

每道脊线都曾是所谓的接地线所在地——思韦茨冰架漂浮部分与陆地连接的位置。

Each ridge was once the location of what's called the Grounding Line, the place where that floating part of the ice shelf of Thwaites connects to the land.

这些脊线告诉我们，思韦茨的崩塌速度可能远超我们以往所见。

Those ridges tell a story that Thwaites could collapse faster than anything we've ever seen.

数据显示思韦茨的接地线退缩速度是人类观测史上最快速度的两到三倍，这非常值得警惕。

They tell us that the grounding line at Thwaites has retreated at rates two to three times faster than humans have ever observed, which is really significant.

另一个重要发现来自进行南极考古的科学家团队。

Another major finding came from a team of scientists doing some Antarctic archaeology.

这些结论源自我们从偏远岛链挖掘出的企鹅骨骼化石。

And this comes from the penguin bones that we were able to exhume from these remote island chains.

自末次冰盛期以来，冰盖就从未再生过，因此我们没有理由认为它会在近期开始增长。

At no time since the last glacial maximum has the weights regenerated, so we have no reason to believe that it will start growing in the near future.

思韦茨这片区域的科考热潮持续了不到一周。

The science frenzy at this part of Thwaites lasted less than a week.

当他们结束在冰川边缘的工作时，南极的夜晚已经明显变长了。

By the end of their time at the edge of the glacier, the Antarctic night was already noticeably longer.

随后，船只调头返航，穿越德雷克海峡，回到了智利。

And then the ship turned back, back across the Drake Passage, back to Chile.

实际上，我记得离开五十四天后归来时，闻到了泥土的气息。

What I remember actually from returning after being gone for fifty four days was that I could smell like earth.

我闻到了一种类似丰饶的气息。

I could smell a certain sort of like fecundity.

冰层中几乎没有这种气息。

The ice has very little of that.

在彭塔阿雷纳斯岸上度过最后一个夜晚，品尝葡萄酒后，船上的人们分散前往世界各地的大学和实验室，他们带走了沉积物岩芯、水样、古代企鹅骨骼以及数据。

After one last evening ashore, drinking wine in Punta Arenas, the ship's community dispersed to universities, to labs all across the world, and they carried with them sediment cores and water samples, ancient penguin bones, and data.

思韦茨冰川被戏称为'末日冰川'。

The Waits is nicknamed the Doomsday Glacier.

它的完全崩塌可能导致海平面急剧上升，这种变化将重塑全球城市。

A complete collapse could lead to a staggering amount of sea level rise, the kind of thing that will transform cities across the world.

伊丽莎白刚刚亲眼目睹了思韦茨冰川及其持续崩解的过程。

Elizabeth had just witnessed the weights and its ongoing disintegration firsthand.

现在她即将回家，并重新考虑组建家庭的计划——这是许多人正在纠结的问题。

And now she was returning home and again picking up her plans to try to start a family, which is something a lot of people are grappling with, that question.

在人类引发的气候变化重塑世界（包括南极洲）的背景下生育子女，

Having children as human caused climate change transforms the world they're living in, including Antarctica.

我们的孩子将生活在怎样的星球和社会中？

With what kind of planet and society our children will be living in and on?

但伊丽莎白认为思韦茨的绰号遗漏了某些关键的东西。

But Elizabeth thinks Thwaites' nickname misses something vital.

我不喜欢这个绰号，但我知道它很上口，而且很多人都在用。

I don't love the nickname, but I am aware that it's catchy and a lot of people use it.

海平面加速上升并不意味着世界末日。

Accelerated sea level rise doesn't have to mean apocalypse.

这取决于人类和人类社会如何应对这种变化。

Like, it depends on how human beings and human society responds to this shift.

即使我们说的是一个世纪内上升几英尺，也有办法改造人类社会，使其不至于像原本可能的那样灾难性。

And even if we're talking, you know, multiple feet in a century, there are ways to transform our human society so that that is not nearly as catastrophic as it might otherwise be.

所以我觉得'末日冰川'这个名字剥夺了我们被这座冰川改变的可能性——而不仅仅是变得更糟。

So I feel like Doomsday Glacier kind of steals from us the possibility of being transformed and not just for the worse by this glacier.

这就是我不喜欢这个名字的原因。

So that's why I don't love the name.

就在她前往南极洲的同一年晚些时候，伊丽莎白怀孕了。

And so later the same year that she traveled to Antarctica, Elizabeth got pregnant.

我认为拥有一个孩子意味着你必须坚信未来可以比过去更好，但这不仅仅是一种信念。

I think having a child means you have to commit to believing that the future can be better than the past, but it's not just a belief.

你还必须致力于成为这种改变的一部分。

You also have to commit to being part of that change.

就像，如果你要把他们带到这个世界上，你必须能够直视他们的眼睛说：是我把你带到这里的。

Like, if you're gonna bring them here, you have to be able to look them in the eye and say, I brought you here.

而这就是我正在做的，为了让未来对你、对地球上所有生命都宜居。

And here's what I'm doing to make the future livable for you, livable for all all matter of life on this planet.

伊丽莎白·拉什是《加速：地球尽头的创造与社区》一书的作者。

Elizabeth Rush is the author of the Quickening, Creation and Community at the Ends of the Earth.

我们最初在2024年的播客中播出了这个故事。

We first aired this story on the podcast in 2024.

今年早些时候，作为对联邦资助科学项目大幅削减预算的一部分，特朗普政府宣布暂停纳撒尼尔·B·帕尔默号考察船的运营，正是这艘船将伊丽莎白送往思韦茨冰川。

Earlier this year, as part of other deep budget cuts to federally funded science programs, the Trump administration announced they were halting operation of the RV Nathaniel b Palmer, that ship that took Elizabeth to Thwaites.

帕尔默号是目前美国唯一专门用于科学研究的南极破冰船。

The Palmer is currently the only US Antarctic icebreaker dedicated to scientific research.

如果预算削减持续生效，这类船只将归零。

If the funding cuts remain in place, there will be zero.

伊丽莎白拍摄了前往思韦茨冰川航程中的绝美照片，其中部分作品她慷慨地与我们分享。

Elizabeth took beautiful pictures of the voyage to Thwaites, some of which she graciously shared with us.

我们会在Instagram上发布其中一些照片，并链接到本次航行及其他类似科考行动产出的科研成果。

So we will be posting a few on our Instagram, and we'll be linking to some of the science that came out of this voyage and other expeditions like it.

您可以在节目备注和我们的网站outsidenradio.org上找到这些链接及更多内容。

You can find links to all that and more in the show notes and on our website, outsidenradio.org.

您现在听到的这些超凡声音并非DJ的即兴创作，而是我们在南极的威德尔海豹盟友的叫声，这些声音可在weddellsealscience.com下载作为手机铃声。

Also These otherworldly sounds you're hearing are not the flourishes of a DJ, but the vocalizations of our Weddell Seal allies in Antarctica, which are made available to download as ringtones at weddellsealscience.com.

这

This

本期节目由贾斯汀·帕拉迪斯制作，由我内特·赫吉协助完成。

episode was produced by Justine Paradis with help from me, Nate Hedgie.

剪辑工作由泰勒·昆比负责。

It was edited by Taylor Quimby.

我们的团队成员还包括玛丽娜·亨克、杰西卡·亨特和费利克斯·潘。

Our staff also includes Marina Henke, Jessica Hunt, and Felix Poon.

丽贝卡·拉沃伊是MHPR的播客总监。

Rebecca Lavoie is MHPR's director of podcasts.

本期节目的音乐来自Blue Dot Sessions，一个乐队名称全由辅音字母组成的团体。

Music in this episode came from Blue Dot Sessions, a band whose entire name is just consonants.

所以我打算试试看。

So I'm gonna try it.

尼克·特恩、Sometimes y、flying、银枫、Yantarian、克里斯·泽布里茨基和Oi。

Nick Turn, Sometimes y, flying, silver maple, Yantarian, Chris Zebritsky, and Oi.

《Outside In》是NHBR制作的一档节目。

Outside In is a production of NHBR.