An update from Verena: After a highly productive 24hrs collecting almost 90m of core the drilling rig was hit with a broken hydraulic line. Drilling is currently halted while the team attempts a temporary fix until the replacement parts arrive on Sunday. However... 2B is currently at ca. 266 mbs and the the drillers have a plan to attempt to punch through the aquifer zone that put an early end to hole 2A.
Progress continues at Chew Bahir. Hole 2B is past the sands and back into the clays with excellent recovery - currently at ca. 215 mbs. The weather is stable, but mosquitoes are in full force after the rains. The UK team (Henry, Erin, Jullien) also just arrived on site.
A good day in Chew Bahir. Smoothly switched from the PQ (lake) to HQ (standard) drilling system and ended the day near ca. 140mbs. Still mostly clay with several potential tephra layers as well. Major thunderstorms and lightening surrounding the basin may be bringing heavy rains soon though. Hopefully nothing that halts progress for too long though. Stay tuned!
Field update: Slow but steady progress at site 2B. Down to ca. 88 meters with good 2A gap coverage and, despite several sandy intervals between 40-90mbs, the majority of the core seems to be good mudstone material.
News from Frank at the drill site today. The team has started drilling the twinned hole a few meters away from the first site and were down to 30 meters as of evening shift change on the 19th. More rain at the drill site delayed progress but drilling is now proceeding again. The plan is to drill this hole down to a depth of 260m, where the sands that ultimately stopped progress in the first hole began.
An update via Frank: Drilling has stopped at the current site at 281m with 87% recovery after encountering an arteisan aquifer, but they are happy overall with the material recovered from the first site. They will now shift ~20m away to get a duplicate/overlapping core to help fill in gaps from the first core.
Good news from Ryan at the drill site! Current depth: 264.38 mbs. HSPDP-CHB14-2A is now the deepest of the HSPDP campaign! The water truck returned last night around 6:30PM and delivered a full load of water. Drilling resumed ~ 7:00PM last night and continued until ~2:30AM reaching a depth of 245.58mbs. The water truck returned this morning ~11 AM and drilling resumed to current depth. Unfortunately the tool is currently stuck in the BHA due to a sandy layer that has flowed over the tool preventing the overshot from retrieving it so we are now tripping all of the HQ rods out of the hole. Drilling will hopefully resume when night shift starts ~9PM tonight-assuming no major issues getting back to bottom. Good news for today, however, is that the second water truck has been freed from the mud and arrived a few hours ago with another load of water. We may receive 2 additional loads tonight as the original truck is on its way back, and this driver has agreed to do another run, returning around midnight. Once drilling can resume after this pipe trip-we may have enough water to operate for 2 consecutive 12 hour shifts. Fingers crossed that the hole will continue to be good to us!
Drilling slowed considerably on the 14th-15th because of problems with supplying water to the drill site and the camp. Once water was supplied to the drill site drilling resumed on the morning of the 15th We were able to drill 2 runs (both clay, full recovery, current depth now 215.58 mbs) before the decision was made to halt drilling to conserve limited water supply.
The Chew Bahir crew is still powering through at the first site, currently down to ~210m with primarily lake clay and total recovery now up to ~85%. Drilling water is still a bit of an issue due to the volume being consumed and transit time to the source being ~5 hours roundtrip, but a second water trucks is on it's way and the hope is that this will allow about 20 hours of drilling per day.
Things improved lithologically right after we decided we would have to move. We started digging water sumps at a new more distal site and made the decision to continue drilling at the first site while the sumps were under construction. However during that time we started getting into much better (mud-rich) sections with less sand so are continuing at the first site for as long as possible. As of yesterday we were down to 142 meters! Material is mostly clay with occasional sand layers and we've encountered at least one thick tephra! Recovery in clays has been good, recovery in sand has been poor- as expected. Now that the formation is drilling nicely-water supply has now become a problem. It's a long supply line to our water source 2 hours away from the site.
An update from Martin Trauth via Frank: Drilling is currently at 65m, but has hit a lot of sand (with inherently poor (~75%) recovery), which is surprising as nearby pilot holes were lacustrine dominated. Also a heavy thunderstorm two days ago slowed things down, but the site dried up the following day. Drilling continued at the site today, but plans are being made to relocate the drill site ~5km to the south along another existing seismic line.
Drilling is about to get underway at Chew Bahir! This is HSPDP's final drill site, in southern Ethiopia. The team is starting to assemble on site. Frank Schabitz, Asfawossen Asrat and company are in the region already getting local permits and documents sorted out and directing the setup at the drill and camp site. They report the weather is good and everyone is looking forward to starting drilling in a few days!
Pardon the long gaps between posts. Communication options are currently slim to none at Chew Bahir. After dealing with some logistical challenges (par for the course), drilling commenced at 6am local time and the team was down to 20m at 7pm. We'll keep you posted as updates come in from the field.
And that's a wrap! Geophysical logging was completed yesterday morning on the Magadi 2A borehole with the loggers and science team arriving back in Nairobi last night. Now time to get the cores exported back to LacCore while the DPI crew finishes demobilizing at the site. Stay tuned for the final drill site at Chew Bahir, Ethiopia later this year.
Just before the shift change last night we hit the basement trachyte in hole 2A, finishing up at ~197.5 meters below surface. We thought about doing an extra few drives to hit 200 even, but the night shift has a reputation of not sticking around if not necessary. We'll sit tight for a few days while we wait for the geophysical loggers to arrive and start on the 8th. Overall the depth to trachyte was less than expected but we have two good cores from different spots in the basin to continue work on.
Started drilling today at Site 2. We had great success and got down ~40m in the first 12 hr shift. Everyone is happy to see lots of trona. Speaking of which, see the photos of the soon to be blockbuster viral graphic novel (courtesy of Anne Billingsley and Emma McNulty), -The Saga Of Trona Man- (what happens when scientists collecting cores in evaporites have too much down time on their hands.
Today the drillers are preparing Site 2 to start coring tomorrow morning. We hope to get a longer and higher resolution section at this new site than at Site 1.
Today we finished putting in the new casing and getting the drill rod back down to near our maximum drilling depth of 125m. We will continue coring from there. Tim Lowenstein left today and was replaced by Nate Rabideaux who arrived yesterday.
The last 2 days have been pretty trying for the drill and science teams. The second hole was bored but not cored down to the 120m level and we got two core sections below that overlapping with our first hole. Then our drill rods broke apart 60m below the ground and we discovered that the casing at the top of the hole had also fallen 9m down into the hole, blocking our attempts to fish out the tools and lost drill pipe. Bottom line was that we had to start a third hole. This has now been started and we have recored the upper portion of the strata, of interest to our sedimentologists. Later this afternoon, once some new drill bits arrive at the site we will drill back down to the 125m level and continue collecting new core. Dan Deocampo left us today but his student Nate Rabideau arrives in a few hours to take his place.
We've been down for 2 days now. Lost part of a tool in the original hole and we could not fish it out, so the first hole had to be terminated. We moved the drill rig about 10 feet over and are now in the process of reaming our way down the prior drilling level. Slow going as we encounter all the nasty chert again!
Yesterday was pretty quiet at the drill site. We had to pour alot of cement and install casing around the drill hole and then let it dry for 18 hours so the day crew knocked off early and got to even go swimming in the Magadi Sports Club pool, which was excellent (we'd been eyeing the pool at dinner time but no one had the energy or inclination to go at night). The night shift had their entire shift off and got thrown of a bit on their sleep and activity schedule. But this morning with the cement set we started drilling again and made great progress, down to 104m by 1PM, with mixed results, some zones of very good recovery and some lousy. For the rest of the day shift we're puting in more casing so the next cores will probably belong to the night shift.
On the 17th the broken subdaptor was taken to the mine machine shop for repair, but because of meetings related to the imminent mine layoffs the repair had to ultimately be done on site. Once the piece was repaired at the end of the day we were able to resume drilling about 5PM. During the downtime the day shift science crew went to visit Little Magadi soda lake about 20 km northwest of the drill site, so that Emma McNulty could collect some nahcolite samples and do some ongoing water chemistry measurements. See pics of our exciting day, which also involved some zebra and grants gazelle sightings and spectacular rift structure scenery. Once drilling resumed we started advancing slowly. Recovery of the interbedded cherts and green mudstones was very poor at first with bits of chert blocking up the liner and loss of mud almost entirely. But as the shift progressed and with a bit of experimentation the drillers got better at collecting samples of this complicated lithology and by the night shift (17th/18th) they were getting up to 50% recovery. The day shift is now back on for the 18th and thankfully so far it is cloudy which makes working here alot more pleasant!
Yesterday was the first day of drilling at Magadi. We had everyone on site (day and night shift for a single 12 hr day shift. Drilling went fine. We went through alternating trona and black sapropelic muds (looks and feels like pipe grease!) plus a few gravel lenses. The changing lithologies were a bit of a challenge for the drilling. We started off with the hydraulic piston corer which went ok until we would hit some trona beds or stiffer clays. Tried switching to extended nose and then eventually to the rotating "Alien" tool, which is what we finished the day with. This seems to be working well at the moment. At the end of the single Sunday shift we were down to 20.76m, which includes about .8m of drill pad so about 20m of lake sediment. Everyone is very happy about that! Today we will probably hit the thick chert layers which will for sure slow us down. We will attempt to core this chert and see how it goes. Magadi is hot during the day amd the sun is intense reflected off the dry salt crust, but it cools off nicely so (for the day shift folks anyway) we will enjoy a nice G&T hour at the end of the shift! Pics to be posted shortly.
Magadi science team is assembled in Nairobi. We're just waiting for Beau Marshall and the other drilling supervisors from DES to arrive tonight and will roll out tomorrow morning for the drill site. DPI drillers at the drill site currently report they have cleared the drill pad, cleaned ad arranged their tools, mixed mud and are ready to go! Tomorrow on arrival we will set up the science camp and should be ready to start drilling on the 15th!
Drillers arrived at the L. Magadi drill site on Sunday June 8 and began setting up (see new photo!). On June 9 our resupply container with drilling equipment shipped from the US finally arrived on site and was offloaded. The international science team will start arriving in Kenya on June 12 and the entire science and DES teams will drive up to the drill site on the 14th. If all goes well we expect to start drilling Lake Magadi on 15 June.
Beau Marshall from DES and Mike Scarpellini from DPI have been visiting the Lake Magadi drill site to make last minute preparations for the start of the next drilling phase of HSPDP there next month. New photos are posted showing the supplementary tent housing that the Magadi mine is making available for the team and current images of the drill pad we have had constructed (water levels have receded considerably since the pad was constructed in December). The drilling team will begin mobilization on June 8 with drilling scheduled to begin June 15. At the moment we are awaiting the arrival of our supply container, which at last word was still on board a container ship standing outside the Mombasa Port and awaiting a berth.
As of March 21 with three successful coring days the team reached a sub bottom depth of 26 m, possibly just intersecting the Eemian, as their extrapolated sedimentation rates and red coarse grained structure visible from the core catchers suggests. Currently the team is waiting for a spare part for the casing which should arrive from Addis over the week-end. The weather conditions continue to be dry, which is perfect for drilling at the site (at the center of the basin)!
The Afar drilling campaign is complete! Weranso core ended at a depth of 245 meters. Combined with the overlying section at Osi Isi, the Afar thickness is on the order of 275 meters stratigraphic thickness, much of it double or triple cored.
Chew Bahir has begun drilling the first of two 50m test holes. At day 2 of drilling they are at 17meters depth with nice cores (update via Sarah Davies). The weather is fine at the drill site and the basin floor is dry. On the 16th of March they successfully set up the drill rig close to the cb05 core site and planned to core the first meters too.
At the end of the PM shift, current depth is 167 meters. Virtually all the shift (32m) was nice mudstone except for the last drive... welcome basalt #3.
After moving the gear to the Ledi site (~13km west of Osi Isi), some local political issues caused us to withdraw before drilling commenced. We are now at the Weranso site (~3km east of Osi Isi), the eastern edge of our original seismic line. Started coring last night and after about 20m of more recent alluvium we are now at about 53m and into mixed lithologies and with good recovery.
Apologies for the lack of Afar updates. After the first hole was a bust a second and third attempt at Osi Isi has come to an end due to a series of equipment complications including a melted/fused bit at the top of the second basalt in the third hole. But not to worry!, they have moved to an alternate location about 13km away where preparations were already under way so hopefully only 1-2 days down time.
Apologies for the lack of Afar updates. After the first hole was a bust a second and third attempt at Osi Isi has come to an end due to a series of equipment complications including a melted/fused bit at the top of the second basalt in the third hole. But not to worry!, they have moved to an alternate location about 13km away where preparations were already under way so hopefully only 1-2 days down time.
The Awash team has made it to 152 m! They've had a few surprises along the way, including a broken wireline and then 25+ meters of unexpected basalt! They are now back in lake sediments and pushing forward.
Drilling at the N. Awash site has commenced! So far with a total of 14 runs 41 m have been drilled! With a brief pause for repairs and maintenance, the rig is now drilling strong. It's hard to see details in the cores, but lots of mudstones are encountered for sure! Pictures will be coming soon!
HSPDP March Madness!! Frank Schäbitz, Henry Lamb, and Asfawossen Asrat, PIs of the HSPDP?s Chew Bahir site in south Ethiopia, will undertake a further pilot drilling at the site next month, March 2014. Their aim is to obtain a 50m core which should span the last 200,000 years, and provide valuable information in advance of the main 400m core to be drilled in November-December 2014. The March campaign, using the equipment and expertise of Addis Geosystems Ltd and advised by DOSECC Exploration Services, will also help realise the objectives of the University of Cologne?s CRC 806 -OUR Way to Europe- Project A3.
The crew had a very busy day today getting the drilling and science equipment from Addis Ababa University to Geosearch?s gear yard. It was a big day with two forklifts, lots of lifting, driving through busy Addis traffic, one big Isuzu, and one big shipping container. In the end, all was loaded successfully and the truck is on the road. After finishing off the day with more shopping and organizing the crew is set for an early morning departure to the Afar.
The last members of the first wave of the science team arrived in Addis this evening. Logistics and planning continue with the loading of drilling and science equipment by Geosearch tomorrow at Addis Ababa University. Meanwhile EthioDer is already setting up camp in the Afar. If all goes as planned the crew will depart Addis and arrive in the field on Wednesday.
Work is underway in Addis Ababa. After an uncertain start to the Northern Awash drilling project, things are looking up! Check in with us for updates and photos of the Awash drilling for the next several weeks. Good luck to the Afar crew and happy drilling!
Following a long period of uncertainty about whether we would be able to find a local drilling company in Ethiopia capable of working with us I am happy to announce that DES has signed a contract with the firm Geosearch, and that we will begin mobilizing for drilling in the Afar later this month. We expect to start drilling at the Oso Isi site, near Mille, around Feb 20 and will be there for about a month. The science team will begin to assemble in Addis Ababa in about two weeks and everyone is very excited to see the project moving ahead once again. This also bodes very well for staying on target with drilling at the other Ethiopian site at Chew Bahir later in 2014. Once mobilization starts we will post some photos! We are also moving forward with using the local company Ethioder to provide logistics support for the Afar camp.
The construction of the drilling pad at Lake Magadi is now completed. We are looking forward to the start of drilling at the Magadi site this coming summer (June-August 2014). The work is being done now to insure that the surface will be dry, compacted and stable when drilling starts. Thanks very much to Marfa Construction and our colleagues at Tata Magadi Soda, Anthony Mbuthia and Luis Kiema, for pushing this work along well ahead of schedule!
HSPDP is featured in two articles in a special issue of the August 2nd edition of Science: Natural Systems in Changing Climates (How a Fickle Climate Made Us Human). Lake Magadi, the final leg for HSPDP is also featured on the cover!
Kenya drill core is on its way to Minneapolis! The final tally was Baringo 210.3m of core in ~228m drilled (226m according to down hole logs), so 94.5% recovery West Turkana. 200.8m of core in ~216m drilled (93.3% recovery) not including a recored interval from 190-199m. We will be having a conference call of the field team leaders for all sites, Dennis, Anders and Jochem to do an evaluation of what went right in Kenya, what the problems were and how we fix them for upcoming sites. Notes from this will be posted on the website. Keep an eye out for upcoming feature article on paleoclimate and human evolution that will be appearing in Science in August. It will feature a discussion of HSPDP!
Science team left the drill site this morning for Lodwar and then flew back to Nairobi. The next step will be getting the cores shipped off to LacCore after the truck arrives a few days from now.
The science crew spent the day cleaning up the site, packing up and waiting for the truck to arrive from Nairobi that will bring cores and supplies back to Nairobi. As of the evening of the 11th it hadn't arrived, so Chris and company are making alternative plans for a truck to come up from Lodwar tomorrow (12th) to do this job. We will need to decide by about 10AM local time whether or not to send for this truck-all attempts to reach the driver of the truck coming from Nairobi have been unsuccessful although we know from Boniface that they made it at least as far as Kainuk, about 4 hours from Lodwar. We also know that the truck is not between Lodwar and Kaitio so the assumption is that it broke down out of cell phone range between Kainuk and Lodwar.
Jochem and Matx arrived about lunch on the 9th, set up, and logged within HQ to 197m (with casing down to 187m). 202m of actually depth, plus the tool and cuttings built on top. DPI tried to jack out casing in the eve/night. On the morning of the 10th, the OSG guys logged in the casing alone and were only able to get down to 112m before it got stopped by the mud/cuttings. DPI spent the rest of the 10th jacking out casing. They were hoping to get it freed and pulled out and then open hole log as much as possible on the 11th. However in the late afternoon of the 10th while attempting to jack out the casing the casing separated and the rig moved. Because the hole is at an angle it then became impossible to remove the casing. So 197m of casing is remaining in the hole and the logging is finished now with only in-casing logs available (i.e. no mag. susceptibility).
