Dear Eos:
Hello from Utqiagvik, Alaska!
This picture was taken in late February 2024 during the research expedition portion of my yearlong Arctic geophysics undergraduate research class.
In this course, students choose their own research question dealing with the sea ice, and I work with them to build—to MacGyver—their own microcontrollerbased sensors to collect data. Then we head to Alaska to deploy the sensors on Arctic sea ice.
One evening during the trip, the aurorae put on a particularly spectacular display. One of my students—Garrett O’Hara—stood atop a pile of snow and ice, caught up in the phenomenon. He had no idea I was behind him, and I captured this photo of him holding his rock hammer overhead, howling in a “hammer of the gods” moment. His unbridled joy is apparent at seeing hazardous particles from the Sun causing harmless and beautiful high-atmosphere light displays by a happy conspiracy of Earth’s magnetic field and its atmosphere.
In addition to experiencing these bucket list auroral marvels, my students get to do research under difficult conditions in an extreme environment, often surprising themselves at what they could accomplish. Many of them refer to this experience—both the research and living in that beautiful area—as life-changing, and I can honestly say the same thing myself.
—Rhett Herman, Department of Physics, Radford University, Radford, Va.