Exploring the heart of an icy island.Photographs by Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Arrival
A visiting group of scientists, journalists and Danish environmental officials land at NEEM, the North Greenland Eemian Ice Drilling project. NEEM had arranged for the visitors to examine their research, which focuses on the climatic conditions which shaped the warm geologic period before the earth's last Ice Age, an important clue in understanding global warming.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Icebergs
The tour also included a visit to the coastal town of Ilulissat, home to one of the most productive glaciers in the world. A tour of Disko Bay, outside the town, revealed massive icebergs floating in the water, the product of accelerated melting.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Cemetery
The main graveyard in Ilulissat, just outside the town, overlooks the icebergs of Disko Bay.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Sapphire Blue
Pools of melted water slice through the Ilulissat icefjord, which is fed by the melting Sermeq Kujalleq glacier.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Running Water
Greenland has lost an average of 150 billion tons of ice a year over the past four summers.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Cherished
In 2004, UNESCO declared the Ilulissat icefjord a World Heritage site.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Open Sea
Every year, the Sermeq Kujalleq glacier surrenders around 20 billion tons of icebergs into the ocean. Most of them end up in the northern Atlantic.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
The NEEM site
The camp, located approximately 600 miles north of the Arctic Circle, consists of a Buckminster Fuller-style main dome and a series of residential and storage tents.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Inside the Dome
The project's principal building serves as kitchen, dining room, office and gathering space.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Someone’s in the Kitchen
Inside the dome, the scientists share a dining room and workspace. A lot of their time is spent here, where it is warm and there is often food to eat.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Soup
A sample of some of the offerings from the station kitchen.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
The Experiments
The scientists are drilling deep into the ice, which is 1.5 miles thick, the accumulation of 130,000 years of snow, to help them analyze the last few hundred years of climatic history.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Windshield
A view of the landscape from a snowmobile.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Art
The scientists use spare core samples to construct ice sculptures like this one.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
Refitted
The project's Land Rover has been souped up, arctic-style.Hakan Ludwigson for TIME
