 Day 19 – The AAE has met heavy ice Posted by Chris - 26 December 2013 
 
 Following our successful visit to Cape Denison, sea ice remained clear, allowing our science expedition to proceed to the Mertz Glacier and open water polynya on the other side of Commonwealth Bay. Supported by volunteers on board, our teams investigated marine mammals, ornithology, glaciology while oceanographic work continued on board. Yesterday the team celebrated Christmas and morale is high.
– An Antarctic adventure cruise has become stuck in ice after a storm, and rescue ships are at least two days away—but to judge from the dispatches from the ship, the people aboard don't seem to mind. The Akademik Shokalskiy sent out a distress call yesterday, News.com.au reports, but a spokesman for the Spirit of Mawson, which organized the voyage, says the Russian ship is "reinforced against ice and well adapted to the conditions." The ship is believed to have enough provisions aboard to hold out. Reports differ on how many people are aboard—News.com.au says there are 50 tourists and 20 crew, while ABC has the numbers at 35 and 22—but those "tourists" include scientists, explorers, and historians. "We're in the ice like the explorers of old! All are well and spirits are high. Happy Christmas," the expedition leader tweeted. In a blog post, the ship said it was just two nautical miles from open sea, but powerless to get closer. The timing of the storm was actually fairly fortuitous though; if it had struck earlier, it might have caught the adventurers in the middle of a nearly 40-mile hike across pack ice.