The MONICA Project
The MONICA Project
MONICA is a multidisciplinary project for the MONitoring of Ice within the CAves financially supported by the University of Trieste (Italy) through the FRA 2012 grant (Finanziamento di Ateneo per progetti di ricerca scientifica), and by the Meteorological Union of Friuli Venezia Giulia - NPO. MONICA is carry on thanks to the scientific cooperations between The University of Milano Bicocca and the EUROCOLD LAB laboratory facilities, the italian National Research Council (CNR) at ISMAR Trieste and IDPA in Milano, the Physics Dept. at University of Haidelberg and the Regional Natural Park of Julian Prealps.
Study area of Monte Canin in the South-Eastern Alps
(C) Location and pictures of the monitored ice caves:
a)Vasto ice cave
b)Leupa ice cave
c)Gilberti hut
d)WSA monitoring site
e)Automatic Weather Station of Livinal Lung (Operating since late 1990s)
Intense speleological research activity developed since several decades, especially in the area of Mt. Canin massif. This massif which hosts more than 2000 visited cavities (Muscio et al., 2011) and the “Col delle Erbe” sector presents the larger cave density reaching more than 250 caves/km2.
The Vasto Cave entrance ant 2205 m a.s.l.
The ice deposit in Vasto Cave
A 7.8 m long ice core has been recently extracted from this cave Each 20 to 100 cm long section of the ice core have been immediately stored in plastic bags and preserved thanks to dry ice. The ice samples, thanks to the helicopter, has been subsequently brought on valley and promptly stored in a refrigerated van, made available by BoFrost. Thus the ice cores has been transported intact to the EUROCOLD LAB laboratory in Milan.
