Team Boreal
From Step 2007 Wiki
Our mission, as we chose to accept it, was to walk in the direction the dish on top of the Elvey building was pointing. We went outside and found that the dish was pointing north.
This took us back toward the building, where were asked to find something that represented a scientific endeavor, and explain why.
We found 3 examples of scientific endeavors represented in the vicinity of the Elvey Building:
(1) The mural depicting current understanding of Earth's layers and volcanism.
(2) The sunflowers thriving in the flower bed depict an understanding of horticulture.
(3) The rock wall supporting the flower bed - a marvel of engineering - represents scientific engineering at its peak, and the chemistry involved in the process of producing mortar.
Our second mission, as we chose to accept it, was to stalk an unsuspecting living creature (in our case, a single male) until we encountered evidence of global climate change. We found our evidence dangling from a spruce tree: a spruce budworm. Fairbanks has been infested this year with these nefarious pests, perhaps because of our gloriously warm and dry summer. The budworms are damaging the trees, leaving brown tips on the ends of the branches.
On our return to the Geophysical Institute, we encountered the International Arctic Research Center, where studies of global climate change are in progress.
