Every autumn the Arctic undergoes a radical metamorphosis. As the sun dips below the horizon one last time—not to rise again until spring—the icy seascape darkens, the temperatures plummet, and the sea ice swells into a brutal fortress, so thick that no icebreaker can penetrate it. Research vessels flee south, desperate to avoid getting trapped during the fearsome season. But this year scientists—and a few lucky journalists, including me—will dare to do just the opposite.
