They say it takes 10 000 hours to master a skill. If that’s true, we have a long way to go, but you have to start somewhere. This morning, the GFI team started conducting our first independent flights with the SUMO, though still under the watchful tutelage of Martin and Christian. It was especially paramount to assert our independence today, as tomorrow our SUMO experts will be leaving, and preparing to head to Svalbard to help with a field campaign there (follow Martin’s blog here). And though conditions became too windy to safely operate the SUMO, we still gained valuable confidence in running our own operations. After tomorrow, we’ll see if that confidence is deserved.