and not necessarily for describing a sequential or chronological order it is to be understood that the terms so used are interchangeable under appropriate circumstances and that the embodiments of the invention described herein are capable of operation in other sequences than described or illustrated herein fig2 shows a probe system 100 for subsurface sampling according to an embodiment of the invention the probe system 100 comprises a probe 30 which in use in one embodiment is advanced through soil by a pushing device such as a hydraulic pushing device not shown a set of pipes 29 connect the pushing device to the probe 30 a transfer line 20 is located in the interior of pipes 29 the transfer line 20 connects apparatus 40 on the surface with the probe 30 apparatus 40 comprises a fluid source 41 connected to carrier tube 11 of the transfer line 20 the transfer line 20 is connected to any suitable equipment at the ground surface for example a detector 42 can be connected to collection tube 12 of the transfer line 20 in use fluid source 41 typically applies a carrier fluid such as a carrier gas under pressure to the carrier tube 11 however the present invention is not restricted to injection of a carrier gas but also includes any other means of passing carrier gas through carrier tube 11 such as drawing the.