My normal Saturday at the office?
As with almost all of my days here in Antarctica, yesterday was an interesting day. In most of the science camps around Ross Island and the Dry Vallys we use UHF 2-way radios with a telephone interface to connect with the McMurdo telephone network. The telephone suddenly stopped working out at the penguin rookery at Cape Royds a day or so ago. So we left the shop at about 8:00 AM to take an A-star to get it working again. We landed in 30 knot winds at Cape Royds. In a case like this the pilot not only keeps the engine running he keeps the throttle up as we get out so he has somewhere to go (up and away) if it gusts. Well anyway, we got the telephone working again after about an hour or two after getting both ends of the link spruced up. It is a tricky (but good) path using knife edge defraction off Tent Island to get the signal back to town. The winds on the ridge where we have the antenna were about 60 knots. I was again reminded about Antarctica being the windiest continent. There are about 25,000 penguins at this rookery. It is one of the smaller ones of the rookeries on Ross Island. The chicks ae hatching now. The seals are waiting in the water and the skuas are flying around looking to feed their chicks with the chicks of penguins. The penguins are fun to watch. Their body shape and mannerisms form a whimsical and comical experience just aching for a soundtrack. Goofy and "an unintention design" that works are descriptions that fit.
Our pick up flight was delayed because of high winds as the winds picked up over 40 knots at the LZ. You never know how long you will be stranded. It may be for a couple of days. We passed the time and eventually in the afternoon they sent a Bell 212 to pick us up. The winds had diminished to under 30 knots at this point. So we loaded up into the 212 and took off only to run into a fog bank/snow storm. Although the ride was bumpy it was the lack of visibility that forced the pilot to set the ship down (very nicely) at Cape Evans near Scott Hut. We spent an hour or so on the ground. Using weather reports from around the area we found a hole and took off only to have to set down off the tip of Big Razorback island on the sea ice for about 10 minutes. We arrived back at McMurdo just ahead of a significant snow squall and quiting time. Folks listening in on all the radio traffic during our day join you vicariously in the experience. The truck was waiting for us back at the helo pad. That was nice.
The Antarctican
The archetypical Antarctican is a 38 year old male. He has a beard. He has a cross of personalities you are familiar with in American culture. He can remind you of a cast member in a Mad Max movie ready for more adventure in a harsh dusty environment and may appear to adhere to the social norms and rule-of-land although you can't be sure. He wears his sunglass-googles on his hat. His skin makes him look older and tired. You really can't determine if his skin is sunburned, ice nipped, or just dried out and cracking. You determine that if this person just gets a good night sleep he will be ok. This individual is also a little like McGiver. He can fix stuff that desperately needs to be thrown away. He will fix it the right way if he can. If he can't, he will fix it anyway perhaps using advice from another trade after extended discussion over coffee and a blue tray. He wears the same clothes day after day. Except on his day off when he does laundry. He wears a factory aged "Mt. Erebus Ross Island" T-shirt and blue jeans. Othertimes it is the uniform of issued special black carhart bib overalls with a gray polar fleece shirt with a tan neck gaitor around the neck looking like a fashion accessory. He walks heavy. This garb is of course inside buildings, shelters or tents. Big red obliterates any other identifiable clothing otherwise. He showers a couple times a week. Although for some reason he really never comes clean.
I was going to post a satellite image of McMurdo Sound and the ross sea but the clouds are too thick to make it worthwhile. http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?RossSea
Select 250M resolution, zoom in and crop the image. You will see the channel very clearly the ships are cutting (after the clouds dissipate). The image is updated everyday. I am going to look at the pier this morning. The ODEN may be in. The Polar Sea is planning on being in on the 10th. We have had very strong southerly winds the past few days. This is what everyone is hoping for. The brash ice in the channel is moving out to sea and the possibilities of more of the sea ice breaking and moving out is possible. The sound may clear out this year. I think 1999 was the last year it cleared. Already this year the shipping channel is very clear of brash ice. That means orcas will be swimming right up to town.
I just looked at the helo schedule. I have an early launch over to the Penguin rookery over at cape royds. Shackelton hut is also at royds.
It seems sort of weird to want to talk about work all the time. But, then again that is where the majority of time is spent. The other time is largely down-time and although rejuvinating largely uneventful.
We haven't had any planes for a while. People are getting annoyed with the delays leaving the ice. Commercial flight delays are pretty common for sure. The ice flights run on a schedule but the delays differ from commercial since they may be delayed a week or more based on weather and equipment. Hopefully we have a flight in from Christchurch this Saturday, maybe Sunday.
I have a meeting this morning regarding re-deployment (going home). A lot of folks take vacation when they get off the ice. Several people I know will be taking at least a month in Africa this time. It is somewhat common to purchase a round-the-world airline ticket. Generally, you have a year or 6 months to take flights (number of flights limited) around the world. If you start in the southern hemisphere going east you must stay in the southern hemisphere going east. I have heard of stories where people get off the ice and go their seperate ways only to unexpectedly to meet up with others off the ice in places like Mongolia.
The first picture was taken in town as part of my walk to work. The second picture shows a storm we had the other day (very mild for Antarctica standards) in the absolute middle of Summer.
I flew out to the US Coast Guard Polar Sea yesterday. That experience may be difficult to top. The guys with the red parkas and strange footwear were quite a novelty aboard ship. After all, these red parka visitors have been in Antarctica since October and they look like it. The crew of the Polar Sea (120 people) will be getting to town in the next couple of days after they get the channel cleared along with the Oden. Being underway on an icebreaking ship breaking ice in Antarctica was quite a thrill. The ship has three turbine engines producing 60,000 HP. Ice chunks the size of small buildings get blasted away in the prop wash. We continually saw a number of orcas, penguins, skuas,and seals. The crew was excited about all the wildlife and remarked that there was a lot more wildlife to see in Antarctica compared to the Arctic. I have a number of videos that show the power needed to break thru three meter thick (multi-year) ice. When our helo came we had to stop the ship, climb off onto the sea ice by ladder and climb aboard our running helo with our familar friendly pilot to take us back to town. It was a peak experience.
The picture of me with the thumbs up shows Mt. Terror in the background. I was thinking about its summit that I was on a few days ago. Looking closely at the picture off the bow of the ship you can see the Oden a couple miles ahead. The black mound of dirt to the left of the channel is McMurdo (observation hill is a distinctive landmark). The Polar Sea was about 5 miles from town.
I am headed out to the Polar Sea today by helo. We are going to install a couple of radio telephones so folks aboard ship can use the station satellite link and to call into town. It looks like we are really going to get stuffed in on the helo with some other folks.
I will be heading to pole on the 15th. I will get some Diamox from medical before I head down there to help fend off altitude sickness. I am ok at altitude usually. I get a headache and I will not be able to sleep at all for the first night, but it is all part of the experience. The pole is at approximately 10000 feet above sea level, and the polar air is quite thin which makes the altitude equivalent higher. It is a stress on your body making extra blood cells and learning how to breathe for sufficient oxygen uptake.
I have watched more movies on the ice than probably have in the last five or ten years. The thing that consistantly strikes me is the level of violence in these movies, really. I remember Taxi Driver was a really graphically violent movie 20+ years ago and now that would be pretty tame. Even movies like King Kong have graphically violent scenes with people getting eaten by giant bugs. I am of the mind set that folks *wanting* graphic scenes of violence that perhaps maybe a visit to a slaughtherhouse or something will make their day. Where is all this going?
Well, the new year came in ok on this side of the world. I hope it does for everyone else. The New Year is always a time of retrospection. I was thinking about my suspicion (before I got here) that McMurdo ran on coffee and diesel. We go though at least 8 tanks of coffee each morning (just for the breakfast hour). That is approximately 40 gallons. Of course that is not all the coffee consumed each morning by a long shot. It is just a comparative sampling. As far as running on diesel, the station also runs on "Mogas." "Mogas" is Antarctican for gas. Don't ask me. The select fuel of choice is however JP8 jet fuel. (Hmmmm... Fuuellll) Lots and lots of jet fuel. Those planes get thirsty. The fuel folks (fuelies) even have their own radio frequency. I have heard estimates of what diesel would cost at southpole if you take into account the distribution cost of getting the fuel to McMurdo and then to pole (by LC-130 aircraft). It is precious stuff. So, my original thought of the program running on coffee and diesel was right, but it really runs on plain old money. The program costs approximately 320 million a year. My position is that it is worth it. Those 320 million bucks buys some pretty cool dinosaur bones, meteorites, and 9 million year old ice samples (shh. it hasn't been proven yet.) and hundreds of other peaceful scientific projects.
I am working on my 2007 goals. I did pretty well on the 2006 ones considering getting to the ice was one of them. There were others that also got scratched off. The only thing I am absolutely confident about is that 2007 is going to be a great year.
Talking to the folks when I first got here they said that after Christmas it is all downhill. It will be easy and it seems like you are on your way home. The vessels come in and the pace and tone of town changes. All of these statements I personally found to be true so far. I am going to have some cool missions as we wrap things up here for the season.
I got these two pictures on yesterday's hike outside of town. The skua took a very nice bath I have on video. You can see the ODEN breaking its way through the ice over Discovery Hut on Hut Point. The ice pier is just this side of hut point. The ODEN was only about 6 miles away. Our ship will soon be in. After the ODEN the Polar Sea is following shortly after.
