Antarctica

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 First off, this last weekend we celebrated Halloween with a huge party in the gymnasium. It was a blast! I was IceBeard the Pirate accompanied by an owl, a penguin, a tiger, the bearded lady, and multiple other unique costumes. there seems to always be something going on every Saturday night, since the majority of us have Sunday off.

So this past week was chocked full of training. On Monday, a group of us headed out for sea ice training. This consists of digging the snow out of cracks in the annual and multi-year sea ice, then drilling each different part of the crack to see how thick the ice is. We do this to decide whether or not we can drive certain vehicles across the crack without the risk of falling through. They do these measurements twice a week and store the data to track trends and to warn the other drivers. In the picture above we are trying out the old manual drill, but we later used a 2-stroke drill.

During this excursion I saw my first penguin! It was probably an adelaide penguin, but it was too far away to tell for sure. We also stopped by the ice cave on the way back to the station. This particular cave is a crack in the toe of the Erebus glacier tongue with sea ice as the floor. When these glaciers (fresh water) meet the sea water they float and can extend out away from the land for quite a ways. They don't necessarily calve off icebergs right as they meet the water. Anyway, the ice cave was kind of little because the sea ice is at its maximum right now. The snow crystals had the walls pretty closed in. 

The next day, I was sent off to happy camper school (Snowcraft I training). We boarded the big Delta transport in town and headed out past Scott Base (the New Zealand base) and on to the Ross Ice Shelf. We gathered in the Instructor's Hut and got lined out for the next 24 hours. We then all headed out to Mound City (remnants of old happy camper camps) and set to work. First we set up the two Scott tents then began building wind walls out of snow blocks.

We also began building a Quincy. We began by piling our gear and shovelling a bunch of snow on top of it, packing it down between layers. After we had about 1.5 feet of snow on it, we let it sit for about 3 hours so the snow could refreeze into its new shape. We then started tunneling in from underneath to access our gear. We pulled all the gear out and widened the snow cave that was left behind. After a bit of work, we had a very suitable shelter for a night in the Antarctic. Two others and I slept in the Quincy and I actually got a little too warm. I suppose I only needed two hot water bottles in my sleeping bag instead of three. The next morning we ran through some scenarios such as what if your vehicle broke down on the ice and you had to use the survival bag, and what to do to try to find someone in a white out. We learned how to operate an HF radio. I tried to hail South Pole but no one picked up, so I contacted McMurdo instead. The whole happy camper training was a blast and made us all feel like little kids making snow forts and such. Very fun.

Spent the next few days working on inventoring RAC tents (modular tents for field camps) and setting up a Weatherport tent, another type for field camps. On Friday, I headed out to Pegasus runway with a surveyor to set some more control points for the new ski-way out there. The big C-17 and some other aircraft have wheels that need a runway, but the Hercs (LC-130s) are ski-equipped so they need a snow runway or ski-way.

Saturday morning, I caught my flight to the South Pole! All other flights got cancelled because of the weather in their destinations, but the Pole was clear so we got out of McMurdo. There were only 10 of us on the flight and a lot of cargo. As to be expected the Pole is cold, but not too bad. Its been around -45 and a windchill of -73. The sun is shining and you can see for eternity out on the horizon. Flat white in all directions with the exception of the drifted snow forming sastruga. I finally have my own room compared to the 25 bunk room in McMurdo. I gained 10000 feet since leaving McMurdo, and I am still acclimating to the change. Was a bit light headed when I first came in, but now I am feeling better and my pulse is still down (which is a good thing). I walked out to the geographic South Pole and reached it at 19:19 on Nov 7th. That's all I have for now. Sorry about the long blog, I had to get caught up! Stay warm!

Posted by Eric at 03:19 PM | Permalink

A little video on YouTube...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sum6qsiI0DE

Posted by Eric at 06:54 PM | Permalink

I’ve been at the South Pole for about a week now. As far as work goes, 8 other GA’s and I have been moving a lot of snow. We shoveled off the fire escapes and walk ways, we dug out a bunch of cables needed for the Ice Cube Project (a huge study of neutrinos in the Antarctic), we cleaned out the LO arch of drift snow, etc. We also went out to Ice Cube drill camp one morning and helped the sparkies (electricians) string out huge cables for the 3 generators out there. Wrestling the HUGE black cables was not easy and took about 6-8 people to roll them out. We were in Condition 2 for weather, the wind moving over 20 knots, and blowing snow reducing visibility. The temp was actually pretty warm that morning, about -18. Later that day we set a new temperature record high of -12.6F for 11/12/09; blew the old record out of the water by 5 degrees.

I haven’t heard much on my trip out to AGAP field camp. My supervisor, Shaggy, is stuck in McMurdo because the weather got really bad there. Apparently they are having 50 knot winds in town, and condition 1 (whiteout) all over the place. So, no flights for a while out of there. But when those planes do come in, they will be carrying almost the entire AGAP camp staff, and our 10^th and final GA. So when they come in, I’m sure I’ll know a lot more and things will get rolling.

Yesterday, I was on fire-watch for the pipefitter/welder. Besides helping out string the welding lead and ground through the arches, my job was to stand there and make sure that the station didn’t burn down. The worst part about it was the getting cold from just standing there.

To get to the arches you have to descend 71 steps down the “beer can” which is a big metal tower that reaches from the top floor of the station to quite a ways under the snow. It connects to some under-snow tunnels that lead down to the power plant, carpentry shop, and heavy machinery shop. The temperature in the arches is usually colder than outside. It was only -35 or so the few days we were down there, but it can easily reach -60. The nice thing is the lack of wind.

The LO arch is a huge Quonset style structure that is connected to the tunnel. It’s still under construction, but will be used for storage. Yesterday in the afternoon, we were assembling the shelving that goes in there. Trying to assemble small nuts and bolts at -35 is pretty hard. I had to have just my glove liners on with hand warmers in them. My palms were sweating but my fingertips were getting numb. It wasn’t too bad though.

There is also the Ice Tunnels, which run from the main station clear out to summer camp, some 2500 feet. Back in there the temp is always around -65. The tunnels are used to get piping out to summer camp and back. There are a few odd monuments back in the tunnels. I haven’t been back there, but I’ve heard stories of a full size frozen sturgeon that was a gift from the Russians back in the 70’s in exchange for blue jeans and other needed items. I think the Russians intended on the South Pole people to eat it, but they made it a mascot instead. There is also a frozen pig head monument back in there that is all decorated with various items. And of course the rumors of aliens living somewhere back those tunnels.

One more cool thing about working in the arches is the potential for sweet ice beards. With the lack of wind, the moisture from your breath just hangs around you and adheres to all of your hair. I’m constantly working on better and better ice beards.

P.S. I changed the blog so people can make comments now. So please do! Just click on the little comments link below a certain blog and then go to the bottom of the page.

Have a good weekend!

Posted by Eric at 08:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So, my flight got changed (as it always seems to do) and I’m flying out to AGAP today.  Because that’s happening, I’m jotting down a rushed blog to fill everyone in on the last week’s doings.

The weather has been hanging around the mid -30’s with the exception of yesterday when it reached down into the -40’s. The wind has been light, and the sun has been bright.

On Monday this week, I headed out to IceCube again with a few others to uncrate some big rolls of cable and to assemble some sunshade frames for the “Ice Top” tanks. These tanks are used to make ice blocks that are frozen slowly to make for very clear ice. I’m not exactly sure what their purpose is yet, but it has something to do with the Nuetrino Telescope.

The rest of the week consisted of shoveling out on the berms, and helping out with the food pull.

The Food Pull is a big push to move all the South Pole’s warehouse of food (currently housed in the Old Station – the geodesic dome) into the LO Arch and onto the shelves we helped construct last week. There is a ton of food and its all frozen solid. Working inside the old dome has been awesome, it’s a shame that it has to come down. So yeah, the old station (dome) is being deconstructed this season. A few of the GA’s will switch over to “night” shift to help out.

I, however, am flying to AGAP this afternoon and won’t be back until sometime around Christmas. So, an early Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas to everyone, just in case I miss the holiday. I don’t think I’ll have any internet access out at the field camp, so my next blog will be at the end of December. Have a good end of the year, everyone!

Posted by Eric at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)