Back on the Bandwagon?

Okay.  I have definitely fallen off the bandwagon, but I haven’t fallen off the face of the Earth!  I can’t believe I haven’t written in almost two months!  The time has absolutely FLOWN here!  My New Year’s resolution was to keep my blog up to date this year.  Well, since that didn’t really work, I’m making that my ‘winter resolution’.  Winter, when the station officially closes, is going to feel like a completely different year, so I’m making resolutions for that instead.  I can’t make up for two completely silent months in this blog, but I’ll do my best to write the gist of what has happened here during the second half of the summer at South Pole…

Air Drop

About a week before Christmas the annual air drop took place.  The Air Force gets to use South Pole as a guinea pig for new supply air drop procedures and inventions.  They also get in some good training.  This year, sixteen pallets of food were shoved out the back of a C-17.  About a week before the actual event we began the preparations.  Since I am on the winter air drop team (just in case we need emergency supplies in the winter, we have a team set up to lead the ground logistics), I got to help with preparations and learn the differences between summer and winter air drop procedures.  The winter team went out the day before the drop and planted flags at the corners of the winter drop zone where we would place burn barrels to mark the area in the dark.  Although the winter drop zone was in place, the Air Force wasn’t authorized to drop a package there – the winter zone is directly on the skiway – I’d hate to see a pallet crash land and put a huge crater where our planes land everyday!

The actual air drop was amazing.  The summer drop zone is almost two miles away from the station,  near the ‘southern’ end of the skiway.  The day of the drop, the skies were clear, but there was an abundance of ice crystals precipitating which created the most amazing halos and other optical displays.  At one point, there were two halos, prominent sun dogs, and several other points of light shooting out from the sun.  The optics made for some dramatic photos, but the ice crystals obscured the view of the air drop from the station.  In fact, the C-17 first did a low and slow pass right over the skiway where the winter drop site was located and the ground crew couldn’t even see it!

After the first ‘buzz’ of the station, it was drop time.  The plane had some mechanical issues which delayed the drop for several minutes, but they finally got it together and made the approach.  Because of our close proximity to the drop site, the direction and speed of the wind, and low altitude of the C-17, it looked like the aircraft dropped the packages right over the top of us!  It was amazing.  Eight pallets were deployed at a time.  During the first pass, two parachutes became tangled around eachother and did not fully deploy.  Pallets weighing several hundred pounds without parachutes drop like rocks!  While the other packages with parachutes experienced a slower descent and relatively ‘soft’ landing, these two crashed into the snow, creating huge craters!  The second pass went better – only one ‘chute failed to deploy.  That one again rocketed out of the sky and made contact with the ground in a cloud of snow, deeply burying itself.  Once the two passes were completed, it was time to get to work.

Parachutes attached to packages are dangerous on the ground.  They are HUGE, heavy, and can remain ‘inflated’ on the ground in the wind.  It is important to remain safe and recover the parachutes quickly.  Luckily, by the time we arrived at the drop zone, all the parachutes were completely deflated and were patiently waiting to be recovered.  Folding a parachute is a job which takes several people – these chutes have a lot of fabric and cord, so they weigh a lot!  The fabric is ‘cigar-rolled’ and folded around the parachute cord, which is first ‘daisy-chained’,  which is pretty much a chain stitch in crochet (nerd alert!).  It was easy to recover the parachutes which deployed, but those which didn’t were thoroughly buried in the snow.  When the packages landed, they didn’t land upright and the parachutes were wrapped around and pinned underneath the boxes.  Ugh.  It was too much work to do by hand – heavy machinery was brought back later to dig out the doomed packages. 

A few goodies were dropped down to us from the C-17 crew – on the first package we recovered, a large stuffed-animal penguin was attached!  We named him ‘Winchester’, after the term used by the Air Force to indicate an aircraft has dropped its entire load.  At our second pallet we recovered, we found a pair of ski goggles that were accidentally dropped.  We were able to give these back to the two C-17 crew members who were on the ground with us to assist with operations.  It was pretty funny.  All of the boxes that were dropped were left in the snow for the night and were recovered later on.

Christmas

A few days after the air drop was CHRISTMAS!  Since I have never been away from home at Christmas, this was definitely an experience for me.  The week leading up to the holiday brought many preparations.  Christmas Dinner is one of the biggest events for the galley, so there was much food prep.  We had potato peeling parties, bean snapping parties, brie-making parties, cookie baking parties, etc.  Lots of food parties!  On top of the food, the ‘Race Around the World’ is traditionally on Christmas Day, so there was much prep to do for the 5K race around the station.  Although I am a runner, I decided to ‘ride’ in this race.  My best buddies at the Pole, the fire fighters, operate a large tractor called ‘Elephant Man’ and use it as their fire truck.  With a name like Elephant Man, what else are you supposed to do besides dress it up like an elephant for Christmas?  This might seem like a strange way to ‘run’ a race, but this race is special.  You can run, walk, ski, bike, ride, slide, or any other possible way of propelling yourself around the station.  I thought it would be fun to do it in style!  A few days before the race, Jason and I spent a few hours creating our elephant.  We took some extremely heavy-duty cardboard and cut out gigantic ears, eyes, and a trunk.  We then used construction paper and watercolor paints to complete the elephant look.  The day before the race I sewed a gigantic tail to affix to the ‘rear’ of the elephant.  It was awesome.

The day of the race we got up early and created our elephant.  Jason got the rig running (not always easy when its chilly outside) while I started dressing our elephant.  We used twine to attach all the parts.  It worked out really well, except for the fact that its quite difficult tying knots with gloved hands.  Brrrrr!  An hour later, our elephant was complete!  (photos to follow when we have more bandwidth!)  We picked up some green and red flags from the Carp Shop, grabbed another fire fighter, and proceeded to the starting line. 

We weren’t the only ones riding in style in this race – there was an assortment of motor vehicles at the starting line.  The Ice Cube van, a van with tracks instead of tires, was pulling a huge Roman chariot filled with Polies wearing Roman helmets.  There were several snowmobiles pulling some fantastic sled ‘floats’.  One snowmobile pulled a snowboarder.  There were several other vehicles sprinkled into the decorated rigs.  On the runner side, a huge crowd showed up to participate.  One of our Polies is a professional runner, so he took the lead and was the front of the pack.  Most runners were out for fun, not polar PRs, so there were many costumes and fun accessories.  The best outfit was a complete body suit of white sparkly spandex.  This brave runner wins for that in my book!  He blended in pretty nicely with the snow…

The race was a blast – when they started the race, the runners and skiers took off, and the drivers and riders sprinted to their vehicles.  Unfortunately it was really only a race for the runners and skiers.  It’s a little too dangerous racing huge bulldozers, tractors, vans, and snowmobiles.  We had to stick to the 10mph speed limit, so it was more of a parade for us.  It was so much fun!  The course for runners ran right next to the vehicle course, so I spent most of the ride yelling out the window at the runners – encouraging them, of course!  It was also a lovely tour of the station, going to some of the outer areas that I don’t usually get to see or drive by.  At the end of the race, we parked at the finish line and cheered on the runners and skiers.  What a wonderful way to spend Christmas morning!

Immediately after the race, it was brunch – easily the best meal at the South Pole.  The galley went all out with the food – delicious!  After eating brunch with friends, I ran out to work to complete my normal daily tasks and calibrations.  As soon as I was done with work , it was time to run inside and get ready for Christmas Dinner.

Dinner was amazing – even better than Thanksgiving!  We had beef wellington that was to DIE for.  After dinner, the evening was pretty chill.  There was a large dance party in the galley, but I didn’t attend.  Instead, I spent the evening in the lounge playing pool and visiting with friends.  It was a lovely Christmas!

I’ll write more later… running out of interweb time!

Bombs Away!

The air drop finally occurred last night!

Yesterday afternoon the entire air drop crew assembled at Cargo for a safety brief – this included the entire Cargo department, plus the seven of us winter-overs that make up the winter air drop team. It was a full house! During the meeting, Paddy briefed us on what to expect, the sequence of events, and what was expected of us. Our C-17 crew, Mike and Scott, also gave us an inside perspective to the air drop – what we would see if we were in the air, and what we should see from the ground. We then waited for the plan to depart from McMurdo, but in the meantime the crew enjoyed a hearty plate of nachos. Those Cargo folks don’t mess around.

Finally, we got word that the plane had left. We departed soon after to make our way to the drop zone. The C-17’s commute from MCM to NPX (McMurdo to South Pole) is much shorter than the C-130. It takes a Herc approximately 3 hours for the transit, but the C-17 accomplished the trip in less than two hours last night. Since we are super-slow in our tracked vehicles on the ground, we must leave at least an hour before the scheduled drop. This gives us half an hour to travel to the site, and then half and hour on the ground to prepare. Once the convoy consisting of the LMC, Pisten Bully, and snowmobiles arrived at the drop zone, our preparations consisted of hanging around, staying warm, playing in the snow, and enjoying the spectacular sun dog show that the blow snow and ice crystals provided.

Finally the plane made it near the station… and then a Twin Otter squeezed in ahead of the C-17 to land. This delayed us by a few minutes. When the Twin Otter was safely on the ground, the C-17 made its first pass. Since they weren’t authorized to actually drop a package in the winter drop zone (on the skiway!), they practiced a fly-by instead. Of course, at this point in the evening, the visibility had dropped significantly. From where we were about two miles from the station, not even the farthest buildings from the station were visible. Our view of the flyby wasn’t great. They came through fast and low to simulate the drop – the pilots were telling us that they would approach the station at about 800 ft, even in the winter without the same visuals. It was quite impressive.

Then it was our turn. We waited for them to turn around and line up on the summer drop zone. And we waited. And waited. How long does it take to turn a plane around? It turns out they had some sort of mechanical issue on the plane that delayed the drop for a while. Finally we heard that they were ‘go’ and were headed our way. Authorization to drop was given from the ground crew, and the drop proceeded. Because of the direction and speed of the wind (it was picking up!), it felt like the plane dropped the packages right on top of us! Really, they were offset a little bit, but it was still quite exciting. They came through at an altitude of approximately 1000ft, opened the back, and slid out 8 pallets at a time. On the first deployment, two parachutes got caught in eachother, so the packages fell connected at a very fast rate. It was quite the explosion of snow when they reached the ground! On the second pass, one pallet’s chute didn’t deploy at all. That was another spectacular finale for that package! Once the packages were dropped at the plane was ‘Winchester’ (nothing left to drop), the C-17 did a few more flybys of the station before departing. Then it was our turn to go to work.

The crew jumped back in our vehicles and proceeded into the drop zone once it was declared safe by the C-17 crew. There were a total of 16 boxes to recover. Last night we only recovered the parachutes. There was no DNF (do not freeze) cargo dropped, so there wasn’t too much emphasis or urgency with the recovery. To recover the chutes, we broke up into teams. First, the chute must be detached from the package. This entails removing a shackle. Then the parachute is ‘cigar-rolled’ to control its huge mass. The parachute lines are bound together and daisy-chained to contain them as well. From there, the whole thing is rolled up and put in a box dragged on a sled for transport. On one of the parachutes Grace and I picked up to take to the box, it unraveled halfway across – I ended up tangled in the parachute and lying in the snow once we arrived. It was hilarious. We also recovered some other items from the drop – the crew sent a large stuffed penguin down with the first package my team recovered (he was later named ‘Winchester’), and we also found a set of ski goggles that one of the C-17 engineers lost by accident. The recovered goggles were sent back with our C-17 ground crew back to their owner.

Recovering the failed parachutes was a little more interesting. On the two that tangled together, the crew had to dig down about four feet to free the parachutes. On the chute that didn’t deploy, the box obviously did some crazy aerobatics and crashed upside-down in the snow. We dug down through the crater to the box, but there was no way we could remove the parachute. Instead, we marked the location for someone to later return with heavy machinery to pull it out. Yikes. All the packages will be recovered this weekend with loads of help – and big bulldozers!

All-in-all, the air drop was a fantastic experience. Not only was it amazing to see the accuracy of the Air Force with their air drops, but it was also important to get a feel for what to expect in the winter if we need an air drop. Winter air drops are strictly used for emergencies, so we really hope we don’t need one. Plus, although yesterday’s drop was a blast, we had perfect conditions. -17 F, sun, and about 17 kts of wind is much different from winter conditions where it will be -80 to -100 F in the dark. Keeping ourselves warm will be difficult, finding the packages will be difficult, and recovering the packages will be difficult. A fun maneuver in the summer is quite dangerous in the winter.

Although its not officially the weekend, it feels like it. With the air drop over, that’s a lot less stress on everyone. Our mass casualty drill was also postponed until next week, taking a large load off my shoulders. We have a busy flight schedule for the next two days, and we need at least 2 hours between flights, since we’ll be on the skiway. Add in the nasty weather that’s bearing down on us, and its not a good time for a drill.

This weekend is going to be fun – tonight there will be a rousing game of paper telephone, quite possibly the most amazing and hilarious game in the world. Tomorrow is Round 2 of James Brown Bingo (a crazy event not to be missed), and then a screening of ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ in the gym – costumes included. I’m excited to wear the wig I brought down. I was told a good wig is an essential item to pack for the South Pole. Good stuff.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

December Happenings

Ahhhh!  Again I slack at the blogging.  I apologize!  Things have been quite busy here since Thanksgiving – the Pole is definitely in the full swing of the summer season!

Things have been good at work – all of our instruments have been running well (knock on wood!), we are starting to receive cargo, and we’re also starting to ship out cargo.  Life is good.  Andy left two weeks ago to spend the holidays at home.  Patrick has replaced him, but leaves next week.  Its been really nice having friends rotate through – not only is it great to see various people, but its also wonderful to pick their brains for useful information.  Over the last few weeks we have also an increase in visitors.  There have been several people who have come out to see what we do at ARO from the station.  Additionally, we have had several groups of distinguished visitors (DV’s) on station.  The US Ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa came out to ARO for a tour.  The National Science Board also paid a visit to the Pole, but unfortunately they weren’t able to make it out to see us; instead we brought a mini presentation and clean air samples to them.  Most recently, we had an Air Force C-17 pilot and load master check out ARO.  More on them later…

The weather has been BEAUTIFUL, so we have gotten a lot of work done outside.  Andy and I raised all of the 2-meter meteorology instruments on our tower.  After several years the snow accumulates, burying buildings, towers, and instruments.  Every so often the instruments must be raised to maintain the 2-meter distance off the snow.  Yesterday Patrick and I raised our albedo rack.  This is a T-shaped stand stuck in the snow that holds 3 solar instruments which look at the albedo, or reflectivity, of the snow.  It was easy to raise our instruments on the tower – that only required wrenches.  The albedo rack was a little more fun.  Patrick and I (ok mostly Patrick) dug a huge 8-foot hole in the snow in order to expose the bottom of the rack post.  It was quite the job.  Once we were at the bottom, we were lucky to have Marco and Joselyn assist us in lifting the entire rack.  We shoveled and packed snow under the post until it was at the correct height.  Then we filled it all back in.  This whole project took from about 10:00am to 3:00pm (including a lunch break).  We were blessed with sun and little wind, so working outside was easy.  During the shoveling I stripped down to liner gloves, a hat, and no jacket.  I never thought I would be so hot outside at the South Pole in -20 degree weather!   After all that shoveling yesterday, I’m a little sore!

On this past Monday the Air Force was supposed to conduct two air drops: a winter and a summer drop.  The main differences between the summer and winter drops are the air drop locations, how the packages are dropped, and out of which hatch they are dropped.  In the summer, we send packages grid South of the station, but in the winter we would direct a plane to send the package over the skiway.  The summer drops are routine because the C-17 is able to open its rear cargo bay hatch and send out the packages by gravity on their sliding mechanisms.  This procedure is well-practiced and is fairly easy for the crew.  The winter is a little more complicated.  The hydraulics don’t work well in the temperatures we are talking about here in the dead of winter (-100F), so the cargo bay hatch cannot be opened.  Instead, cargo is physically pushed out of the paratroop door (the door on the side of the plane parachutists jump out) on the side.  There is no gravity assistance, and its COLD!  To matters more interesting, a winter air drop is done in the darkness.  This is not a problem for the C-17 crew – they are used to this stuff!  It’s a little more difficult for us, the crew who has to pick up the crashed cargo.  Last week we had several meetings to discuss how we would run a winter air drop, how we would set up, and how we would recover the cargo.  In preparation for this week’s drop, the air drop crew learned how to light the burn barrels that will illuminate the winter drop zone.  We also planted flags at the surveyed locations which indicate where our burn barrels would be located.  It was a lovely boondoggle in a pisten bully out about 2 miles away from the station. 

Well, Monday rolled around and the air drop was scheduled for 1800 (6:00pm).  During the day the drop was put on delay, then mechanical delay, then indefinite mechanical delay before being cancelled all together.  Today was their next opportunity, but it turns out the C-17 needs a part shipped in from the US and there is no way that part will arrive today.  Tomorrow perhaps?  In the meantime, the C-17 air crew (pilot and load master) who came to assist on our side of the air drop are loving their mini vacation at the South Pole!  They are a great group of guys, and we are very glad to have them!

The ERT team (emergency response team) is in full prep mode this week.  On Friday we are scheduled to have our annual mass casualty drill.  I can’t speak too much about the prospective incident, but I know it will involve a mock plane and several people down.  It is going to be a real test of the system we have set up.  I’m nervous for the event, but I’m also pretty excited for it.  We’ve put in a lot of hours hashing out how we would handle several serious injuries at once, including initial response and transportation, so I’m looking forward to see how everyone handles it.

Other than work and emergencies, I’ve continued to have a lot of fun down here.  The weekend after Thanksgiving there was an Open Mic night at Summercamp.  It seems half the station crammed into the Summercamp lounge to see our fellow Polies show off their musical talents.  And a talented group we are (myself not included!).  I was completely blown away by my co-workers, friends, and peers!  I was very much inspired to continue my goal of learning at least a little of the guitar this winter.  We had extremely talented guitarists, a keyboard player, a banjo player, and a few other types of instruments.  There were soloists and groups that performed.  It was wonderful.  The music ranged from folk to bluegrass, to classic rock, soft rock, you name it.  I had a moment of “Whoa.  Here I am.  In a tent.  Its -40 degrees outside.  I’m listening to awesome music with my friends.  I’m at the South Pole!”  I have those moments every so often where I have to take a step back, assess my situation, and remind myself I’m at the bottom of the world! 

I’ve also kept up with my swing and salsa dancing.  We’ve been learning more and more advanced moves, but we are also gaining attendance during class.  I think a lot of people think dance lessons would be silly or stupid – but that’s until they try it.  I was able to convince several friends to attend a class, and now they are hooked.  Or at least they are having fun and don’t feel so silly.  It was awesome the other night at the Carp Shop party – a rock song was playing (I forget, but something on the hard side of rock), and my buddy and I were able to salsa dance to it – and I think we looked pretty good!  I was impressed with our ability to make the salsa fit into that situation and not completely screw it up.  Dancing is definitely a good skill to have.

Christmas, although it doesn’t feel like it down here, is right around the corner!  Some people have done a little decorating: the galley dish pit is very festive, and Comms went all out on their side of the building!  Its nice that Christmas is on a weekend this year so we can actually celebrate it on a weekend.  Like Thanksgiving, there is a feast and a party.  But before all this happens on Christmas Day, there is the Race Around the World, a race around the station and grounds.  This is a crazy race: you can either walk, run, ski, bike, board, ride, or whatever you can think of.  I am trying to convince the fire fighters to let me ride on their rig for the race.  The fire ‘truck’ is named ‘Elephant Man’, so we’re going to decorate it like an elephant.  I think I know what I’m doing Sunday.  A little sewing, anyone?  I want to make a big trunk to strap to the front!  Plus ears and eyes.  And probably a tail.  Nice!  Christmas, although not at home, is going to be a blast, I think!

Tonight is ARO movie night and we are showing a modern New Zealand classic:  Black Sheep.  This is not the 1996 Chris Farley Black Sheep.  Oh noooo… this is the 2007 zombie sheep flick.  Basically, New Zealand has more sheep than it has people.  Imagine the sheep becoming infected or genetically changed, and craving human flesh.  It is going to be fantastic!  I’m secretly glad the C-17 is still missing parts, so the film can be shown tonight!

That’s about all that is currently going on around here.  We’re free from the Christmas buzz at the South Pole.  There are no radio or tv commercials, no ridiculous holiday displays at stores, and so far no real Christmas music.  I hope you’re all enjoying it back home!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving at the Pole was FANTASTIC!  Holidays are a community effort down here on the Ice.  Everyone pitches in to help out and make things run smoothly.  The week before the big dinner, there were several sessions of community preparations.  One night about 15-20 people pitched in to bake pies.  We baked in epic proportions.  I helped out with the pumpkin pies, as those are my favorite.  I have never added gallons of pureed pumpkin to a bowl before!  And it was definitely not a bowl – more like a cauldron.  I stirred the filling with a HUGE whisk, and it required two hands.  It was awesome.  The next night there was the potato peeling party, which was more like vegetable cutting and prep. 

Last night was our Thanksgiving dinner.  There were three different shifts because we have so many people on station.  I was in the first seating with the majority of my friends – it was a blast!  Before dinner, the ladies got dressed up and it felt like we were going to the prom.  I found some killer red pumps in skua and tested those out – success!  Everyone arrived in the hallway outside the galley 30 minutes before the start of dinner for h’ours d’oeuvres (sp?), music, and mingling.  Then we proceeded to dinner.  I was shocked by how beautifully-decorated the room was.  All it took was some lighting, table cloths, candles, and a fake fire on our tv displays to turn the galley into a fancy banquet hall.  The food was served buffet-style and we had wine and pie stewards running around keeping our glasses and plates full.  It was quite different than my normal Thanksgiving dinners and was quite a treat!  I loved it!

After our seating, I took an hour off to work off the delicious turkey dinner with a few games of fooseball in the lounge.  It was great.  After some play time, I returned to the ‘hall’ to help clean, get another seating ready, and serve wine and pie.  It was a blast volunteering, but I think next time I am going to work in the dish pit cleaning dishes.  They really had a party going in there – disco lights and all!  The party migrated later on in the evening to SummerCamp, where the dancing didn’t cease until after 4:00am.  All in all, it was a great event!

Ok... its been a while!

Okay.  As has been pointed out to me by several people, I have totally fallen off the blog bandwagon.  Sorry!  Its actually a good thing though – things have been great here!  Where to begin?

Well to start off with, my baggage made it here!  It was amazing unpacking everything and then picking out an outfit the next day.  The boxes I shipped myself also arrived.  My bed is officially the most comfortable in the station!  I have a memory foam bed top, down comforter, and flannel sheets.  Its heaven.  Seriously!  The bad part is that it seems that ALL my boxes arrived at once!  I had several people ask me how many winters I plan on staying.  Ooops.  After living so long with so little, I realized how overboard I packed!  And there are more boxes on the way… oh well!  I plan on making a large donation to skua at the end of the winter (the community pile of odds and ends free for all). 

The previous NOAA winter crew left!  Andy and I have been flying solo for several weeks at ARO without major issues!  We’ve fallen into a good routine, and I’m feeling pretty comfortable with the basic job.  This is a good thing – Andy leaves in a few weeks and Cully comes in.  Then I’ll be alone at ARO for a few weeks – over Christmas and New Years. 

The Emergency Response Team has been working pretty hard here the last few weeks.  We are ironing out all the bugs in the system and getting trained up.  There is a lot of experience on the team to draw from – its fantastic.  The aircraft fire fighters have also been awesome.  They are excellent teachers and have been an integral part of our training!  They have also stood in and observed our drills, giving us constructive criticism in our drill debriefs.  We are slowly coming together.  We had the opportunity to test our system in real life a few nights ago.  At 2:00am on Sunday night we had a fire alarm trip in the garage.  We all jumped

People arrived!  TONS of people!  When I first got here, there were about 80 people on station.  Now there are 232!  Its just crazy.  The station is full, and the Jamesways are near their capacity as well.  The rumor is that we are going to top out at 250 people this season.  Its amazing seeing how many people it takes to support the science that occurs here – and its really cool being a part of it.  We have plumbers, carpenters, electricians, dishwashers, chefs, HR, heavy equipment operators, fuel specialists, cargo experts, materials personnel, grub luggers, utilities technicians, professional fire fighters, station engineers, power plant mechanics – you name it, we have it!  Everyone is fantastic.  I have met people from all over the county and all over the world since I’ve been here.  Everyone has a fascinating story as well – you don’t get down here by having your run of the mill lifestyle, hopes, and dreams.  Its wonderful talking with the people sitting next to you at meals, hearing where they are from, and what they have experienced.  I love it.

Aside from work, there is TONS to do here, recreation-wise.  Volunteers teach classes every morning and night of the week.  If you’re bored here, its strictly your own fault.  I have been taking part in the dance classes – I’ve been swing and salsa dancing several nights every week!  It’s a blast!  There aren’t too many of us, but it’s a lot of fun to just let loose and learn something new.  I have also been hosting movie night at ARO every week.  Attendance has been improving.  This week’s film is going to be ‘Strange Brew’, a classic Canadian comedy about two brothers on a quest for free adult beverages.  This movie is a little nostalgic for me – we used to play it on Rainier when we were cruising through Canadian waters on our way through the Inside Passage.  Since the station is currently out of beer (good beer, anyway), I thought it was the perfect choice this week.  Saturday nights have been movie night in our Communications Shop – they have a projector, disco ball, and bubble machine.  Good times.  Last Saturday night was the 10^th annual James Brown Bingo.  It is an evening of bingo and craziness hosted by our top chef.  It was pretty insane!  There was a cream pie fight, at least one shirtless guy, and enough yelling for me to begin losing my voice.  I can’t wait for the next bingo night. 

This morning a bulldozer finally made it out to ARO to clear the HUGE drift that was in front of the lab.  We can’t get cargo in or out with the snow in the way.  For about two hours, the dozer pushed snow away from the cargo deck and smoothed out a nice ramp for forklifts to nudge up and take away our boxes.  It was like watching an artist work!  The equipment operator was a PRO!  She did a fantastic job clearing the small mountain and then using the blade of the dozer to make a nice smooth ramp.  In the aftermath of the clearing, there was the perfect setup for a snow fort.  So what did I do?  I grabbed large blocks of snow created by the dozer and began stacking them.  I plan on building a little more each day until I have a superior structure which provides excellent shelter from incoming snowballs.  Not that anyone throws snowballs other than me… but maybe I will when I start ambushing visitors to ARO.  The first test is going to be tomorrow night when my friends come out to watch the movie… Muahahahaha!

We had an Indian traverse group arrive on station yesterday – they came in three GORGEOUS Toyota Tundras retrofitted for Antarctic travel.  They run on jet fuel, have huge tires, and are outfitted to haul huge trailers and complete science during their trek across the continent.  I’m not sure where they started, but they made it here in only 10 days from the coast!  Crazy!  Our traverses which bring fuel take at least a month to get here.  These guys were HAULING.  I saw two of the trucks driving around the Pole for a photo shoot, and they were amazing.  These things are definitely built to float over the snow.  The ride looked a little bumpy, but not terrible!  I can’t imagine traversing the continent in less than a month.  Along the way, they are completing several studies, including looking at aerosols, glaciology, and other things – I can’t remember what their scientists told me this morning during our conversation!

Thanksgiving is this weekend!  Yes – I said this weekend.  We aren’t celebrating Thanksgiving on Thursday with the rest of the world.  Instead of breaking up the week with a day off and then having Saturday being a normal working day and Sunday off, Thanksgiving was shifted to Saturday.  This way, the Raytheon crew gets a solid two days off in a row.  Everyone is pretty excited for that!  So this week is chock full of preparations for the 232-person feast this weekend.  I’m helping bake pies on Thursday evening.  There is also a huge potato-peeling party on the same night.  There will be three different seatings for dinner itself – two for the day crews and one for the night and swing shifters.  I’m helping serve wine at the last seating.  I am attending the first seating, where a good chunk of my friends will also be.  It should be a lot of fun – I’m excited to put on a dress, do my hair, and wear makeup!  It’s the little things… 

That pretty much sums up how things are going here.  I’m loving life.  Until next time…

PS – Hello Ben’s Dad!

Happy Halloween :)

31 October 2010

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from the South Pole!  Today marks my one week anniversary at 90 South, and we are still blissfully happy!  Okay… lame, I know.  Truthfully, everything is still great down here.  After a week of turnover with Johan and Nick, I’m feeling pretty good about them leaving on Wednesday.  There are still things I’m shaky on, but at some point you just have to start doing things by yourself.

Since many winterovers were sure they were leaving Saturday, there was no Halloween party planned.  We were supposed to have two Hercs arrive on station, but two unfortunate events occurred that day: a French helicopter crashed somewhere on the Ice, causing one of our Hercs to be deployed for the recovery mission, and the second Herc suffered an engine casualty soon after takeoff from McMurdo and had to return to the airfield immediately.  Both events left the winter-overs stranded at Pole for Halloween.  At the last minute,  a few of the science techs banded together and created their own party.

The party was a lot of fun!  The party supplies down here are pretty awesome.  We had serious lights (strobe, disco, different colors) run by a real light board, and a serious sound system!  About half the attendees arrived in costume.  We had: 2 pirates, a shark, Indiana Jones, Lucifer, and a man with a beautiful blonde wig.  It was quite funny.  Aside from the winter-overs and a few new summer guys (myself included), the flight crew from a Canadian twin otter that spent the night joined in the fun.  Good times!

Today was busy, busy, busy!  On top of the instruments I am brushing up on, we had to do a little fixin’.  When I left Boulder, I was given a few replacement parts for the Nephelometer, an instrument which measures aerosols and their scattering properties.  I brought with me several photomultiplier tubes and filters for the unit.  One of the components of the instrument was getting incorrect readings – hopefully one of these parts would be the fix.  We first installed the new filter.  This involved shutting down the acquisition system, shutting off the nephelometer, completely unplugging it, disconnecting all of the air intake and exhaust tubes, and taking it down off a high shelf.  Then we took off one of the covers, swapped out the filter and re-assembled the instrument.  Once it was up and running again, we were able to look at the data and see that the problem wasn’t fixed.  Next we replaced the photomultiplier tube through the same process with the same result.  Darn!  We’ve all the trouble-shooting we could do down here for the moment.  Now we just have to wait to hear back from Boulder this week with more ideas…

So we think tomorrow is the BIG DAY.  Aka the first Hercs will probably arrive!  There are four flights on the schedule – two with passengers arriving, one taking passengers away, and two presumably with fuel and cargo.  Very exciting!  All of us that arrived by Basler (about 50 of us) are anxiously awaiting our luggage (as I’m sure you gathered from my last few posts).  I’m also excited to see the friends I made in fire school!  Keep your fingers crossed that the weather will cooperate in McMurdo and that the planes actually run!

Hooray for showers!

The ozonesonde launch went well yesterday – it was wonderful having the entire process thoroughly explained and then launched in one sitting.  It was also fantastic seeing the data which resulted from the launch.  The ozone hole is still depleted over Antarctica, but it is showing promising signs of its annual breakup.  Very cool stuff.

Today I took my first shower since I reported to Pole.  You may think that’s disgusting and unbelievable, but water is very scarce here.  We are allocated two showers per week, two minutes each.  Amazingly enough, it is so cold and dry down here that you really don’t get THAT dirty in a few day’s time.  Contrary to popular belief, we don’t all smell like Appalachian Trail through-hikers.  Even when you’re working hard, its still -40 to -50 degrees outside, so your body is pretty much maintaining.  It did feel wonderful to wash my hair though!  Like any 2-minute shower, you have to have a plan of attack going in.  I found it worked well to soap up as much as possible sans water, jump in for a few seconds, lather, and then spend the rest of the allotted time rinsing.  I have never put so much thought into a shower before.

After my shower, which was by far the highlight of my day, I spent the rest of the day at ARO continuing to learn the ropes with Johan, Nick, and Andy.  I feel much more comfortable after today’s time out there.  Its all coming back and I’m beginning to have a decent grasp on the job.  This is a good thing – Nick and Johan leave next week!

Our bakers made the most AMAZING dessert tonight:  a chocolate and raspberry truffle cake with white chocolate icing.  I thought I had died and gone to heaven.  Wow.  I can’t wait until my body has adjusted enough to the altitude so I can hit the gym!

The forecast looks decent tomorrow for flights – could this be our day?