Antarctica Strikes Back!

Well it has been a long since I posted on my blog and with the end of my season down here quickly approaching I figured I would take some time and put up a little update.

So since my last post I have gone from working nights to working the day shift around Christmas and things down here have been quite interesting since.  Our very last night shift I was out on the snow road between McMurdo and the airfield in the Kress and was able to get the big machine up to speed quite easily with how good the road was, fast forward a week the Kress was parked due to soft snow conditions and that is where things got crazy.  We had a few days right after New Years where the temps were in the 40's and the snow started to melt all over the area.  The transition from the dirt road from Ross Island to the ice shelf melted out into a pool about 18 inches+ deep of water.  The last 3 miles of road into the airfield went soft and started to look like it did last year.  The entry into the airfield had puddles of water 18 inches deep and the walk around town at the airfield because a trek just to get to the bathroom.  The worst part of this, the main runway that the wheeled aircraft (C-17, 757 and Airbus) land on soon turned into a pool of water about 4 feet deep.  So since early January that runway has been closed to all aircraft.  Well what does that mean you ask, well everybody who will be coming down for winter or to work with the vessel will fly in on the LC-130's from Christchurch and those leaving here will have to fly out as well on the LC-130's.  We have not had wheeled aircraft land here since the end of November when we transitioned to Pegasus from the Ice Runway.  Also during all this time the weather and aircraft have always cooperated for us to get all the flights in that we need to.  Some field camps were closed early, other field camps were never even put in.  So even more science has been effected this season.  I now feel bad for everyone who may have to come back down here next year just to finish off their research for their studies and those who may have to be bumped back a year do to it as well.

Not only has the airfield caused problems this year but so has the weather.  The weather that I am speaking of happened just one week ago tomorrow.  There were predictions of a weather system passing through the area as early as last Thursday with high winds.  Normally this isn't that big of a deal but we were in the middle of vessel offload/onload when it was going to hit.  Luckily everything that needed to come off the boat was able to get off, bad news is not everything that needed to get back on did.  During the daytime Thursday the call went out for line handlers to help tie up a few more line to the resupply vessel so it would be more secure, by 12:30 this was complete.  By 8:30pm the winds had hit and things got crazy.  The resupply vessel decided that it was time to leave and leave behind cargo that still needed to get on for 2 reasons, #1 the wind, #2 the ice pier that it was tied up against and everyone was working on started to fail and fall apart.  There were gusts of 50+ knots when the captain said it was time to go.  They decided to wait for the ice breaker to show up and see if they could help pull the bigger vessel out from out bay.  The breaker attempted to get into position 3 times to make this maneuver but failed each time.  In the end after 3 hours of waiting and trying to leave the resupply ship decided to stay in the bay for the night and give it a chance when the winds died down.  At 3:30am Friday I was alerted to the needs for line handling, I went and check out my window and saw that they ship was getting ready to leave but the winds didn't die down.  The big ship tried to go out on its own but wasn't successful and was retied up for the day.  At 3:00pm we assisted with more lines to secure the vessel through Sunday, at 7:00pm the captain heard of an oncoming weather report and decided it was time to go.  We casted off the ship at 7:20pm Friday night with 150 containers and vehicles left behind that were not able to make it onto the boat.  This same storm that came through and the one on Saturday base broken out large chunks of ice from the ice shelf that we drive on and our runways are located on, had damaged both the fresh water intakes here at McMurdo and at Scott Base, destroyed our ice pier and exposed parts of the island to water that we have never seen down here before.  This has now put us into a situation were we are locating and trying to get everything together that needs to fly out before winter hits and sent back north on aircraft that can only carry around 10,000 pounds of cargo for the 8 hour flight to Christchurch along with around 700 people that need to fly home on a plane that can carry 44 passengers at a time.  So a logistics nightmare is occurring down here.  Luckily there are individuals who are making sure that we all get out of here safely but so does the cargo that needs to go north.  I am hoping to get out of here on my regular day of February 24th but I may be here a few days longer due to the situation.  I am ok with this and will be going back to the Rockies in March for season #3.  Other than the problems that I have talked about here things are going great down here.

I hope you all enjoy this update and the photos.  Till next time.

Tim

Last week of Nights and Christmas and New Years coming up next!

McMurdo from OB Hill!

So for this weeks update I have decided that I should give a better idea of what there is around McMurdo.  I am not sure why I didn’t do this my first year or my second season.

A “Mining Town” is the best way to describe McMurdo station.  This station originally started in 1956, and the oldest building that still exists here was built in 1959 and houses our coffee house.  The newest structure is a fuel tank that was just built last year.  So from 1959 to the present various buildings have been constructed and torn down as the station as evolved.  The station is not very pretty looking and we see photos of new stations that have been built and you realize this. 2 years ago a group put together by the NSF came down here and put together some recommendations that this station needs to be updated from the standpoint of cost as well as efficiency.  We currently have over 100 buildings on station that provide housing, work centers, storage warehouses, bars, a coffee house, a helicopter hanger, a gymnasium, a cardio vascular room, station management, facilities maintenance, science cargo, field cargo, field support, heavy equipment maintenance, medical, galley, a chapel, power plant, water treatment plant, waste water treatment, waste disposal both hazardous and general trash, a science/research laboratory and the buildings I work out of for Cargo.  We used to have a nuclear power plant but that has since been taken out from fears of radiation leaking from the plant.  There is a new master plan in the works that will take the 100+ buildings and condense the station footprint down to fewer than 20.  Why do this, simple most of the buildings are undersized and out of date and cost more to maintain than to build a new one even down here.  Working in cargo we have to deliver cargo to over 10 different locations depending on what it is.  The new plan will have a centralized warehouse for the science groups, a warehouse for station supplies and a warehouse for galley supplies.  The hope is that they warehouse for science groups will be tied into a new facility that cargo will get so that as the science groups supplies come in it will not have to be handled numerous times before it is even sent out into the field.  This would make our life in cargo a lot easier and we would be better suited in our current small team size where as with the way things are now, the small department that we are there is a bit of a struggle to make sure that we get all the work that we need to done.  This new plan is going to take some time to develop and construct so it might be a while before it is all finished.  I may have to find a way to come back down later in life and see if the changes are made and how this place looks in 40 years. 

So a little more about the station and where I live and where I work, my dorm is in what is called upper case housing.  The rooms in upper case are all suite style rooms that share a shower and toilet with an adjoining room.  Each room has their own sink.  My room this year overlooks the bay, which I am looking forward to when the vessels get here.  So far for the three years I have been here I have gotten lucky with my roommate situation and have had no issues.  I have heard of stories from others and their roommate situations and have been extremely thankful for how lucky I have been.  In my room there are 2 beds, 2 storage lockers, an armoire, a desk and a refrigerator.  We can check out a TV for our room if we want to, but this year I got lucky and was asked to take care of a TV for a person that works winters down here.  So we have a bigger TV in our room than others do.  The rooms are smaller in Upper Case than where I lived my first year but I am happy with where I am living.  The main building on station is called 155 and it houses the galley, store, barber shop, craft room, Human resources, Finance, our rec department, radio station and dorm rooms.  The building was painted blue a few years back and we joke how we should work with IKEA and get some new furniture that would make living here a little nicer in return for us painting a yellow stripe around the building and putting IKEA on it.  The building I work out of is 140 or MCC, this building houses our offices for cargo, shuttles and supply along with a heated bay area for storage and work.  All the buildings have an actual number assigned to them and are often referred to by the number like an address, others have gotten names assigned to them based on what goes on there so like a business.  When you are new to living down here it takes a while to learn and know what someone is talking about but you eventually learn and it becomes just like living at home. 

I hope you enjoy this weeks update and photos.

Tim

This is Building 140 or MCC where I work out of.  The garage door on the right is our cargo bay.

140 walking up from 155

The Gerbil gym, I have been spending more time here this year working out

The outside of Southern Exposure, this is one of the 2 bars.  The bins outside are for trash.

Building 155 that houses the galley, store, craft room, dorms, barber shop and our ATMs.

This is the outside of the coffee house, the oldest building on station.

The chapel.  I went to a wedding here last season.

This is Hut 10, we can rent it out and have a private party if we would like to.  

Building 209, I live on the 3rd floor in the very middle of the building.  

This is my view from my window in 209 from back in October.  It doesn't look a pretty now but it will snow when there is open water.

A view of Mt. Erebus, Mt. Terror and Scott Base from OB Hill.

Enjoying the view from OB hill

New staff=New Airfield

Well the arrival of the last of our staff has signaled the change of our airfield locations.  We are now operating out of Pegasus for the rest of the season.  Everyone down here is not looking forward to this move based on what occurred last season.  The impact to operations when the road and airfield melted is indescribable.  I know the staff that have worked endlessly trying to repair the airfield last season and getting everything back to normal this year.   I hope for them that things go well.  So far we have had a few wind storms come through but nothing that has shown any signs of black dust, so we are keeping our fingers crossed.

We had our Town Thanksgiving celebration last weekend.  The kitchen staff did a great job providing the food for our enjoyment.  It is hard to tell that Christmas will be he soon since we don't have normal commercials on tv here and all the adds in the paper along with the lack of Christmas decorations.  But it will be here before we know it and signaling that we are on the downhill side to the season.  Planning trips post season will begin and the thoughts of fresh food, warm air and our families will start to distract us.  Hopefully we all can keep our minds in check and get our jobs done safely and get home in one piece.

Other than the normal work routine nothing new is going on down here.  So now onto the pictures.

The first 5 I got from a coworker.

This is a satellite shot of the Ice Runway.

These next few are from another coworker that show the before and after at Pegasus and the hard work that they put into it so that we can fly there this year.

 This is the approach to the White Ice Runway, where our wheeled aircraft land.

And this is it now.  A big difference.

This is a core sample from the White Ice Runway.

Now all these photos I took.

The NASA P-3B for Ice Bridge.  Here is a link to explain a bit more about IceBridge and their time here.

http://blogs.nasa.gov/icebridge/2013/11/28/icebridge-antarctic-2013-a-year-and-a-half-in-the-making/

The airfield at 4:00 am

Just a little drifting but no black dust!

Some cool clouds about 2 hours before the last storm hit.

More interesting clouds above Mt. Erebus

The Ninja Hurc Returns

Had to go for the photo op while it is here.

Hope that this finds everyone in good health and spirits.  Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and thank you for reading.

Tim