Fwd: Update 3: McMurdo Madness

[Paul Summers]

Hello All!

I'm very happy to report that I made it to McMurdo on Tuesday my time, and that now means that our entire 14 person team is assembled in McMurdo!

This is me in front of our aircraft, a C-17 celebrating the beautiful day that Antarctica had for us. It was perfectly clear, relatively calm, and ideal for flying. This actually started a run of successful flights where McMurdo got 3-4 C-17 flights in over 3-4 days, a very good run of flights for bringing cargo and people to McMurdo. Thus far the whole week has been very calm, which is nice for getting settled and adjusting to the new climate here, which has been roughly in the -10C/10F range.

Here are more photos from our flight from Christchurch to McMurdo, the first is a photo of the red tailed LC-130s which are variants of the more common C-130. We saw the 2 of these that are currently in Christchurch getting ready to fly down to McMurdo, they are actually scheduled to fly tomorrow. If you look closely you can see they have skis as well as wheels, the nose one is particularly noticeable. These are the largest ski-equipped planes in the USAP, and I believe the world. As such, they are critically important to flying people and equipment from McMurdo to places further inland that only support skied aircraft, like WAIS Divide camp (where I'll go through) and South Pole (where I won't go). Between the importance of these aircraft, and the fact they are simply very impressive machines, it is always exciting to see one. The second photo shows you the interior seated view of the aircraft, where we sit with the cargo. I am seated next to a large concrete slab which is a part of the ongoing construction for upgrading McMurdo station, and a large container (or millvan). The millvan I believe had this high altitude balloon payload in it, which is very cool, but we did not get to open and inspect it. Pete alas was not assigned a seat, but he was content to be strapped into my backpack for the flight. For a flightless bird he certainly has done a fair amount of air travel so he is accustomed to this. The final photo is Danny and I and more interior views of the C-17. It is very loud, so we both have both earplugs and noise cancelling headphones on. They also control the climate temp to be comfortable for most of the flight, but turn it way down just before landing so that we won't be shocked by the cold weather upon landing and deplaning. When we land, we actually walk directly down the ladder and onto the ice shelf, a very fun welcome to the icy continent!  

On the flight we also had some beautiful scenery, this photo on the left is of an outlet glacier flowing out to the Ross Sea between snow covered mountains. We are flying at 30,000 ft in this photo, and the linear shadow is our contrail. I'm yet to figure out exactly which glacier this is, but it is likely over a mile across. The scale of things here can be a little overwhelming but is beautiful to see from the air. The final photo is us boarding the vehicle that brings us to McMurdo base over about 45 minutes of snow roads and then dirt roads. This is called the 'Kress' and is mainly used for hauling heavy cargo, but can also carry the large passenger trailer that we loaded into. Note the massive tires that let it drive on snow covered roads. 

Once in McMurdo, it's been a mad dash to get everything done. I'm honestly shocked it's been less than a week so far as each day has felt like a week of its own. Antarctica is both cold and remote, so even the little things can be surprisingly difficult, but we have a great team here that is adaptable and up for the challenge. A good example is that McMurdo is currently very low on working trucks at the moment, which makes moving heavy loads around the station very difficult. Thankfully, some smaller Mules are available for use, and you can see on the left here that even though the bed is small, it has unlimited vertical and horizontal space if you pack it right. Thankfully the roads are very wide here and other traffic is limited. These big red things are siglin sleds that we will tow behind our snowmobiles. They are heavy duty plastic, 12-14 ft long, about 50lbs a piece and very awkward not on snow, but much easier to deal with once we get them on snow or ice. In addition to getting all our equipment sorted, we have been doing a number of training sessions that prepare us for our even more isolated field work. Pictured in the middle here is a live action shot of our advanced snowmobile mechanics class where we learned how to diagnose, repair, tune and cry over various mechanical issues we may encounter in the field with our snowmobiles. Our particular snowmobiles are almost 20 years old and many have braved 5+ antarctic winters with just a lightweight cover, so we opted for the advanced course as issues are expected. The machines have been worked on by a professional mechanic last year, and hopefully another will join us this year as well, so I'm actually quite optimistic they will run just fine but it is best to be prepared. In a theme of preparing for the worst, we also had our field safety course, which is the picture on the right. Whenever any of us depart from the main camp, we will all have a large survival bag, which is about a 60-80L dry sack filled with pieces of equipment for 2 people to survive for 2-3 days. This training had all of us unpack, set-up, and use every component of the bag including the tents (pictured) and stoves. This training I find particularly fun, but hopefully I will never have to put these skills to use as an unplanned night out in Antarctica is the stuff of epics I'd rather read about than live through. 

In moments away from the rush of work here, there is also much to do recreationally. I grabbed a photo of the fitness board as a hint of some of the community organized activities here, but there are also chess tournaments, knitting circles, novel writing clubs, and much much more to do! I personally have some sewing projects to tackle here, the craft room here is a favorite of mine. There also is a good network of hiking trails around McMurdo, with some opportunities for wildlife viewing. Birds like Skua and Penguins are common later in the summer, but for now there are just Weddell seals and pups. On the left is a photo of a mom and pup, who I have visited a few times now. It is fun that you can walk down to the trail and check in on the same seals, they often come back to the same place to rest. The pup has been quite enthusiastic and rambunctious, much to my enjoyment and apparently the mother's annoyance. I'm glad I brought my telephoto lens this year which lets me get much closer photos of the wildlife. I'm still very excited for any potential penguin sighting, but that will likely not be for a while. 

In addition to the wildlife, the scenery is quite beautiful as well. The McMurdo area is not perennially snow or ice covered, which is part of the reason it was selected as site for the base. There is a port here, the southernmost port in the world in fact, but the sea is currently covered in sea ice (pictured on the left) which can be feet thick and stable enough to have roads and trails on. The photo here shows a large crack system, as well as some farther off islands called White Island and Black Island (creative huh?) The rock here is all volcanic, and the southernmost active volcano, Mt Erebus is visible from town most days! The right photo is of Observation Hill, a very common hiking trail can be seen going up the center of the mountain, and a historic memorial cross can be seen at the top. Both these photos are taken at about 830 pm but even midnight looks pretty much the same as we are well into 24 hour daylight this time of year. Thankfully all the rooms have blackout shades and I brought my eye mask.

This coming week we have more training and practice out "on the ice" or actually on a glacier which I'm very excited for. We have a hot water drill we will all be training on, and we will be doing our practice camping trip where we do a single night out on the ice shelf with all our camping equipment to ensure everything works the way we expect. Danny and I are also planning 2-3 days of scientific testing of our new radar equipment, so we'll be prepping, using, then adjusting all our systems throughout the week. I'll try to take more photos of the exciting bits and can't wait to check in with all of you next week.

Missing you all, and I hope you're all enjoying your weekends!

Best,

Paul