Update 4: Blues Skies and Warm Temps

[Paul Summers]

Hello all again from sunny McMurdo!

It has been another busy week of training and trying to find some time for rest and recreation down here, but we're making good progress on getting ready for our coming field deployment. Thankfully the weather has been very pleasant here, reaching up to 20F and full sun which has made our outside training and hiking around town much more pleasant. 

 

I went for a hike up Observation Hill last week and took a nice photo of town from up there. You can see essentially all of McMurdo from here to get a feel for McMurdo is like. The large circular things are fuel tanks, and the viewers right side of town is mostly cargo yards and storage. Center left, the large blue building is called 155 and is a large dorm, as well as the Galley and larger gathering area. The 4 brown buildings (these are hard to make out) next to 155 are the Dorms I am in, so it's just a 2 minute walk for me to breakfast which is nice. Many of the buildings have a fun flair to them around McMurdo, as is seen on the 2nd photo here of the carpenter's shop with (fire breathing?) dinosaurs and a polar bear on the side of it. This is from Andrew (pictured) and I running errands around town.

Despite the warm temperatures, when we go out on the sea ice (viewers left in the 1st photo) or ice shelf (see later photos) there is usually more wind which chills things significantly. Additionally, we mostly get around on snowmobiles which create their own windchill, so when we go out for work on the ice we bundle up regardless of the temperature the thermometer reads.

This is Andrew (I think? Honestly we all look similar bundled up) and I bundled up for our snowmobile out to our hot-water drilli testing. We are using a custom built hot water drill, but the technology is similar to the one described here (https://icedrill.org/equipment/small-hot-water-drill). The Ice Drilling Program can likely explain this better than I so you can read there, but in general the principle is to use pressurized, hot water to melt a vertical borehole in the snow, firn, and ice. We then will put explosive charges in these holes for our seismic experiments. For this testing around town, we aim to only make the holes and we don't do anything with explosives. Our drill has 3 sleds, 2 shown here. The first is a sled (not shown) with a MASSIVE Yeti 210 cooler, which we use as the reservoir of hot water. The second (pictured center frame) is the heater sled with 2 water heaters like you have in your closet at home, the third is a high pressure pump (pictured on the left side in back) and various plumbing all over connecting it all. This machine certainly qualifies as a 'whole thing' in my book, and testing and tuning of it has continued all week. Thankfully we have many very experienced mechanics on our team that are working on this and will be indispensable in the field where troubleshooting will certainly continue. 

Going back to town, there have been a few questions about what the McMurdo experience is like, and I wanted to share some photos of the Galley, where almost everyone on station eats 3 meals a day. The Galley is open 24/7, and always has some food available, including a midnight lunch for the night shift people. Inside, it looks a lot like cafeterias you may have seen at school or camps in the past complete with blue trays and sneeze guards everywhere. 

 

Hot food is served on the left of this photo, salad bar on the right (a special thing here are fresh greens are rare) and the center is an egg line in the morning where you can get a made to order omelette, my personal favorite! Just in view is the 'Glacer Deli' where you can make your own sandwich any time of day, complete with panini press and toasters. Out of the frame is the drink station with juices, milk, coffee and lots of hot water for hot cocoa or tea. 

With all the great weather, I've been able to sneak out for some runs after work which has been a great way to attempt to destress and enjoy the scenic surroundings. One of my favorite runs is to run the about 2 miles on the dirt road to Scott base, the New Zealand Base next door. This is one of the few long roads around here with a good surface for running. However, this is also a road that heavy vehicles use for work, so you have to take care to get out of their way

Here is the Kress I have talked about driving a crew of people back from work on the ice shelf, and a heavy crane coming back from some construction work. I was sure to be well out of the way for these guys, but they know to keep an eye out for runners on nice days and usually give me a nice friendly wave. The next picture is the view from Scott Base of Mt Erebus and the start of the ice shelf below it. I really enjoy this view, and making it over here is always a highlight for me. 

The last big event this week was our deepfield shake down. 'Deep Field' is the term to describe camping in your own tents, more than a helicopter flight away from McMurdo, which is what we are planning to do, and the shakedown is basically just a practice run. To do this, we use the tents, stoves, and sleeping kit we are issued for our deep field camp for an overnight camp on the ice shelf which is only a 30-45 minute snowmobile ride away.

I always enjoy getting out on the ice shelf as the views are stunning, and it starts to really feel like we're in Antarctica being on the ice shelf. The ice shelf is a floating section of glacier, about 30-60 meters thick in this location. This ice is non-salty glacial ice that formed on land from compacting snow, and then was transported by sliding out onto the ocean, and is present year round . This is distinct from 'sea ice' which is formed from freezing ocean water which is salty and generally not thicker than a few meters and can seasonally break out. Pete was particularly excited for the shakedown as he has been stuck inside for most of the trip. Despite the perfect handlebar mount, he couldn't drive as there is a strict helmet policy here at McMurdo and they don't have his size helmet. The style of tents we will use for sleeping in are called Scott Tents and are largely similar in design to those used over a hundred years ago. They are thick canvas, have 4 thick poles supporting the corners of the pyramid, many guy lines, weigh over 100 pounds each, and can withstand winds over 80 mph. This yellow tent is ours from the shakedown, it comfortably sleeps 2 and you access the inside through the tube/hole you can see in the front of the tent here. It takes some getting used to. The final photo is of the most photogenic portapotty I know of, which they have by the camping area we used. In the McMurdo all waste is containerized and processed in the wastewater treatment plant, including fluid waste. For hikes and longer days out, a pee bottle is a vital companion, and this goes a long way to preserving the Antarctic environment. In the 'deep-field', we will practice similar protocols, but due to the remote nature of our worksite and the fact that at our site everything is continually buried in meters of snow every year, we are allowed to release our waste in particular locations carefully tracked and reported at the end of the season. This will look like 2 'long drop' toilet tents above deep snow holes for solid waste, another snow hole for human liquid waste, and likely one final snow hole for gray water waste near our kitchen tent. Otherwise all other trash/waste will be bagged and removed with us at the end of the season.  

For our timeline on getting to the field site, a number of things have to happen before we can get there, and the biggest first step is the establishment of WAIS Divide Camp. This has been delayed due to cancelled flights over a week at this point, likely resulting in a similar shorting of our season. The end date of our season is already planned to be as late as is safe, so any delays are directly translated into shortening our season, which is unfortunate but not unexpected as delays are common for this work. We are staying positive, preparing our alternative plans, and hoping that flights needed for WAIS Divide Camp to get going actually fly tomorrow! 

Next week is Thanksgiving, celebrated on Saturday here, so that is something I'm looking forward to. I am definitely missing you all these days, but I am thankful for all the support from you, my friends and family that makes me feel so loved, even from afar. I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving and encourage you to take the extra time to appreciate the special people in your life, near and far, this year. 

Sending my best,

Paul