We had our town Christmas party last night. Interesting finger foods, music and company in the Vehicle Maintenance Facility (VMF).
I have two days off. I am primarily working on my video for the McMurdo film festival. The criteria is they must be less than 5 minutes, rated PG-13 and must be edited (and primarily filmed) in Antarctica. I also plan on getting up to the ham shack with a spectrum analyzer to track down some interference. The South Pole Station has a brand new ham station. it sounds like they have been getting out to the US occasionally. So I will be using that station the 7 days I am at pole. I will also be publishing a time I will be in front of the webcam when I get there. Somebody will have to take a screen dump of that for me. I won't be hanging around outside for hours I am sure (well maybe). It is about -40 at pole (it is summer after all). It has never been above zero F at pole so the temperature is always refered to at an absolute number..."Today it is 40", which means 40 below zero F.
On the 20th the program had a test/milestone in logistics. We had a Air Force C-17 fly from Christchurch, land in McMurdo for fuel, fly to pole, air drop 70,000 pounds of supplies turn around and fly all the way back to Christchurch. They may have to do this in the winter. They want to be prepared. The following photos show the event. I wish I had seen it in person.
I participated in a art project last night. They were looking for volunteers. It seemed strange enough, why not?
Rather than have me try and describe "the work" you can read all about it here.
http://www.stellaraxis.com/
Overall, I decided that this was an interesting way to seek into nice fashionably designed homes with nice interior decorating, fancy canapes and expensive champagne. My plan is that I can sneak in as part of a Magazine or coffee table book. My photo will be in the pages. I am hoping that my entrance will otherwise be unnoticed in these fashionble living spaces. Wish me luck. I am going in.
Whoo Hoo!. I am getting a trip to pole. (We don't often say South Pole since it is pretty much redundant). I will getting a week long visit at pole filling in for a tech who will be on R&R for a week. Sometime between 1-15 and 1-20 I will be heading down there. It will be good to see the differences between mactown and the brand new South Pole Station. I will see the dome before it gets shipped back to the states and ends up as a mueseum or a bar... or both.
I took this pic in the dry valleys a while back. Critters just get lost I guess, really lost. This is many many miles from the sea.
I went to another session of cruise ship tour guide school today. We may get a couple of ships in January.
I do miss being home for Christmas. It was choice, a tough one. I am here. The thing I don't miss is all the BS and hype about Christmas from the advertisers and all the stress and all that. There is none of it. The holiday is a lot easier to appreciate as a solitude and a personal event rather that a "made for TV" peer-pressure *not really* competitive buying frenzy it is back in the states. Give me a break already. We have a town Chistmas party in the Heavy Shop this coming Saturday night. They pull all the equipment out and wash the floor real nice. I bet you can hardly tell it is very busy heavy equipment garage. I bet you can hardly smell the diesel and gear lube.
I am headed over to Scott Base tonight as something different. Work is kind of slow. We are working on problems and fixing stuff but the consequence/fixability ratios are getting close to unity.
I have a bunch of small presents that Bonnie has shipped to me to open on Sunday.
Here are a couple more shots from Mt. Terror. It looks like I will be getting up to Mt. Erebus pretty soon. Erebus is in the background. Some one was telling me they saw some time-lapse of Erebus and the smoke coming out of the cone pulsated like a steam train. Any change in your perspective of time can be illuminating.
The other night we had our shop Christmas party, one of the guys made us all traditional Russian food and drink. We had to draw the line at that silly dance they do.
I made it up to Mt. Terror today. It was a totally different scene from the other day. It was calm and the snow had become the familiar "styrofoam packed" stuff that has a predicable rheology. We landed after a few passes and only one attempt. The helos have a problem with "contrailing" in these conditions. It can be very dangerous. The craft becomes engulfed in its own contail making visibility impossible at landing. It takes a lot of skill and experience to avoid the situation. It was expertly done. The ship was really steaming on our final approach.
After we landed we still had to climb up an ice sheet to the summit where the gear is, about 200 feet in altitude.The training with the ice ax is really appreciated... such as how to use the ice ax after you fall down a glacier face to save yourself.
It was a peak experience.
We were supposed to be dropped off and the other tech was flying to our "end user". It turned out the "end user" was totally fogged in and they couldn't land so the helo came back and landed for close support. We fixed the stuff we needed to fix but we found a couple other issues that we had to "jury rig". It took us a little longer than best case, but less than plan. The system is working.
In the photo you can see Mt. Erebus in the background. It is about 1000 ft. higher than terror but it is less difficult to land. We have equipment up there too.
When we went to leave, interestingly enough the helo wouldn't start .. Yep. It added a new scenario in my head that I had not originally considered. There is probably no other spot to land another ship up there when the parking place is taken. We all went through some head scratchers as we tried again and we got both engines on the 212 going. A good scenario to consider. We all know it now. Hiking down the hill was obvious... but to where? And how do we get the mechanics and gear to the disabled ship? The ship is definately not going to be safe up there for long the way the weather is around here.
We all had a swearing session at one point on the mountain today, the pilot, techs, everybody. It was probably only -30 up on the mountain. Warm by Terror standards. The altitude effects are immediate; the air is so thin in Antarctica to begin with. Hypoxia is all part of it. Knowing the early signs and pointing them out in your teammates is always a source of entertainment. The swearing is a lot more of a release rather than a dialog.
A lot of people have been to Antarctica. Not many people have been on Mt Terror.
