Ice Blog

All Done Ice!

2006-07-27T23:24:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is way overdue, but long story short, my time on the ice came to an abrupt end in mid-February. We finally got some cans to unload and were busy, busy, busy for 12 hours a day, every day until we were done and then wham! It was time to go.
What an experience I had on the ice. Now, as I tolerate the 100+ degree weather here in Eugene, OR, it's hard to imagine I was on the coldest, dryest, highest continent just five months ago. It all seems like a dream...
Anyway, thanks for watching and stay tuned for the next great thing!
al

Waiting to Unload a Can

2006-02-02T08:50:00.000-08:00

Photos courtesy of Michiel. The ship has been docked for about a day, but we haven't yet gotten any containers ("cans") of food to open. Lots of eating, knitting, joking, waiting....

Ice Breaker

2006-02-01T02:12:00.000-08:00

At last, our ship has come in! Sorry it has been so long since my last post, but I have been working nights in preparation for the yearly supply ship, the American Tern, to arrive. We have all been in a holding pattern, waiting to see if the ship will be able to reach McMurdo. The sea ice is really thick this year and the contracted Russian ice breaker, the Krasin, has a broken propeller and is not running at capacity. So, we are very lucky the ship made it in so soon.
It's amazing to think there is a year's worth of supplies on the boat. Starting tomorrow we will be working 12-hour shifts until it is all offloaded. I will be receiving the food. Lots and lots of food...
After offload, we are free to "redeploy" to the real world. That's a whole 'nother story. I can't wait to be back amongst plants, animals, children and other living things. This is a big dead place indeed...

Holidays on Ice

2006-01-01T23:43:00.000-08:00

By the way, Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris has nothing to do with Antarctica, but is a fun read.
This year, Santa filled my bunny boots with goodies, I rang in the new year in a shipping container (with sunglasses on!), and spent new years day listening to and watching the local talent at Icestock. Good times.

Me and Loralee

2005-12-29T23:30:00.000-08:00

As requested, pictures of me and lovely Loralee, my preferred mode of transport here.

Happy Camper

2005-12-23T12:16:00.000-08:00

Last week I got to go to Happy Camper School, a basic overnight cold weather survival class and it was AWESOME! Our group consisted 11 campers, most of us fingees. What a great group of people -- within about 10 minutes we had come up with nicknames for everyone. (Mine was Paradise, because I lived in the tropics.)
We did and learned so much. After about an hour of lecture time, we drove out to our campsite, an hour from McMurdo. At the instructor's hut, we learned some basic stuff like how to light a Whisperlite stove, got our gear and then walked to camp. There, we built a snow wall, set up a Scott tent (the only truly Antarctic shelter) and some regular tents, and made a Quinzhee: an igloo-like snow hut, made by shoveling lots and lots of snow onto a pile of duffel bags (our sleeping gear -- how's that for incentive to dig?), and then digging a tunnel into it to retrieve the bags, leaving a snow cave to sleep in.
Which I did! Amazingly enough, my roommate (Quinzheemate?) and I stayed relatively warm all night. Apparently the key to staying warm is to constantly eat and drink, which we did. And of course dress appropriately and exercise.
We also learned how to prevent and treat hypothermia and frostnip, operate a ham radio (we called the South Pole!), perform a search and rescue in a simulated white-out (wearing buckets on our heads), and all kinds of nifty stuff. We worked hard but had so much fun. Definitely a highlight of my time here.

The Happy Campers

2005-12-22T16:04:00.000-08:00

Happy Campers: Paradise, Gingle Ho, The Satiator, Insatiable, Skull & Bones, Madge the Manicurist, Furnace, Tool Man, Sethamphetamine, Farmer Girl aka the Tick, and Frijolita!

Happy Camper - Home Sweet Home & Bucketheads

2005-12-22T14:28:00.000-08:00

Carrying gear to campsite, quinzhee, sweet quinzhee, and the whiteout search & rescue drill.

Gettin' Schooled on Sea Ice

2005-12-07T15:47:00.000-08:00

The other day I got sent to Sea Ice School, which is considered a morale trip, but also required for doing any kind of "boondoggle" on the sea ice. This was actually probably one of the last trips like this out on the sea ice, as it has become very active (meaning it's cracking and thinning -- good old summer thaw). After an hour in the classroom, we 8 students and one instructor piled into a Haglin (vehicle especially designed for traveling on ice) and drove north, towards Cape Evans and the Erebus Ice Tongue. We stopped at a couple of spots , looked and seals, skuas, and the cracks and pressure ridges in the ice. As we headed north, our instructor saw signs of flooding, so we stopped to measure the depth of the snow and ice by shoveling snow until we hit ice, then drilling holes into the ice until we hit sea water. We determined that the ice is about 6.5 feet thick, a definite change from its usual thickness of 9 feet. The weather that day was warmish, but incredibly windy -- we drove back in Condition 2.

Trip to Nowhere

2005-12-01T19:25:00.000-08:00

On Sunday I went on a Recreation Dept. sponsored "Trip to Nowhere." Basically they took us out on Deltas (huge people moving on ice machines!) as far as we could safely go on the sea ice to see what we could see. The sea ice is being weird this year -- a huge iceberg that for the past five years has caused the sound to freeze solid, has moved, and that is causing these crazy pressure ridges on the ice, which look really cool. But what this also means is that the sea ice is fairly unstable and we can't go to places like Cape Evans or Cape Royds, where we would normally go to see other huts (like Shackleton's) or penguins. So we just went out of town a ways and were lucky enough to see some sleeping Weddell seals (the dark blobs in the background -- some scientists came by on showmobiles to check on them) and just be out on the ice on an incredibly beautiful Sunday. +30 degrees and no wind!

Thanksgiving on Ice

2005-11-30T21:58:00.000-08:00

We celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday by having a big feast in the galley. That morning my roommate Cori and I kicked things off by watching a movie and knitting in our room, then decided we had better earn our dinner so walked out on the sea ice for a while, and then made our way to the galley, dressed to the nines (thank you, Mom, for providing me with fancy clothes that go with purple Ugg boots! Who would have thought that people get dressed up in Antarctica?), bottles of wine stuffed into the pockets our our Big Red parkas.
What a great meal it was and a superb effort by the kitchen staff! The galley was decorated, people looked fabulous and the food was wonderful.
Afterwards, we all went to the Coffee House to listen to some live music. A very nice Thanksgiving day indeed.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2005-11-25T10:05:00.000-08:00

It's Thanksgiving in North America, and I'm thinking about my family and friends (all over the world!)and missing you all very much! I hope you are all enjoying the day. We are celebrating tomorrow (our Saturday), and we get two whole days off in a row - woo hoo! The galley puts on a huge spread with turkey, pumpkin pie (my favorite, although nothing could possible compare to Rosemary's :), the works. I'll post more pictures and details soon. Happy Thanksgiving! I am thankful for you all.

My Roommate, Superfly

2005-11-22T12:51:00.000-08:00

What a lucky girl am I to have a roommate with bigger hair than me! This is Cori, my roommate. She's great: she's kind of like Julie the Cruise Director ("Ok, here's our list of activities for the week..") meets kicka** HR specialist meets professional costume wearer. She has become somewhat of a local celebrity because she wears a different costume to work everyday. There is no shortage of costumes here because Halloween is THE event of the season. There is a sign on her office that reads "Have Costume, Will Wear."

Brain Freeze and my Modeling Debut

2005-11-21T17:56:00.000-08:00

Lately, I have been getting brainfreeze from just walking to work in a head wind. Note to self: Google brainfreeze...
On another note, I have become a professional Antarctic model. I was asked to pose for a series of photos on how NOT to load cases of soda into a triwall. Being of shorter stature, I fit the bill. I would post said photos here, but they would be considered property of the company I work for and I would then be guilty of all sorts of Antarctic copywrite infringements. Suffice to say, I looked really hot.
We Antarctic supermodels have to keep in shape, so I'm off to yoga now. One thing there is no shortage of here is yoga classes.

25 Degree Tie Dye Friday

2005-11-19T20:39:00.000-08:00

Special prize for best captions here.

More Inside Scott's Hut

2005-11-14T12:43:00.000-08:00

Inside Scott's Hut

2005-11-11T12:13:00.000-08:00

There was an open house at Scott's Hut on Sunday, so I walked over there to see inside. It was really interesting -- all the leftover supplies have been preserved in the dry, cold air. There are seal carcusses just lying in a frozen heap outside. There's even still food in the pot on the stove. Someone must have left in a hurry. All of it has remained untouched since the hut was last used by explorers. This particular hut was used mainly for storage, since the Australian wood it was made from proved to be a poor insulator. But some explorers did use it for temporary or emergency housing.

Roll Cage Mary and Biodiversity

2005-11-07T15:50:00.000-08:00

I am not sure why Mary is in a roll cage.

I found this biodiversity study amusing.

Baby's First Skua

2005-11-07T15:29:00.000-08:00

Saw my first Skua (the bird, not the clothing exchange -- it's the tiny black dot in the sky) Sunday. This is kind of a big deal, since I haven't seen any wildlife since I got here except for the fish in the aquarium and the occasional bug in my salad. (Bugs are even a big deal here -- I have heard of at least two people who collect bugs they find in the produce and attempt to keep them alive as pets.) These were taken from above Scott Hut, near roll cage Mary.

It's a Small World Afterall

2005-11-03T19:34:00.000-08:00

Who'd a thought I'd run into two people from my home town in Antarctica! Here I am in the galley with Point Richmonders LaVonne Hynes Webber and Greg Murphy, giving a shout out to everyone at the Santa Fe Market!
There are also a few Kwaj residents lurking about (i.e, freezing their you-know-whats off in) the Antarctic. Pictured here at the Coffee House with me are Peter Rejcek, Andrea Dixon and Chris Danals. (Missing is Susan DeSoto.) Chris is just passing through here at McMurdo, on his way home from the South Pole. He went from 12 years at Kwaj straight to an entire year at the South Pole, so if he looks a little maniacal, that explains it. :) Andrea and Peter have done a year at "Pole" too, so they all have some good stories about it. It sounds like the winter sky is absolutely amazing there.

Condition 2

2005-11-01T15:49:00.000-08:00

You've seen how amazingly clear it can be here, but the weather changes quickly. This is what a Condition 2 storm looks like (taken from the comfort of the galley last week). Winds up to 40 knots and low visibility. We can still work in these conditions, just need to be careful. Condition 1 means that you cannot leave where you are whatsoever, you must stay in the building you are in (and hope there is a bathroom!)

I walked to work in a storm like this one the other day and it was crazy! Some gusts were impossible to walk against -- they almost blew me over. Balaclavas (polarfleece face-covering hood) and goggles are a must in these conditions.

Even More Pictures

2005-10-26T21:43:00.000-07:00

Views of and from McMurdo including the Discovery (Scott's) Hut, and the sea ice, which will hopefully thaw this summer now that an enormous ice berg that was clogging things up has moved. Oh, yeah, and a "sunset" -- that's about as much as it sets, and that was taken at about 11:30 pm!

Science Stuff

2005-10-26T21:20:00.000-07:00

On Sunday (our one and only day off) I went on a tour of the Crary Science Center, which I believe is the biggest building at McMurdo. At the time the Crary was built several years ago, it was also the most expensive building the US Government had ever built. I noticed immediately that it's humidified (at least in some areas), a welcome change from the extremely dry air outside.
Our guide met us in the hallway and explained what all goes on there, and it is a lot. We saw meteor fragments found on the ice (it's a good place to look for them since they stand out on the ice desert), gigantic pickled sea fleas (giganticism is common in many marine species here, probably due to the cold), volcanic crystals that are only found in two places in the world: Mt. Erebus in Antarctica and Mt. Kenya, seal skulls and penguin eggs.
One wing is dedicated to biology, another area houses atmospheric studies. We saw video of Mt. Erebus (Antarctica's only active volcano) errupting and diagrams of the path the atmospheric balloons are following around the ozone hole. But my favorite area was the aquarium.
We walked into a chilly room filled with large blue tanks of sea water. The tanks held sea urchins, anemones, sea stars, sponges, octopus, sea spiders (really creepy looking!), and of course the famous antifreeze fish. These fish develop a chemical in their bodies to prevent them from freezing. They looked a lot like groupers to me. I asked the biologist if they were related and she said they are not sure, as they have not found any fossil record of these fish yet. She also said that they have to be really careful when catching these fish because if a single ice crystal hits their bodies when they come out of the water, they freeze instantly (as she put it, instant fish popcicle). Crazy! She allowed us to dip our hands in the tank and it was cold! Just under the freezing point of sea water, which I think is 23 degrees F -- something like that.

Ice Ice Baby

2005-10-23T16:30:00.000-07:00

And it's actually not too cold...
Hi everyone, and welcome to my ice blog. I am writing to you from McMurdo Station, Antarctica. Today is a balmy 12 degrees F (-31F with windchill) and the sun is shining. As it will be all night. Wait, a storm just blew in and now we are at Condition 2, meaning it's really windy and poor visibility. Things change here fast! Anyway, I digress...
I arrived here Oct. 11, 2005 to an overcast day of negative 27 F. After spending 3 days of orientation in lovely Christchurch, New Zealand, I was anxious to go to "the ice," as we call it. We flew in a C-17 (huge military cargo plane), taking 5 hours to get to McMurdo. About 4 hours into the flight we could finally see the Antarctic continent below. Now, I'm generally not one to get overly excited about stuff, but I tell you, when I looked out that window and saw the mountains and ice fields below, I just about peed my pants. I mean, it's ANTARCTICA!!
Before landing, we bundled up in all our ECWs (Extreme Cold Weather gear), including signature red parka and "bunny boots." (This stuff really works! I can honestly say, I have not really been cold, core body temperature-wise, since I got here. Ok, my face feels like it's going to freeze off at times, but no hypothermia yet. We'll save that for Happy Camper school. That's when they take you out of town, teach you how to build igloos and stuff and you camp overnight.)
Anyway, we landed on the sea ice runway that will hopefully become McMurdo Sound as we progress into summer. And we really hit the ground running. As soon as we landed, we were driven to town in a huge orange vehicle called Ivan the Terra Bus. My supervisor met us and we were taken to the Galley (cafeteria) for orientation, given our room keys and eventually left to wander about for the day.
The following days are somewhat of a blur of training, meeting people, hiking, exploring, working, eating, sleeping and more training. Looking back now I realize I was exhausted the first week. It's a lot to take in: new place, new climate, new people, new job. And to top it off, you are wearing about 10-20 pounds of clothing whenever you are outside. It takes some getting used to. I found myself getting a little grumpy with how hard it is to do the most mundane tasks here. But eventually you get used to it and then start to take the time to stop and see the ice.
Here are some of my observations so far:

Lots of white, lots of brown (volcanic dirt)
Lots of beards
Lots of drinking. People here have an immense fascination with alcohol -- even more so than Kwaj!
Good food -- better than Kwaj. "Freshies" come from New Zealand -- good stuff!
It doesn't take long before any temperature above zero seems warm.
Wind = bad, cold. Weather changes quickly and often.
Constant sunlight not a problem for sleeping, but very weird when leaving Open Mic night at the Coffee House at 11 pm and it looks like 2 in the afternoon outside.
Wearing just jeans and a sweater feels like wearing nothing.
Insulated Carhartt overalls are not designed for 5'3" women. Nor are any of the issued ECWs, for that matter.
Returning with frozen faces from a hike up Ob Hill, we passed a guy out jogging in shorts and a t-shirt.
Inspired by jogger, I can now make it from work to the bathroom 20 yards away without my big red parka. Raa!

Anyway, that's it for now. Thanks for checking in. I am going to post some pictures now and will try to update this when I can. The internet is extremely slow here, but afterall, it's Antarctica, man!!

More pictures!

2005-10-23T02:35:00.000-07:00

My life: my work (Carpentry & Construction shop warehouse, featuring Kathy the forklift I learned how to operate), the galley (cafeteria), my dorm room, pre-arrival of roommate Cori.

Pictures!

2005-10-23T01:00:00.000-07:00

View of Antarctica from window of C-17; Cindy, me and Jessica aboard C-17 en route to McMurdo; view of McMurdo Station from Ob Hill.

Glossary of Terms

2005-10-23T00:25:00.000-07:00

McMurdo has its own language of sorts. Here are a few ice-isms -- feel free to try these at home:

The Ice - Antarctica
Polie - A South Pole resident, also a rock cover band from the Pole.
Mac Town - What polies call McMurdo
Fingee - That's what I am. Derived from FNG, for F-ing New Guy. (I prefer to call my self a newbee). (Can be a verb, meaning to go through orientation together. "You'll find the best friends you make here are the ones you fingeed with.")
Returnee - Veteran of the ice
Ice time - how long you have been a veteran of the ice
Skua - 1. An Antarctic bird known for it's scanvenging. 2. Sort of a free Goodwill Store at McMurdo where people can leave clothing, etc. for others to scavenge. 3. v. To Skua - to either donate something to Skua or score something great at Skua. "Hey, where'd you get that awesome sweater?" "I skuaed it."
Freshies - Fresh fruits and vegetables. (A rarity in the winter and later parts of the summer.)
Kiwi Station - Scott Base, the New Zealand Station about 2 miles away from McMurdo