Wrapping up our season

Lee and I made another attempt to get to Linda AWS on a helo. This time we did not even get to fly all the way to the station - the horizon was not clear enough to even try landing at the site. We did manage to get another station done - Minna Bluff. It is not far from McMurdo and it is on the pathway of strong weather systems, so we are really glad to have it completed. We did not do it earlier, because we were waiting for a broken wind direction sensor replacement part to come in through cargo for a long time. Due to poor runway conditions and lack of large aircrafts cargo and passenger flights are quite backlogged this season. Finally, the day we got back to the lab from the first unsuccessful helo flight, we got our cargo and flew to fix Minna Bluff the next day.

View of Mt Discovery from the helo

Our last working day here at McMurdo was February 7th. We made an attempt to fly to Lettau on a Twin Otter, but the weather was not good and we got canceled. Considering we had to finalize all of our back cargo and put everything else in the storage, it was somewhat good news for us. It is sad we did not get as many stations done as we hoped, but some things are just beyond our control. We spent all day running around McMurdo in cold and windy conditions, moving boxes and organizing our shipments, but we managed to pack everything on time!

At the end of the day I even went onboard Russian icebreaker docked in McMurdo for the day. I acted as a translator for a couple of my friends who wanted to come look at the ship with me - we got a small private tour of the vessel and a grapefruit (!!!!!). It was a lot of fun to learn about their work (and to speak Russian again!). And to understand our excitement about a grapefruit you have to spend two months eating only canned food. ;)

***

The getting off the ice saga begins now. As I mentioned numerous times, there is a backlog of passengers trying to go back North. Lee and I were scheduled to leave today (February 8) at 6am. We checked in our luggage the night before and are now left with one carry-on item each. We did not make it to the flight - they had to cut 9 people off, and Lee and I were among the people cut. As I was anticipating this, I packed spare clothes and other essentials in my carry-on. I called my parents today to share the news of not getting off the ice, and they commented that our reality is very different right now. I wonder how big of a culture shock I will get coming back to "main" land with children, animals, sunsets, trees and fresh vegetables to eat ;)

I originally had a ticket leaving Christchurch on the 9th of February, so I had to deal with changing my ticket and other plans all morning. Luckily, since the delay is totally out of my reach, I was not charged $350 for the ticket change. I was expecting this charge, so it came as a pleasant surprise!

Lee and I are both attending the AMOS annual meeting in Melbourne next week and we both have talks on Monday. So I also wrote to conference organizers to let them know about our rescheduled flight and possible delays getting off the ice. We have another chance to leave tomorrow (Saturday, February 9) and catch a flight from Christchurch to Melbourne on Sunday - but this would be our last chance to get to Melbourne in time to give our talks. 

I think of all traits that I learned during this field season, the most important one is learning to accept things I can not change!

My first helo flight!

Of all the flying I was going to do in Antarctica I was the most excited about helicopters. I have never been in a helicopter before and flying over the gorgeous landscapes of Antarctica seemed like a perfect opportunity.

Unfortunately the weather today was less then perfect - it was quite cold and very windy, making it feel way colder then it actually was. Our helo pilot checked with us before leaving to make sure we are eager to visit our site. The idea of servicing another station in our bumpy season seemed appealing, so Lee and I decided to give it a go.

During my security briefing I was told not to get overly excited and follow the lead of the crew and Lee, who is quite experienced with helo flights. I guess my face showed it all ;)

All buckled in and ready to go. Note that I am wearing my big red and quite a few layers underneath. Temperatures of -15C were reported in McMurdo, but the wind chill added another 10 degrees of discomfort, lowering it to -25C.

It took us about half an hour to get to Linda AWS site, and the weather was getting only worse. By the time we got to the site the wind picked up. Note that you can't really distinguish between snow and clouds on this picture (I'm not sure if the station is actually leaning, there was no point of reference to shoot from):

The wind was 25 knotts and forecasted to increase. Unlike Twin Otter flights, where the pilots take us to the sight and wait with us, helicopters drop us off and pick us up a few hours later, when all the work is done. Our helicopter pilot, Chris, once again said that he would not attempt to go outside and work for 5 hours in such conditions. Moreover, he said that if the weather worsens, he might not be able to come pick us up. All things considered, we decided to stay on the helo and come back to Linda once the weather improves.

Working on the cargo today (outside) we got a feel of the cold and windy weather and were really glad we didn't end up staying in the field for the whole day.

On the way back we saw the Russian icebreaker "Vladimir Ignatyuk" working hard on breaking the ice near the dock in McMurdo. US vessel is scheduled to come in a couple of days and the path needs to be cleared.

Wish us better weather tomorrow.

Thanks for reading!

McMurdo panorama

This is a picture I took about five days ago from the road between NZ Scott base and US McMurdo base. You can see NZ base on the left side of the picture - it is fairly small and all buildings are painted green. McMurdo buildings are behind the Ob hill on the right side of the picture, so they are not visible. The distance between the two bases is about 3 km.

You can also see the sea ice breaking up to the left of Ob hill. On the other side of the sound you can see Mt Discovery.

And most importantly I want to thank my friend Bella, who put the panorama together. I have limited access to software here and I am also not very good at making panoramas. So big thank you, it came out perfect!

As far south as I went

So my blog is titled "as far south as you can go". I have to admit, it is not a true statement - I did not get to South Pole on this trip. The southernmost point I have been to is 85 degrees South - 5 degrees short of the Pole. It was a pretty site, though, near the Transantarctic mountains:

Progress report

Lee and I had quite an eventful week. This prevented from posting, but I have a lot to talk about now.

I wrote about our progress in the "work blog", I will copy some of it here:

On Saturday, February 2, Lee and I had an ambitious day planned - to visit Schwerdtfeger, Marilyn and Alexander Tall Tower! stations in one day.

It was our second day flying with Brent and Darin - the Ken Boreck Air (KBA) pilots. They ended up helping quite a lot with everything, providing extra hands, advice and tools to fix some issues. And they also showed me how to make snow angels. I want to extend my appreciation and my support to all the KBA crew members. Every single person we worked with was wonderful at his/her job and very supportive with ours!

So, back to our Satruday. Lee and I were joined by Cole - a cartographer and a google maps volunteer, who carried a 360 degree camera. Scwerdtfeger, Marilyn and Alexander Tall Tower! are coming soon to google street view - how exciting is that ;)

The first site we visited was Schwerdtfeger. None of the pilots or fixed wing ops can spell it properly, so the underground name of the station became Schwarzenegger (also misspelled). This station needed the most work - we were replacing all instruments with new set up and possible raising the tower. We actually tried to find this station on our previous with Brent and Darin, but coordinates were old and we did not manage to find the station. The stations we are servicing right now are located on the ice shelf - which is a moving entity. Therefore every year our coordinates shift by

When we were almost done with the install, we had to trouble shoot an issue we encountered with the power system. Our pilots were really helpful - you can see everyone was working here. A parka on the tower is preventing a solar power from being charged.

(Troubleshooting our power system in the field)

Marilyn is an old station, which had issues with the wind measurements. It is due for a full replacement next year, so we replaced the instruments to keep it going for another year. Marilyn tower is leaning - that's another reason why we would have to build this site again - it doesn't make sense to build on top of a leaning tower.

(I'm trying to correct Marilyn ;)

After replacing the boom we waited forever for the station to transmit. We had to wait for 10 minutes at least, but we did not get a signal for while... That's when our dear pilots taught me to do snow angels! 

The last station on our list was Alexander Tall Tower! It is a one of a kine 100-ft tall tower with multiple sets of observations.

(Lee climbing the tower)

 

(Lee climbed all the way to the top)

 

(I just climbed a little to get a good picture ;)

Since we had some waiting time at the Tall Tower! as well, I got to try the Google Street View equipment:

Thanks for reading!

Life at WAIS part II

The food!
Food in the deep camp is much better then in McMurdo. The ingredients the cooks have are the same, but cooking for 40 people is much easier then cooking for ~1000. Food tastes better and more real. Also being in the middle of an icesheet, living in tents and working outside a lot contributes to good appetite.

No wonder the galley is called an "oasis" WAIS style:

As I mentioned before the second largest Jamesway in the campe is for washing/laundry and recreation.

All the water we drink comes from the snow. There are melting tanks in the galley and in the rec tent. Every day we shovel several buckets to use for drinking, cooking and washing. And many of you asked about showers - we had great showers at WAIS:

Since a shower increases an "average" use of water, everyone is supposed to shovel three buckets of snow to replace the water after a shower. In reality, everyone is pretty good about checking the water levels in the tank and fills up the water on "as needed" basis.

And last but not least - the question I get the most about the "deep field" camp. How do we go to the toilet? There are outhouses in the camp - the good old style - a hole in the snow. They have styrofoam seats, which are amazingly warm. We also have "pee bottles" - regular Nalgene water bottles used for above mentioned purpose. They are extremely useful during the night in your tent - it is so much nicer to use a pee bottle, rather then go to a cold outhouse in the middle of the night (especially considering that my tent was in the last row of the tent city).

(You can see a row of outhouses on this picture) 

Please feel free to ask me more questions about living situation at WAIS - I will be more then happy to answer them. 

Thanks for reading!

Life at WAIS

I am back in McMurdo now, so I will post some notes I wrote when I was living at WAIS without internet:

I have been at the West Antarctic Ice Station (WAIS) for the last couple of weeks. Life in the deep field is very different from life in McMurdo. The camp is set up for the summer season only – the main purpose of the camp is to support the drilling operations. However, since the camp is there several programs share its resource to support their activities as well. There are a number of AWS stations on the West Antarctic ice sheet and we’re staying at WAIS camp while servicing them.

There about 40 people at the camp right now, the population is rather dynamic and people are coming and going – passing through and rotating jobs. As in McMurdo the population is divided into “camp staff” and “scientists”, but since it’s fewer people we actually get to interact with everyone, which is really nice.

The camp consists of a few “Jamesway” tents – long structure for multiple people to use. The biggest Jamesway is the Galley , there is another large one for washing/laundry and recreation. There’s a communications tent, tent for temp visitors, tent for medical, tent for pilots and several science “office” tents. Jamesway tents have stoves inside them, so they are comfortable to stay in for the day.

Jamesway "buidlings" are the darkest vertical row in the picture. 

The four semi continuous vertical lines parallel to the Jamesway row are cargo lines - this is where we stored some of our equipment, and all of the camp stuff is stored there as well.

In the upper left corner you can see a couple buildings that are isolated from the camp - this is drilling offices. The main drilling arch is buried under 50m of snow. I went to tour the arch and their operations, so I will try to post about them separately.

At about a hundred yards away there is a tent city (dots in the upper right corner)- sleeping quarters for the WAIS camp.

***
First thing first - I had to find a place to sleep. I came to WAIS with a "sleeping kit", which included a tent, a couple of tents, a sleeping bag, small camping pillow and last but not least - a pee bottle. The camp had a spare tent, so I did not need to put up my own (mountain tent), and had a luxury of living in an "Arctic oven":

It is really warm and bright inside. The coldest it got inside my tent was -14C and the warmest temperature was +11C. Having a shield from the wind really makes a difference! My last week at WAIS a big storm came through - high winds, low visibility and cold temperatures prevented us from going outside unless we absolutely had to. Yet, it was really warm and cozy inside the tent (although quite loud).

Second most important thing in a camp - food ;) Here's a closer look at the largest communal Jamesway tent - the Galley. This is were we ate, socialized, and relaxed.

Here's the entrance to the Galley closer - as indicated by the WAIS sign - the Galley is the most important building of the camp. 

Here's how the Galley looks like inside. Note that there's no light bulbs - just windows in the roof of the James way tent. There is power in the Galley as well - so you can bring your laptop and work. The galley is also the place where we held camp meetings and science talks.

to be continued...

R.I.P.

As many of you probably heard by now our tight Antarctic community has suffered a loss.

A Twin Otter plane, operated by the Canadian crew of three men was en route from South Pole station to the Italian base in Terra Nova bay, when an emergency beacon got activated. They encountered bad weather when flying over the mountains and their last known location was at ~13000 feet above sea level. It happened late on Wednesday, January 23.

For the next five days all of us were anxiously waiting for the search and rescue (SAR) team to get to the site and praying for the best.  Every plane in Antartica carries "survival bags" with food, fuel, sleeping bags and tents - enough for the crew to last for 3-5 days in the cold weather. We were all hoping that the crew managed to survive the crash and will last for several days till the SAR team comes. The weather was really bad for quite a few days, preventing the SAR planes on obtaining a visual on the last recorded coordinates of the plane. On Saturday night a visual was obtained. The crash scene was brutal and the accident was presumed unsurvivable. Due to avalanche risk and crevasses in the area the SAR team on the ground was not able to get to the front of the plane and recover the crew members from the crash site.

Our thoughts and prayers go to friends and families of Bob Heath, Mike Denton and Perry Andersen.

What I am doing in Antarctica

A couple of people asked me to talk more about my project in Antarctica. So here you go:

I came here with the AWS group from Wisconsin - supporting the Automated Weather Stations (AWS) network. The AWS project was taken over by Wisconsin several decades ago and it has been expanding ever since. Every summer season a couple of members of the team go to the field and service weather stations. This year I am lucky enough to be a part of the team.

Here's how an AWS looks like:

(Kominko-Slade station near WAIS camp)

Each weather station is equipped with a temperature sensor, humidity sensor, pressure sensor, aerovane measuring direction and speed of the wind and acoustic gauge to measure distance to the ground (i.e.. snow accumulation). Some stations have additional sensors, such as radiation measurements.  Stations are powered by solar panels and batteries, which provide energy to the station during polar night. Each station is also equipped with an antenna and transmits all the data in real time via satellite.

The data from each station are available on the University of Wisconsin site and are used by various research communities. The data are also utilized in Antarctic forecast model, making it really useful for broader Antarctic community.

The network is quite elaborate with over 60 stations throughout the continent:

The red triangles on the map above are the station that University of Wisconsin group put up and maintain. The stations are autonomous for the most part, but every now and again they need a new battery or an instrument replacement. Also stations get buried under the snow in areas of high accumulation and need to be raised. The AWS network is also quite active, so every year we remove stations that are not needed and put up new station in new locations.

Some station are close to where we stay, so visiting them involves a short snow mobile ride:

 (Masha and Zozo by the Kominko-Slade station - a short snowmobile ride away from the WAIS camp)

However, most of the stations are located far away and visiting a station usually involves flying to a site in a helicopter or in a small Twin otter plane. The majority of stations are serviced from McMurdo, but there are a few that we service from "deep field" camp such as WAIS. Due to weather delays that I talked about before my first Twin Otter flight of the season was out of WAIS station:

(Emily and Zozo are about to get on their first plane ride of the season - visiting Janet station in West Antarctica).

Flying is a lot of fun! 

(This is our pilot Lindsey hanging out with Zozo in the cockpit)

If we can, we try to take other people from town/camp when we fly. Usually people really want to get out and we get help shoveling the snow - it's a win-win situation!

For example this station, Janet, needed to be completely reinstalled - we had to take all the instruments off, dig out the tower completely, secure the tower again and install all instruments back on it.

 

(Janet before and after)

We had three "moral" people on this trip, which actually resulted in Lee and I mostly working on the station and instruments, while our helpers shoveled the snow. Thank you!

(Janet in progress - the tower is completely disassembled. Lee and I are trying to connect two tower sections together properly. The old section that we are reusing was a little bent, so we straightened it out... mainly with the with the help of curse words and a hammer. Zozo had an important job as well - he was marking "due South" direction. We need this direction to align the aerovane properly - to make sure our wind direction measurements are correct).

(The tower is up again and Lee is installing the instruments back on it)

Janet was the first station we did and Lee was showing me a lot of his tricks. The next station, Erin, I got to work on myself, although Lee had to help me quite a bit ;). It was much colder and windier and I was wearing my "big red" jacket. I looked ridiculous, but I was warm, so that's what matters. Since I was mainly working on the tower I did not get as many pictures of it.

(Erin before and after)

(Lee and I are happy after Erin is done)

(Me, posing for camera after completing all the measurements. Lee is chatting with our pilots Lindsey and Mike)

Back from the West Antarctica

Hello!
I am back from West Antarctic Ice Station (WAIS). It was the most awesome experience so far - I got to experience real "deep field" of Antarctica. We even got a storm passing by with strong winds, blowing snow, low temperatures and poor visibility. Besides giving me a flavor of the "other kind of weather" the storm delayed my return back to McMurdo by a few days.

We did not get many sunny days at WAIS, but the once the sun did come out it was just spectacular! Here's a picture of our "great white" with a couple of sun dogs and the low hanging sun circling around the sky.

Leaving for West Antarctica

Hello!
I am a little backed up on posts, mainly because it takes forever to sort out pictures and also a long time to download them. I have a lot of pictures, they are not of perfect quality, but I really want to share some of them, so please bare with me.

 We have had bad weather for the last couple of days, it's snowy and windy and we're not flying. Aside from being a little frustrated, I am doing really well. I have explored a lot of things around McMurdo. I found a "crafts" room where I could borrow yarn and most importantly some patterns. This would be handy for my upcoming trip to WAIS - West Antarctic Ice Station. I will not have internet access there, so I will not update for a while. I will try to keep notes on my computer though, so I can post them when I get back.

Also, there's a "work" blog that I writing now. Unfortunately there hasn't been much to report, but I am hoping it will get better soon: amrc.ssec.wisc.edu/blog/

I have visited New Zealand's Scott base, found a bike to bike around, did most of the hikes in the area, saw penguins and seals and even went to a yoga class. Zozo continues to be a very recognizable penguin on the station. In fact I lost him once and my colleague Lee found him, so I continue to introduce Zozo to everyone ;) I hope Zozo will not try to run away from me again.

 Here's Zozo having a glass of NZ sauvignon blanc at Scott base.

Cheers, Masha

January 2-3, 2013: snow training

Everyone involved in field work in Antarctica need to go through a "happy camper" school - a snow survival training. A group of us (eight total) were taken to the Ross ice shelf and left there overnight. Well, first our instructor told us what to do ;)

The weather was magnificent both days and it felt like an incredibly fun hiking trip. Before we went to the field we talked in the classroom about the importance to be prepared for unexpected weather changes. Our instructor, Alasdair, worked as a tour guide and in search and rescue in many different places all over the world and he had many stories to share.

The first thing we needed to do - mark a path from our "camp central" to the outhouses. Since US Antarctic program continuously brings people out to the ice shelf - an "permanent" outhouses were installed. And what a view they have - Mt Erebus in the background.

The Sun was bright and the idea of putting flag every meter or so to mark the path seemed like an overkill. However, in the morning we woke up to a foggy weather, and couldn't see beyond several meters (only for a short time though) and flags were there to help orient us around.

Our camp consisted of two Scott tents, two different kinds of mountain tents, a kitchen and a few snow trenches people dug out. Here's how it looked from the distance:

 A Scott tent is the same design as used by Scott's expeditions in earl 1900s. It is amazingly sturdy and can sustain crazy Antarctic winds. The floor of the tent is a separate piece of material, which I have never seen before, but it seems practical. The only disadvantage of a Scott tent - it is not particularly well isolated and it is colder then a mountain tent.

First we put up two Scott tents, making sure to secure them in the snow. A short bamboo stack is all we used, Alasdair showed us a couple of knots and taught us how to dig a hole to put the anchor in. Sides of Scott tent were also heaved down with snow.

After we were done with Scott tents we build a snow wall to protect smaller mountain tents from being blown away. We started a quarry and then used a "snow saw" (a regular saw actually) to cut out blocks. We managed to put up a wall really fast. Although not perfectly aligned, it was solid.

(April, Zozo, Masha, Mitch and Jenny by the newly constructed snow wall)

Here's a picture of our snow quarry - you can see shovels and saws we used and can sort off guess how/where the cutting was done. It is important to cut out through pristine part of the snow, so the area behind the quarry was off limits.

Upon completing a snow wall we put up a mountain tent behind it:

(Jeff in front of his tent, which is behind a snow wall)

The next task was to dig out a kitchen. We decided to do an island table in the middle first (and dig around it to allow us to stand up around it, While working on this design we thought it would be fun to carve sitting area out in the snow - so we ended up with three 2/3 seater benches around the table. We put the stove on the table and managed to have a great dinner as group. (A few hours later once we melted the snow for food!)

(April and Danette were working on getting the snow melted, while others worked on snow trenches)

(Water finally boiled! At this point we are almost done with snow trenches and are quite tired. We had dehydrated dinner available in our green "kitchen" bag)

Digging a snow trench was a lot of fun. Here's Zozo - picking out a spot to dig:

I have to admit though I did a rookie mistake and dug a really wide trench. You are supposed to completely cover the trench up with snow (or whatever material you can find. It is wise to dig a hole as narrow as possible - it will be easier to close it. You can later on widen your trench, a friend of mine actually dug a 2-person trench once, so your sleeping quarters can be as luxurious as you have energy for them to be! At the same time it will be really hard to get in and out. 

Since the Sun was up and it was really warm, the snow started to melt and to fall apart. Cutting blocks wide enough for my trench was impossible, in fact even more narrow trenches had issues. Zozo and I decided to improvise and used banana sleds over the top:

(also mainly sitting in my pocket or on the snow, Zozo got really tired digging the trench and couldn't even stand up when I asked him to pose)

(Almost finished trench)

Now I have to admit defeat. Although I finished my trench and even brought my stuff inside and layed it out I decided not to sleep in there. I could get good sleep in, but the idea of waking up and going to the bathroom in the middle of the night freaked me out. In the hindsight, I probably should have made my trench a bit roomier, wider and deeper - maybe moving inside would be a little easier then. But from what I hear it was quite awkward to move around.

(My post somehow turns to the bathroom topic over and over, but here we go again. We were given pee bootles - regular water bottles designated for this purpose. The idea is to use it in the field if you don't have an outhouse to preserve the landscape as much as possible. Pee bootles also come handy  if you are too lazy to get up and go to the camp outhouse in the middle of the night.  Since my trench was somewhat narrow and unlike Zozo I'm not a boy, I doubted my ability to use the pee bottle inside a trench "without accidents" and opted out to sleep in a tent.)

Here's a photo of Mitch's trench - His entrance was actually really nice and narrow and he managed to be able to cut snow blocks wide enough (some block did collapse in the process since the snow was too warm):

(Zozo by Mitch's trench. Every trench was also designated by flags to make 

sure people do not walk over it)

Sleeping in a mountain tent was warm. No, VERY WARM! The Sun is always out and the tent basically acts as a greenhouse. I opened all windows and left the door open and I was still rather warm in my super-warm sleeping bag. Which makes me feel so good about my upcoming trip to West Antarctica - I will likely be sleeping in a tent there as well. 

In the morning we woke up around 6:30 am or so, boiled snow again for some oatmeal and tea and started disassembling our camp. We had to be ready by 8:30 am, when Alasdair came to pick us up and continue the survival training. All the trenches, the kitchen, and the quarry needed to be leveled up, the tents put away and all our stuff collected. The site looked like we were never there!

The rest of the morning we spent talking about snow survival. One of the exercises was scenario simulation. A scenario was - a member of our team went to the bathroom (about 50m away from the house we were in, marked by flags every meter or so). Bad weather came suddenly and we are now in a complete white out situation and our team member has not come back. What shall we do?

We started a rescue operation. 

To simulate the complete white out conditions nobody could leave the house without a white bucket on their head. It is amazing  how easy it is to loose the sense of direction once you can not see where you are going. The white bucket also prevents you from hearing well, so you can only talk to a person standing right next to you.

Our team failed to rescue the missing team member. It was only eight of us and we did not have a strong leader. We were also quite clueless about how to proceed and what technique would work best. Here's a picture of me being quite clueless:

I managed to find the first flag (thanks to the broom!), but went way of course in search for the second one.  My partner Andy actually tried to steer me back – he could feel that I went in the wrong direction, but it was hard to understand his signals via rope  and I couldn’t hear him at all.  I eventually corrected myself (with a lot of help from Andy), but we ran out of time and got pulled back in by other team members, who were worried that we will get hypothermia (whiteout conditions are associated with high winds and low wind chill temperatures). I had a lot of ideas on what to do once I got back, but we ran out of time and had to go back to McMurdo.

What can I say - all in all I am a happy camper ;)

And so is Zozo: