1 November--Condition 1

I took Ivan the Terra Bus and a load of Polies down to the Ice Runway.  Being as this was at least their third attempt to fly to the Pole, they were getting frustrated and a few were slightly abusive.  Some have been waiting for at least 2 or 3 weeks for the weather to clear.  I remember some of them from a few days ago.  We had had to wait on the apron for a long time and then I moved them to the Ice Runway Galley to wait some more.  After that we went back to the apron for yet more waiting.  A few were whining that they shouldn't have to stay out here and that I should take them back to the better meals at the Galley in town.  While they had been issued  box lunches, things were not helped when it came over the radio that they couldn't actually eat in the Ice Runway Galley since the Galley staff had not prepared food for so many people, but that I, as the vehicle operator, could eat there.  Definite bad vibes!  After an interminable wait, that flight was also cancelled.

Ice Runway Galley



Ice Runway Galley





Ice Runway sewage outfall empties into the Sound.


So on the first I was again taking these people out again for the third try.  We waited again on the apron and
the flight was yet again cancelled and had to take them back to town yet again.  Only this time I was to also pick up a group of Australians that had just arrived on the Airbus and whose conecting flight out to the Australian Casey base was also cancelled.  They were to be delivered to the Big Gym to sleep on the basketball court.  And yet their attitude was uniformly positive and upbeat.  Contrasts!

The afternoon was perfectly calm and almost balmy by Antarctic standards.  The Royal Society Mountains across the sound were perfectly and sharply focused.  Razor sharp focus.  Talking to a weather guy on the shuttle, he was mentioning that something strong was coming in later in the afternoon, something with strong winds and a slight chance of snow.  Almost like clockwork I noticed out the van window thin streaks of snow snaking and meandering across the ice road.  Not too bad and visibility not reduced at all.  But over the next few hours it went from fingers of snow blowing along the surface to a layer of blowing snow several feet deep.  If you were to have been standing in it, you would probably not seen your boots.  Looking out over the Sound from town it eventually became so deep that the vehicles out at the Ice Runway were obscured and then--as the layer became thicker--the huts and towers.  MacOps announced that weather conditions were Condition 2 in most areas and deteriorating.  The radio began to crackle with orders to evacuate all personnel from the Ice Runway before it went to Condition 1 and all personnel were to be confined to whatever building they were in at the time.  The wind--like you've read so many times before in this blog--became cutting and penetrated almost anything you could wear.  People were leaning heavily into the wind as they walked and would be thrown around slightly by the gusts.  And yet this morning, the day after, it is again clear and not so windy, though still much colder.

If you want to take a look at current conditions down here, here's the link to the McMurdo webcam:
http://www.usap.gov/videoclipsandmaps/mcmWebCam.cfm

If you'd like to see the criteria for what cosntitutes Conditions 1, 2, and 3, follow this link:
http://intranet.mcmurdo.usap.gov/documents/WeatherConditions.pdf

Errata:  I earlier said that penguin has its origin in Latin for fat.  I just finished a book on Antarctic exploration and that's just one of 4 explanations for the origin.  Still, I like that one the best.

7 October--Ivan the Terra Bus

The highlight of the day for me was driving Ivan down to pickup passengers from yesterday's cancelled C-17 flight on the Ice Runway.  It's so big!  55 feet or so and weighing 67,000 pounds.  To make a turn you start turning, and turning, and turning, and turning, and finally you start to see some progress.  Such a wide turning radius means that some areas are just off-limits to Ivan.  Word has it that there are only 10 or 11 of them in the world.  They're Canadian made by Foremost, who also makes the Deltas.  It must be a Canadian thing with their Great White North.The other Terra Buses are reportedly all in the Hudson's Bay and Canadian Rockies areas.  At Hudson's Bay they are used for the Winter polar bear viewing trips/  The Deltas are Navy surplus and around 37 years old while Ivan is 14 or 15 years old and would cost an estimated $1 million to replace.  (Incidentally, the legendary and best snow cat is the Tucker, made in Medford, Oregon, of all places.)

The weather was good--for Antarctica--right up until 15 minutes before the plan landed.  The wind came up and it tried to blow me over when I was outside of Ivan.  Necessary even with the full ECW gear to have your back to the wind to keep the wind from penetrating every little chink in our clothing--but way better to be inside.  The ground blizzard made seeing next to impossible.  It made we wonder what the pilot was sensing.  When he taxied back to the apron, he was all but invisible until he was perhaps 150 yards from where we parked.  A looming gray mass in the grayish-white, impenetrable sky.  It makes for a very unimpressive photo!  But the storm left as quickly as it came in and so they were able to fly out an hour or so later with 8 or 9 people.  He had brought in 27, many of them scientists.  We are probably up to around 800 people at this point, with an ultimate population in December of 1,286.

The normal routine when they fly in is for them to carry their kangaroo bags with them off the plane.  Their baggage is later off-loaded and brought up to our building.  After they go through an orientation, they come up to get their bags and we are available to drive them and their bags to their dormitories, a process we term bell-hopping.

30 September--Deltas!

Lots of training today, but the 2 highlights are beginning training on the Deltas and a trip out to the Ice Runway to pick up people from a C-17 flight.

The Deltas are these huge former Navy vehicles, something like 44,000 pounds.  Replacement cost for these 37 year old behemoths is estimated to be $800, 000.  You climb up a short ladder to get inside the cabin.  The engine is behind that and then comes a large box with bench seats for the passengers.  Some are configured to carry cargo rather than people.  They are articulated between the cabin and the box and this makes it possible to turn in an unlikely radius, basically their own length.  Try that with your SUV!  They are a bit much to handle, but when I get more experience with them, I think that they're going to be the one I'll enjoy driving most.

We had morning training in airfield operations and then we drove out to the Ice Runway.  The C-17 came in but it was obscured by a large snow berm and I hope that later I'll be in a position to see it better.  As it came on to the apron, its size was very apparent, though it's small compared to the C-5s they occasionally fly in.  (The C-5s are supposed to depress the ice 14 inches when they land.)  As the people land and get off they are all bit with the urge to stop, turn around, and take a photo, just like we were the other day.  On an active apron they can't do this and we are supposed to shoe them up to the vehicles for safety.  Still, the urge is there.