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| Blake's Delta dropped a wheel in the ice transition and needed to be pulled out. The crazy angle caused the full diesel tank to leak and the Spill Response Team had to deploy. Not a pretty picture. |
The ice roads out to Pegasus Field have gone bad more quickly than anyone can remember. Today is supposed to be up to 37 degrees F. and yesterday must have been at least that much. Lows have been in the mid 20s. (How there can be that much of a diurnal range each day when the sun never goes down is something to ponder.) With the 24 hours of sunlight, there has been a lot of melting and it seems to accumulate in melt water pools on the surface.
I had to drive out through the same transition a few hours later, so I got out and scouted a route through it, threading between 2 lakes and deep ruts where others had become stuck. Successful! Whew! But for how long?
Some of the passengers aren't very understanding when it takes us longer than normal to transport them. Many also don't like that we're using Deltas almost exclusively to go out to Pegasus; the ride is much, much worse. They don't realize that the ride for us in the front cab is only marginally better. Our seats are set up like Pogo sticks and we bounce a lot, too. McMurdo talk has it that one shuttle driver had her seat set too high and was bounced up to hit the ceiling and received a compression fracture. The trip out in a Delta using this route takes about 35 minutes. If we were to take vans, we'd have to go via Scott Base and that's about an hour ride, one-way. Not a great choice. We'll be going that way later in the season when the Pegasus Cut-off gets too bad. It's only a matter of time.
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| Where the pressure ridges meet and force the ice to curl back, the ice will often reach vertical and can occasionally double back almost over itself. How long this can last before succumbing to gravity is anyone's guess. |
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| The pup has gotten bigger and bigger. |
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| Only a memory now, but coming back in the not-so-distant future. |
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