On these two days I got to go out to Happy Camper School, most of which is held a few miles out past the Scott Base. We learned to set up the legendary Scott tent, a humongous (holds 4 people and the gear easily and weighs 80 pounds) and famously strong to resist the Antarctic winds. It is also double walled and warmer than many other tents. We also learned to set up some smaller tents properly. Properly down here means staking them out with "Deadmen" buried several feet off to each side. You did a trench as deep as 2 feet; bury a stake parallel to the tent in the bottom; tie the ropes to the deadman after creating thin slots up out of the trench towards the tent; and then filling the trench and stomping it down firmly. Without deadmen, a tent can easily be blow away, even with people inside. All of the tents also have a strip of cloth about 2 feet wide around the bottom of the tent, all the way around. When you set up the tent, you pile snow around the outside strip to help prevent wind from getting under the tent and sending it airborne. Like they say, it's a harsh continent.
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| Figuring out the Whisperlite camp stove. |
We also learned how to use a snow saw to cut out blocks to make a wind wall. These go just upwind of any of the smaller, non Scott tents, and are to give some additional protection to the tent. They're also good for sitting behind and could be used for cooking in a pinch. There are definite tricks to doing it right. You need to start in an area that has not been walked on. Being walked on changes the structure of the snow and makes your blocks weak. When you cut them, the cut should not be vertical and will instead angle in slightly as you cut downwards. This lets you light the block out easily. They almost pop out when you put a shovel underneath them. Then when you put the blocks in place, you rotate them 180 degrees and the sides fit together snugly. You sometimes have to trim the blocks to get them to fit strongly.
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| Setting up a Scott tent. |
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| We use flags for everything. Red and green signify that it's OK to proceed. Blue flags are set up near fuel pipelines. Black is for dangers, such as crevasses. I like to think of these as being somehow akin to Tibetan prayer flags. They certainly get blown around enough to send prayers somewhere. |
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| Digging and placing deadmen around the tents. |
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| Cutting snow blocks for wind walls or trench covers. |
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| Sitting out of the wind behind our new wind wall. |
Another type of shelter is a snow trench. This goes down vertically for a while and then flares out as it goes down deeper. You can put a cargo sled over the trench and then blocks any holes with snow. If the wind comes up (after all, it is Antarctica), any tiny openings will allow the snow to finds its way in. It's imperative to have your shovel in side when you sleep in case the trench collapses. Another shelter talked about is to pile all the bags in one place and bury them with several feet of snow. Then you stomp the snow down tightly and dig a whole. One then carefully pulls out the bags, leaving an igloo-like shelter.
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One of many styles of trenches.
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The more ambitious snow wall builders cut out blocks, making both a second wall to block the wind and a table and benches to eat at.
Twelve of the people chose to build and sleep in trenches. They needed to have very specific back-up for which specific tent they would retreat to in case they got too cold. Every one made it through the night and no one had to go to a tent. Some were warm all night long and had to shed clothes. Others got cold and had to do sit-ups and use the hand warmers. I stayed pretty warm in my Scott tent and slept OK.
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| Whose pet is sitting on my head? |
All this went on in ideal conditions. Relatively warm and no wind. We heard of classes that have come out in full-on Condition 1 conditions. The every action is of the most serious nature. I'm glad we had Condition 3 for this, our first serious outing. We all stayed warm and comfortable, no cold toes or fingers. The morning was cloudy and it got windy, i.e. more Antarctic-like. As we were waiting for the instructors to come back out to pick us up we saw an solitary Adelie penguin come by, sometimes gliding by on his/her belly and sometimes waddling comically by. He/she would stop for a while and stare at us quizzically.
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| Minimizing exposed skin. |
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| A complete bundling. |
