A cold day, but some beautiful optics (sun dogs/parahelia).
There are actually trips that tourists can do to come down here. There’s a
small camp about ½ mile away. The tourists come in on Basler planes. Some are
there for just a few hours to take pictures at the pole, others stay the night
at the camp. I think there are various types of tours that come to the pole
(include going to see penguins somewhere, or a stop on a glacier, things like
that), and I’ve heard they cost between $40,000 and $60,000 per person! And
here I am being paid to be here! About 6 tourist planes have come in the week
I’ve been here. It’s kind of funny to watch, from the galley windows, the
tourists doing their various things at the ceremonial pole. Neal said he’s seen
some really weird things over the years: people performing cultish ceremonies,
people dressed up in costumes, people with film crews, etc.
12/11/18
It was pretty nasty weather today with really high winds, so we spent the morning doing some prep for our water and wastewater sampling. We went on a tour to find our various locations, which included going to the giant supply warehouse and the generator area. They are located in these giant metal arches that are actually under the snow. We also had to walk through this long maze of snow tunnels to get to the locations (separate) where they are melting ice for water and to the well where they are putting the waste water. The ice tunnels are really cool (literally). They were dug out using chainsaws, and the ice blocks carried out by sled. They remind me of mining tunnels. Just tall and wide enough to walk through. The portion that we walked through was about ½ mile long. Along the way there are some crazy escape hatches where you would have to climb up several hundred feet to get back up on top of the ice in case there was a collapse in the tunnel. They are really cold, probably reflecting about the average yearly temperature of the South Pole. The thermometer down there said -58F ! No wind, which is nice, but so cold that ice crystals form everywhere your breath reaches, including eyelashes. Nate looked kind of funny with his red eyebrows and eyelashes covered by a layer of white frost. Cold enough that if you keep your eyes open long enough without blinking, you can get a little freezing on your tears.
Throughout the tunnel, they’ve carved out little shelves and put cool little items in there. Very random things. Like a whole sturgeon fish, the last carton of vanilla icecream from winter 2012, random stuffed animals, bottles of alcohol, flip flops, cake, and signed picture of hugh heffner. The coolest is a picture of Buzz Aldrin (astronaut who visited here) and a tissue that he sneezed into, labeled "Buzz Aldrin's germs". I think he got pretty sick and was med-evaced out.
12/12/18
Today we received the sobering news that 2 members of the McM community died while testing the fire suppression system at a small building in the dry valleys.
Yesterday in the Dry Valleys a mishap occurred that resulted
in the fatality of two ASC employees.
Two technicians were performing routine preventive
maintenance on the fire suppression system in a remote communications shelter
on Mt Newall. At approximately 1430 12 December a helicopter pilot
flying in the area saw vapor coming from the shelter, landed and investigated,
finding the two individuals unresponsive on the floor of the shelter.
An emergency response was launched, attempts to revive them were
unsuccessful. Their bodies are now at McMurdo Station.
Next-of-kin have been notified. The identities of the
two people have not yet been released.
A press notification from NSF is being released this
hour. We don’t have a lot of confirmed information at this
time. I will have more information to share when our satellites
come up this evening.
If you have any questions or need any assistance please see
me or your supervisor. Let’s take good care of each other.
Bill
https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=297454&org=NSF&from=news
12/13/18
Today was our poop (waste-water) and drinking water sampling
day. We needed to sample the waste-water stream 4 times during the day, 6 hours
a part. Believe it or not, we felt the day to be a rest day because we didn’t
have to get all geared up and go outside and do that hard physical work.
Sampling water is easy, just like we do at McM. The poop sampling involved
going to the effluent stream, getting geared up in tyvek suits and dipping a ½ liter
dip jar, attached to a pole into the waste water stream. Pretty gross, but not
absolutely disgusting.
12/14/18
Today was the day that Roald Amundsen reached the Pole. He
was the first ever to reach the South Pole, just beating out Robert Falcon
Scott. Interestingly, there are 2 guys (American and Brit) competing to be the
first and fasted to go from coast to the pole and back completely unsupported.
The American went through about a day and a half ago in the middle of the
night, but we saw the Brit go by and take photos at the pole today.
It was also volleyball night, which was a lot of fun and a
good portion of the station comes to it.
12/15/18
One of the NSF science reps is visiting, so Neal gave her,
and us a tour of some of the various science experiments going on around the
station. This included projects looking at neutrinos, boreholes drilled all the
way through the nearly 2 mile thick ice, and various telescopes looking into deep
space, all the way to the edge of our universe. One of the telescopes has
characterized the size, shape, and edges of the universe.
After dinner, Nate, Neal, and I hung out in a lounge
chatting and drinking some sierra nevadas. In the evening a party was held in
the gym. Before the dancing got started there was a competition measuring the
size of everyone’s head by how much water they displaced in a bucket. The
person with the largest head and the person with the smallest head would win.
There are 2 giant snow mountains just outside of the building that have been
created by dozers pushing up drifted snow. The 2 mountains will be named, with
signs, after the winners of the measure your head competition.
12/16/18
After brunch, Nate and I went out to the geographic and
ceremonial pole to take our ‘Hero’ shots. It was a nice and sunny, though cold
and breezy day. After doing that, I went for a short 4 mile ski, first out to
the tourist camp and then out to the South Pole telescope. There was a
Christmas decorating/watch Christmas movies party in the galley that I went to
for a bit. But mostly I relaxed after an exhausting week.
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