Penguin sightings!!!

They say that penguin sightings usually start around mid-December, and on a really good year you might see some in November. By the middle of October I had two separate sightings, so this summer will hopefully be a fantastic one for seeing these little guys. Granted, one of my two 'sightings' was kind of cheating, because I went to the penguin rookery, where you are guaranteed to see them after the beginning of October.

The first pictures you see with the one Adelie Penguin were taken on October 14th, I believe. We were working out at Willy Field installing the lighting for the runway, when this little critter came sliding along on his belly. When I first saw the dark object on the horizon, I said to my boss that there was a dog running over here, and how strange that was. He told me I was an idiot, and then reminded me where I was in the world, which made it click. It was a penguin coming this way! When they are sliding on their bellies they just look like a black dog in the distance. I ran to the truck to get my camera, and he just kept getting closer. When he got about 50 feet away, my boss Chad said, "Get on your knees, and sometimes they will get curious and come right up to you." Sure enough, next thing I know and I am staring face to face at this guy, about 10 feet from me.

According to the Antarctic Treaty, we are not allowed to get close enough to any wildlife that we alter their normal behavior. Basically, if wildlife sees us, we are too close. Apparently there is a loophole though, because I have been told by several different people that if you stop when they are far away and they come up to you, there is nothing you can do but stay still. If you get up and move farther away, they will definitely see you, so you are supposed to just stay there and stay still. Works for me.

This guy was totally curious about me. He slid right over to me, stopped about 10 feet away, and began cycles of standing and lying down, all while staring right at me. Not afraid at all. I was like a little kid. I wish you all could have seen the elated look on my face. To see a penguin in its natural environment was blowing me away. The crazy part was that we were about 20 miles from the nearest sea ice and access to the ocean, and he was heading farther away from it. He was 20 miles onto the Ross Ice Shelf and not turning back. Nobody seems to know why they do this, but it is somewhat common they tell me.

"I can leave a happy man now! Whenever I end up leaving, I will be okay with it," I tell Chad. He just laughs.

A week or two later I got the lucky privaledge of working through my day off (the second of several 'days off' I had to work). 12 hours of work on this particular Sunday. I was wiring up a building for some scientists that was leaving on a sled Monday morning, getting towed out onto the sea ice. The scientists were mapping the floor of McMurdo Sound, and this building was going to house all of there instruments. At the end of a LONG day, I told them they were good to go and my work there was done. It was a that point when one of them asked me, "Was this your day off?" They were very thankful when I told them it was, and just before I left one of them asked me if I would be interested in a trip out to Cape Royds that evening. "Are you kidding me?" Of course I want to go. Cape Royds is where the Adelie Penguin rookery is, and it has been closed to everyone but the scientists for five years now. They told me we would leave at 8:00pm. This seemed a little late to me because it is about 10 miles past Cape Evans, and the Rec trip to Cape Evans is an all day outing. When I asked how long it would take to get there they looked at me, laughed a little and said, "only 35 minutes if you are going 60mph the whole way."

We were riding snowmobiles out there! 32 miles one way accross the sea ice. They asked if I had my snowmobile training yet, which I hadn't. I thought this might pose a problem, but they said we would just make this trip a bit of a 'secret'. They got five snowmobiles for the five of us, and one quick crash course later we were off. They said there weren't going to be that many penguins yet because it was still so early in the season, and they don't usually show up in large numbers until the sea ice retreats further. When we got there there were at least a thousand penguins, and I said, 'I thought there weren't going to be that many." They said that in mid-December there would be about 50 -75 thousand. Nonetheless, it was amazing. There were so many, all making these very strange noises. It was like listening to a penguin symphony. This area is an ASPA, or Antarctic Specially Preserved Area, which means the only one who have access to it are scientists and by special permit only. I was sooo lucky to be there. I have learned a very important lesson here: ALWAYS work on your day off if it is for an important science group! Who knows what kind of cool stuff they can show you. I hope you all like these pictures. I have about a hundred more from the same sightings, but these are a few of the best.

If you read this earlier, you would have noticed an unusually large number of typos. Sorry about that. I was finishing this at 3 in the morning last night, and didn't proof read it before I posted. Oh, and for Lauren, the photo of me on the snowmobile was taken on the way back to McMurdo at about 12:30am. That's as dark as it gets!

Recreation in Mactown

This entry will be more of a photo essay. I have sooo many pictures I need to start putting more shots up quickly. The recreational opportunities here are quite numerous when the weather is good. For the adventurous there is plenty of stuff to do while not at work (which feels like never). Here are some of the shots I have been getting lately. I hope you all enjoy...

This is what we do during condition fun (see next paragraph. no wait, 2 more paragraphs). Notice the windows behind me in the picture of me playing pool. LOTS of blowing snow is what usually makes things condition one around here. Soemtimes the visability is unbelievably bad, like 10-20 feet. When it's like this there is nothing to do but read, play pool or ping pong, or watch movies. It was fun at first but it can get boring quickly...

When the carpenters get bored, this is what they resort to. Ice sculpting contests!!! Some of them are pretty awesome. The next shot is one of McMurdo in the center of the picture, with the enormous Mt. Erebus looming in the background with it's ever constant plume of smoke coming from it's cauldron. It has been slowly erupting for more than 20 years now. Believe it or not, but those hills directly behind McMurdo are much larger than they look. They are so large that you cannot see Mt. Erebus at all from Mactown, they compltely obscure the view... This shot was taken from the Williams Field Runway on the Ross Ice Shelf. It may not look like it, but I am standing 19 miles from town when I took this shot, and the foot of Mt. Erebus is 30 miles from McMurdo, even though it looks like Mactown is right next to it...

I told many of you that we have not been receiving packages lately because planes have not been able to land. This is why. Over a week of consistent weather like this. This is a photo of the TV set in my room which has weather updates on channel 2. It honestly looked like this for ten days straight. These conditions are what leads to the first photo of this entry, "Condition One, No Travel Allowed". After these ten days of horrible weather it has now become affectionately known as "Condition fun", because we ended up playing lots of pool and ping pong. If it is condition fun outside, we are not allowed to leave the building, even to go to work! Four days of work were cancelled completely, and three others had partial condition fun troubles. We are definitley playing catch up now... Oh yeah the last sunset is coming up. I am planning a big hike for it. Already if you go to the bars on Saturday night, you'd better emember to bring your sunglasses, because when they call last call at 1am and it is time to leave, it is BRIGHT outside. It's a 'you definitely need your sunglasses' kind of bright at 1:30am.

These are shots of the bouldering cave and the ceramics room, which are located right next to eachother. Perfect for me. The cave has lots of routes but I have taken upon myself to be the town's new route setter. I have a new found appreciation for really nice routes in the gym, because they are a bit harder to create than I had expected. My toes have really been hurting a lot lately, which is why I have been climbing in my bare feet. It definitely makes me concentrate on my footwork more. The ceramics room not very big, but actually has a ton of great stuff for such a small space. Two wheels, all the glazes and tools one could ever want, and a really nice, albeit small, kiln. There are some great potters and sculptors here.

This is Discovery Hut. It is right on the tip of the point in front of McMurdo. It was built was Robert E. Scott and his expedition as a base camp for their journey to the South Pole. They landed in 1901 and finished construction of the hut in 1902. Unfortunately, thier attempt to be the first to the Geographic South Pole was ill fated; in not one but two ways. Upon arriving at the Pole, they realized that they had been beaten by about 6 weeks by a team led by Amundsen, which crossed the continent frmo the opposite direction. Both teams left at roughly the same time, but Amundsen employed dogs to carry sleds with their gear, while Scott and his crew carried the gear filled sleds themselves. Can you imagine towing a sled with all of your food, shelter, and clothes from the egde of the continent to the South Pole and back? Over 1,900 miles. Unfortunately for Scott, his team never returned. They all perished about halfway back to Discovery Hut. The hut still stands as a tribute to his team, and is now a world heritage site. The picture of the brown leathery thing is actually the mummified remains of a leopard seal his team had killed and were saving to eat. Temperatures this cold tend to preserve things extraordinarily well, as you can see in these 106 year old seal remains.

More pics

This was intended to be a post about hypothermia, but as it turns out there are more lessons to learn here in McMurdo than those of cold weather and survival... Stay tuned and the hypothermia post will come soon.

Another important thing I have learned in my short time here is that static electricity really sucks. Not only does it give you a real nice shock anytime and everytime you touch something metal, but apparently it also fries electronics with ease. Case and point: A couple of days ago I sat down at my computer to plug in my Ipod and as soon as the connection was made, poof! The computer screen went black. As it turns out, static electricity (which is a never ending problem here) that had built up within me went from me straight through my Ipod and right into my USB port, effectively disabling the entire port. I now have nothing to plug my pictures into (or my Ipod for that matter) except the station computers, of which there are five of for all of us here on station.

This explains the lack of posts recently, as well as the change in topic for this blog. When I figure out how to upload my new pics I will certainly share.

The new topic will be "McMurdo: An electrician's perspective". How does that sound?

We'll start with the night flight. This might have been the most paradoxical night of my life. One description might be to say it was the most boring night of my life. Another might suggest that it was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen; not to mention being witness to history in the making.

Basically, I spent seven hours sitting in a truck (so warm inside!!!) in order to witness about 3 minutes of aircraft activity. Those three minutes were amazing but was that ever a long night. A USAF C-17 (the same type that deposited us here) was attempting a nighttime landing, the first one in history on the ice, in order to test new technologies for possible future winter medi-vacs. Historically, getting hurt in the middle of winter here is a very bad idea, seeing as how there might not be transportation to a real hospital (New Zealand) available for up to seven months (worst case scenario). The United States Air Force is trying to change this by testing infrared landing lights on the runway that are not visible to the naked eye. Too bad I was not here last summer to help install these lights.

Anyways, they needed two electricians on call in case there was a problem with the infrared lights and the regular Nav-Aid lights needed to be turned back on. Of course the lights worked perfectly and I had absolutely nothing to do for seven hours but take pictures of the plane landing and subsequently taking off. It was still very much worth it, as it afforded some fantastic shots, as you can see. Most of the shots you see here were taken with my boss Shawn's camera. He has the most amazing camera ever but almost never takes pictures. I have been lucky in that he has let me run around with it quite frequently.

The first shots are of the night flight, obviously. After that you have the fish huts followed by one of the polar traverse tractors. This tractor, along with several others, will tow the fish huts you see along with several thousand gallons of fuel from McMurdo to the South Pole. Over a thousand miles at a rate of 5 mph. Can you believe that? Supposedly it takes about 70 days for a team of 11 to make it there and back. Raytheon and the NSF (National Science Foundation) swear that this is more cost effective than flying it. When you think about 11 people's wages for over two months, a reported $20,000 in food and $55,000 in fuel consumption just to get there and back, it is hard for me to imagine that is true. The project is a go October 21, so it must be... We the electricians have been wiring the fish huts for the team and were given specific instructions not to screw anything up. That is pretty much a direct quote from the boss. We can't have them losing power 500 miles from the South Pole and 500 miles from McMurdo, since there will not be an electrician on the team.

The last shots were taken from the summit of Ob Hill the second time around. Much nicer weather this time. Cold but almost no wind. A rarity!

The hypothermia post will hopefully be up soon, but I hope this holds you all over. Thanks for checking back!

warm weather!

Well for the first time since I arrived, the weather got close to zero degrees today (Sunday). -3F outside today. This is ambient temperature, of course. Still hovering around -20F with the wind chill. Anyways, whats the first thing on your mind when the weather turns practically sub-tropical outside as it was today? Hiking, obviously!!

It's absolutely amazing how a week of -25 to -50F weather can help you acclimatize. -3F is practically t-shirt and sweater weather. I even found myself going from the dorm to the gym wearing just my gym clothes. Anyways, back to the hiking. Ob hill (observation hill) sits just to the east, looming over McMurdo with it's constant plume of snowdrift blowing off the top. It called to me. I decided to try the ob hill loop. It's a short 3.7 mile loop the skirts the base of ob hill and takes you out to the edge of Cape Armitage. The hike was spectacular, affording views of the pressure ridges, Williams Air Field, White and Black Islands, Mt. Discovery, the Royal Society Range, McMurdo, and Scott Base.

Unfortunately, the wind was so severe I honestly started to think about frostbite. I'm sure it was a long way off, but it didn't feel like it. It was relatively calm in McMurdo so, like an idiot, I only brought my sunglasses and not my goggles. I'm not sure how fast the wind was blowing, but it felt very similar to the con 2 wind I was working in a couple of days ago which was sustained at 60 mph with gusts up to 85 mph. Of course, the direction I choose to do the loop in had me walking directly into the wind. That was the first mistake. Second mistake? Don't ever judge the weather outside by what it is like in our sheltered little oasis we call Mactown. Baaaad idea. While it is definitely cold here in town, half a mile in any direction takes you to places with significantly less shelter from the wind, leaving you exposed and vulnerable.

Speaking of places with significantly less shelter from the wind, I have had the pleasure of working out at Pegasus White Ice Runway, about 10-12 miles straight out to see (south) from Mactown. The feeling while working on frozen ocean 10 feet thick while surrounded by mountains 5,000-13,000ft tall is euphoric to say the least. After three days out on the ice runway, I still find myself staring at the dramatic coastline every chance I get. It definitely helps me keep my mind off the fact that it is usually 10-15 degrees colder on the ice than in town.

I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying the pictures...

Weather comes to McMurdo

I had read it, I had heard it, but I hadn't seen it... Until today. They say that Antarctica is the windiest place on earth. Also the driest. With less than two inches of precipitation a year on average, Antarctica is technically a desert; the driest landmass on earth. It receives less precipitation than the Sahara Desert. Anyways, today I witnessed a rarity. Two events occurred within about 6 hours, one being extremely common and the other quite rare (especially for this time of year). The day started off normal enough, with clear skies and temps in the 15-20F below region (see first picture). Saying it's windy in Antarctica is like saying it's sunny in the Sahara desert. Understatement of the year! In McMurdo you are surrounded by very tall mountains (the Royal Society Mountains), and if the weather is coming from the other side of those mountains it will crest those mountains and be on top of you quicker than you can say "We need to get inside because I am FREEZING". Being a climber I have dealt with this scenario in the Sierras, among other places, but never to this extent.

With that being said, I would implore you to now look at the second picture. This was taken less then 40 minutes after the first shot. If you look carefully you will notice that they were taken from the exact same position, as we were trying to finish a project (more on that project later) before the supposed 'weather' moved in. Which brings me to my second point. 'Weather' in Antarctica is the second understatement of the year. If the say there is possible 'weather' moving in (which they do quite frequently), it means batten down the hatches. Do not pass go, do not collect $200, just get inside! Anything and everything else takes too long. I have now learned that the wind gusts of this particular 'weather' reached 85 mph, which, according to my research, put me in the middle of what was the equivalent of a category one hurricane.

To people that have spent any time here, this wasn't a very big deal. Wind gusts routinely reach 100+ mph here. Maybe that's why my boss said we stay until the job is done. What a day to be working outside! Nothing like some fresh air, right? Unless it is going into your nose at 85 mph...

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention the other little problem with wind. It seems to have quite an effect on the temperature outside. When we finally did finish the project (which took 4 hours to do something it would take 15-20 min in L.A.) and went in for lunch, the weather report said -35F ambient temp with wind chill peaking at -58F. Let me remind you that at the start of the project it was -15F ambient, -20F with wind chill. Basically, the temp dropped 38 degrees in about an hour. The best part you ask? Since it did not reach -100F and visability did not drop below 25 feet (it hovered around 40 feet), this was not category one (in which case we all stay put in whatever building you might be in), but rather category two, and I got to go back to work after lunch. Thankfully there was work to be done in the shop, but just getting there was on ordeal in itself. When the shop is about 500 feet away and you can only see 40 feet in front of you, plus an 85 mph wind pelting anything that weighs less than 2-3 pounds into your body, including rocks, dirt and debris, and ice, it makes for a very interesting walk to say the least.

All in all, life could be worse, and it feels good to have gotten my first major storm under my belt. Tonight is Kiwi night, so, if it is possible (probably not) I am going over to Scott Base, which is run by the Kiwis (New Zealanders), for a drink.

Oh yeah. The second thing that happened today was the semi-rare part. It snowed! Usually this doesn't happen because when the weather is this cold the low pressure pushes clouds with snow farther north and leaves us with lenticular clouds that are associated with high winds. Not the case today! Almost 4 inches of snow fell in a 24 hour period which made for a very beautiful and serene setting. More on the snow later as well (next blog) as I have to get back to work...

I hope all is well with everyone back home and more updates soon!

The Big Day

Monday September 8th was the day of days for me. Not something I will soon forget. At 2:30am we leave the hotel and head to the airport. First order of business, getting ALL the ECW (see previous post) gear donned and the baggage weighed. My baggage clocked in at 114 pounds, not including my carry-on, and I was lucky that they let me adhere to the winter-over weight limit, as I am still an alternate for the position. After sitting in all that gear for about an hour, they tell us it is -65F on the Pegasus Ice Field, which means the engines of the USAF C-17 would freeze up upon descent into the ice shelf. They tell us -50F is the cut-off, and that is still pushing it. So we are forced to sit there and wait to see if conditions improve, which fortunately they did and a couple of hours later we were in the air.

If you have never been inside of an Air Force cargo plane let me tell you, it is impressive. The sheer size and power are awe inspiring. We sit in jump seats along the side of the plane with cargo taking up the center. It was a much more comfortable flight than anticipated, aside from the noise. All the ear muffs in the world wouldn't drown out the noise from those engines. Anyways, the USAF crew was very nice, and even let us into the cockpit for a few pictures during the flight. I waited until the end of the flight to do this, a strategic move on my part. As I was one of the last people allowed up (I almost missed my chance), I was afforded views out the cockpit window that truly made my jaw hit the floor. I waited because I figured (correctly) that towards the end of the flight we would for a short time be flying over the frozen continent rather than ocean, and it payed off with the spectacular views you see. Our flight path took us directly over the Trans-Antarctic mountains, which scrape the sky at 8,000-16,000 feet. These are the mountains that you see in the pictures.

When we landed the temperature had risen considerably, as it was a very comfortable (yeah right) -35F. There is nothing on the ice field to block the wind, so to me it felt like it was about -300F. But it didn't matter because here I was!!!! Less than 200,000 people in history had viewed what I was viewing right now! An incredibly overwhelming feeling had taken over, accompanied by mixed emotions of excitement and depression. How exciting to be here, but also realizing this was a point of no return to some extent. There are a lot of people I really love that I wont be seeing for quite some time kept running through my head. Namely, my parents and Jen. It was a very sobering excitement to say the least.

An hour later our shuttle deposited us in the town of McMurdo, which is surrounded by HUGE mountains and the only active volcano on Antarctica, Mount Erebus, at over 14,000 feet. Snow-covered mountains dominate the landscape as far as the eye can see, with nothing but 25 miles of the flat Ross Ice Shelf and lots of wind seperating us. Oh yeah, where we landed was frozen ocean, not the Ross Ice Shelf as I had thought. This was kind of scary because the Ross Ice Shelf is thousands of feet thick and permanent throughout the summer. The Pegasus Ice Field is on frozen ocean about 10-20 feet thick, and will not exist in a couple of months except to the penguins, whales, and seals. It is a bit unnerving to be in a plane weighing how many thousands of pounds and knowing the ice underneath you is maybe only 10 feet thick and will be gone in a few months!

Being surrounded by such large mountains, the wind in McMurdo is much tamer (relative to the ice field only) resulting in a bit warmer weather. -18F when we arrived in town, but it is so dry here that it doesn't feel quite that cold. Don't get me wrong, it feels really really cold out there, but bearable when not super windy. One quick orientation later and I was giving myself a self-guided tour of the station. Two gyms, one with treadmills and such (the gerbil gym) and the other with weights (the meathead gym) as they are affectionately known. Also a small climbing wall, indoor basketball court which doubles as a volleyball and small soccer court. They have a ceramics room too! I think with a gym, climbing wall, and wheel to throw on I am going to be able to pass time no problem. Also there is a greenhouse with a hammock in it, saunas in all the dorms, a library, and bowling alley (the oldest operating bowling alley in the world), but you have to set the pins up yourself... They tell me pinsetters work for tips.

When we landed it was about 1:30pm and the sun was just barely above the horizon, and by 2:30 or 3:00 it had set. (See third to last picture, taken at 2:35pm). Right now we get about 4 hours of daylight each day. (Maybe twilight would be a better description because it is not very bright). At six o'clock my self guided tour was in the pitch black. (COLD!!!!!!!!). Apparently two days before I arrived it was condition 1, which means -100F or worse with less than 25 feet visability. Nobody is allowed to leave the building they are in without permission from the firehouse if condition 1 is sounded. Right now it is condition 3, which is the best weather but still much too cold for my liking. It's 20 below outside and believe it or not I have seen people in shorts outside... These people are institutionalized.

I'll post more when I get a better feel for the place. I hope you all enjoy the pictures and thanks so much for all the comments everyone. I really appreciate hearing from all of you. Love you all.