Well it is now 11:45pm and I have some time to write this blog. So yesterday we had a morning of Antarctic Field Training theory. This consisted of getting familiar with their standard operating procedures for things like safety, responsibility, sea ice travel, radios, etc. Then in the afternoon we were to meet at 3:30 to be ready to go to our field site.
Our excellent guides allowed us to combine some science with our practical training so we went out with three skidoos and a Hägglund (pictures of this and some of the other awesome equipment around will be in the posts). We towed our two EM31 ground based electromagnetic inductions sensors behind two of the skiddos. These are mounted on Nansen sleds and measure the total thickness, or snow plus ice thickness. These require a sled passenger to operate a foot brake that drags in the snow and slows the sled down. On the way out there, I was the sled passenger for one of the sleds. This was a lot of fun as you have some control of the sled by moving your body weight, but you need to hang on tight, especially once you get off the established trails. However we had some problems with one of the EM31 instruments as it kept losing the data connection between the data logger and the sensor.
Around Scott Base and McMurdo Stations there are a lot of trails that are marked and checked. These connect important places like the runway on the sea ice, research huts and so forth with the rest of the base. These trails get marked with flags that indicate where you can travel, where there are dangers such as cracks, holes, or thin ice or where there are pipelines/wires. The colors of these flags are red/green, black, and blue, respectively. The red/green flags that mark routes indicate that 5m to each side of the flag is known to be safe.
Upon arrival at our field site near the end of the Erebus Ice Tongue, we set up camp including some nice mountaineering Mountain Hardware Tents, and some Scott tents (Scott Polar Tents). These tents are really excellent, but are very heavy (30kg or so). Here you can see my tent (shared with Christian) and in the background is Mount Erebus, a mountain/volcano on Ross Island. Definitely one of the best camp spots I’ve ever had.
After cooking a delicious supper consisting of dehydrated campers food, I had the Beef Pasta Hot pot which was very good, Dan, Ken and I took a little walk to the ice tongue just to see it up closer. We were asked by the supervisors and field trainers not to go up onto the ice tongue because of crevasse (ice cracks) danger. Here you can see our camp out on the sea ice.
This morning, we took down camp, and then put up a GPS station near the camp, this involved some basic shoveling of snow, drilling a hole through the ice (to get the water level), and setting up a couple of tripods, one for the GPS unit and one for the solar panels to charge the battery.
Then we headed back to the base, after our amazingly beautiful weather on the first day we had some wind in the morning that really picked up during our trip, making the ride back much less pleasant, with reduced visibility and blowing snow. However we traveled in a close convoy and visibility was not terrible. However I still enjoyed it, nice to see what the wind is like here.
One interesting thing about Antarctica is that because of all the cold ice here, the air moving over it cools. Since cold air is denser than warm air it begins to move downhill as a result of gravity, and as it does so you get a wind called katabatic winds.
Once we got back to Scott Base we had to DEMOB (demobilize) our Antarctic Field Course material. Here at Scott Base the scientists are far more responsible for cleaning up after themselves and helping with base operations (such as helping in the kitchen, with dishes, etc). We had to unpack all of our gear, wash the tents, hang sleeping bags, do some laundry, and so forth. After that we had some more discussion of our training, mostly on things to improve, things to watch out for and other suggestions. We then finished with a practical scenario, in which one member of our party was injured, and another was wet and the other members in the team had to identify the critical issues, delegate and deal with them. This was really good as it forces you to think quickly and carefully. By the time this was all done it was supper time.
After dinner, Dan and I walked along the ice ridge recreational route near the base. Weddell seals area everywhere in this area as they come up through cracks/thin ice and maintain their holes. They come up onto the ice to sun. It must also be calving season as there are several baby seals on the ice. Here in Antarctica you are supposed to maintain a 10m distance from wildlife while on foot, but you should not put yourself in a dangerous position to do so. In this case, the route is flagged and so you cannot stray to far from the flags. We tried to maximize our distance from the animals but this still gets you quite close in some cases.
By Scott Base, there are some very large pressure ridges where the sea ice has collided with the land has has been forced up onto it, forming immense ridges of ice.
I had hoped to have some more scientific information ready to present to you, or an interview with one of our group members, but I haven’t had time. We have been quite busy so far, and this will hopefully get better over the next few days, so maybe tomorrow.
Tomorrow, Dan, Ken, Christian and I are going on a tourist trip organized by the base to Cape Evans and the Terra Nova hut (I actually don’t know the history here but will try to find out for you guys). This will take all day, but I’ve been told to go so no arguments. I also hope to have some pictures of some of the vehicles here, but maybe not as I will have the trip to talk about. But we will see, am really hoping there will be penguins at the site as I have heard that there may be.
Well until next time, hope you are all doing well, especially my lovely wife.
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