-

Well, the new year came in ok on this side of the world. I hope it does for everyone else. The New Year is always a time of retrospection. I was thinking about my suspicion (before I got here) that McMurdo ran on coffee and diesel. We go though at least 8 tanks of coffee each morning (just for the breakfast hour). That is approximately 40 gallons. Of course that is not all the coffee consumed each morning by a long shot. It is just a comparative sampling. As far as running on diesel, the station also runs on "Mogas." "Mogas" is Antarctican for gas. Don't ask me. The select fuel of choice is however JP8 jet fuel. (Hmmmm... Fuuellll) Lots and lots of jet fuel. Those planes get thirsty. The fuel folks (fuelies) even have their own radio frequency. I have heard estimates of what diesel would cost at southpole if you take into account the distribution cost of getting the fuel to McMurdo and then to pole (by LC-130 aircraft). It is precious stuff. So, my original thought of the program running on coffee and diesel was right, but it really runs on plain old money. The program costs approximately 320 million a year. My position is that it is worth it. Those 320 million bucks buys some pretty cool dinosaur bones, meteorites, and 9 million year old ice samples (shh. it hasn't been proven yet.) and hundreds of other peaceful scientific projects.

I am working on my 2007 goals. I did pretty well on the 2006 ones considering getting to the ice was one of them. There were others that also got scratched off. The only thing I am absolutely confident about is that 2007 is going to be a great year.

Talking to the folks when I first got here they said that after Christmas it is all downhill. It will be easy and it seems like you are on your way home. The vessels come in and the pace and tone of town changes. All of these statements I personally found to be true so far. I am going to have some cool missions as we wrap things up here for the season.

I got these two pictures on yesterday's hike outside of town. The skua took a very nice bath I have on video. You can see the ODEN breaking its way through the ice over Discovery Hut on Hut Point. The ice pier is just this side of hut point. The ODEN was only about 6 miles away. Our ship will soon be in. After the ODEN the Polar Sea is following shortly after.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chicago, Micro Excavators, Cats, Fish and Dirty Trucks

-
Image
I was in Chicago for a couple of days for work. I got a pic with an unavailable micro-excavator. Big contrast with the largest earthmoving equipment in the world that Komatsu makes. My truck got so incredibly dirty from the trees and other pollen this spring. I had to finaly wash it. I only got the top layer off with the soapy power washer. It will take several sessions. The paint is coming off the service body. It was shot with a topcoat by the upfitter in Ohio where I bought the truck. The primer from Knapheide (the service body manuafacturer) looks like it held up great. I am looking to get the truck repainted. I bought it new in Columbus Ohio in 2017 and it only has 30k miles (most of them highway between the my farm in NY and Duluth GA.) We stocked Canary Lake with new fish. About 10k fish flew into the lake off the delivery truck. We have a healthy lake and we grow some large fish. Angie and I went to a Cat Show in Gwinnett county. It was a smaller show than the other sh...
Read more

California, Berkshire NY, Baltimore Maryland and Washington DC

-
Image
I am back from a speaking engagement at a familiar conference (CIDM) in San Jose California. Afterwards, I met Angie at the ATL airport and headed to the farm and to see my cousins, Aunt and Sister (and my newest relative) in Baltimore and Washington DC. It was a densely scheduled trip, but nothing compared to our typical overseas vacation trips. I have been having educational fun with my recent birthday gift. It is a Radiacode 103. It is a very sensitive scintillation radiation detector. Loads of fun. The 1k µS/hr spike shown is what the carry on baggage x-ray machine doses out. I am glad I wasn't inside the x-ray equipment. Stopping at some antique stores along the way, I found a number of uranium glass pieces. Yes, they are radioactive. Yes, the dose is comparable to that you get from riding in a commercial airplane. I took a couple of pics of property in Upstate NY. Unbelievable. It will beat out images of the best trailer trash anywhere. And yes, the vehicles are systemica...
Read more

Busy and Busier

-
Image
It has been busy and somewhat stressful. I am reflecting on the comparatively relative low stress of traveling alone in Southern Africa last year at about this time. I mean in Africa, I only had to worry about getting in car accidents (maybe running someone over), missing flights, getting robbed or attacked. All of these possibilities in a very unfamiliar land. Now interestingly, I seem to have more stress -- over what? It is probably a very good example of good stress versus bad stress. Good stress comes from calculated self-directed challenge. Bad stress comes from captivity and what we feel we "should" be doing. "Should" indicates there are external forces we are beholden to --without our own devices or agency. In April, I am speaking at CIDM Convex in San Jose CA. https://convex.infomanagementcenter.com/ . I also learned I am speaking at LavaCon in October https://www.lavacon.org/ . There were 150 speakers considered and only 40 selected. It will be my first t...
Read more

Updates Storm and Other

-
Image
We had a storm last night in Georgia just like the recent storms that have seemingly have covered the whole country. We lost power and I have been doing a 3 hour on- 3 hour off with the generator. I am definately prepared. Generator started up 2nd pull, plenty of gas and all the other stuff incluing supply chain readiness getting more gas, oil, etc. I like helping neighbors when things go wrong. I have my service truck, my large chainsaw and lots o' tools. I can be quite helpful. Someday (perhaps soon) we will be amazed that we have to have these noisy reciprocating gas engine generators. I like the quiet. I also like having electricity in the house I think I am going to sell my IFR 1200S Service Monitor. Its a fantastic tool. Although they aren't the the newest, they are in great demand because they are incredibly versatile, durable and most of all- trustworthy. It will be on ebay. I am looking forward to Spring. I will be working on the humvee and boat and the property in...
Read more

Ends and Odds and Other Executions of Word Order

-
Image
We made some Chakalaka stew recently. I had a can from South Africa and it was time to eat. Canned foods taste better after a year or two. It was quite tasty and I thoroughly enjoyed pronouncing Chakalaka. The Tesla has an impressionist side for its full self drive robot. The screen shows a string of buses as a train passes ahead. I kinda like it. The robot definately likes to consider objects with people rather than just objects. The weather really turned nice at least for a few days. The leaves are really popping out, as well as the pollen. It was a good oportunity to run the whole fleet. I am planning the radio systems for the Humvee and getting my electrical problems sorted out. I am still quite angry about the shop that decided to hook up the batteries incorrectly and cause some issues. It's fun to drive, not comfortable. Almost the exact opposite of the Tesla.
Read more