Chazd's (Charles Dowdell's) News Burps

My normal Saturday at the office? As with almost all of my days here in Antarctica, yesterday was an interesting day. In most of the science camps around Ross Island and the Dry Vallys we use UHF 2-way radios with a telephone interface to connect with the McMurdo telephone network. The telephone suddenly stopped working out at the penguin rookery at Cape Royds a day or so ago. So we left the shop at about 8:00 AM to take an A-star to get it working again. We landed in 30 knot winds at Cape Royds. In a case like this the pilot not only keeps the engine running he keeps the throttle up as we get out so he has somewhere to go (up and away) if it gusts. Well anyway, we got the telephone working again after about an hour or two after getting both ends of the link spruced up. It is a tricky (but good) path using knife edge defraction off Tent Island to get the signal back to town. The winds on the ridge where we have the antenna were about 60 knots. I was again reminded about Antarctica be...

I was going to post a satellite image of McMurdo Sound and the ross sea but the clouds are too thick to make it worthwhile. http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?RossSea Select 250M resolution, zoom in and crop the image. You will see the channel very clearly the ships are cutting (after the clouds dissipate). The image is updated everyday. I am going to look at the pier this morning. The ODEN may be in. The Polar Sea is planning on being in on the 10th. We have had very strong southerly winds the past few days. This is what everyone is hoping for. The brash ice in the channel is moving out to sea and the possibilities of more of the sea ice breaking and moving out is possible. The sound may clear out this year. I think 1999 was the last year it cleared. Already this year the shipping channel is very clear of brash ice. That means orcas will be swimming right up to town. I just looked at the helo schedule. I have an early launch over to the Penguin rookery over at cape royds...

It seems sort of weird to want to talk about work all the time. But, then again that is where the majority of time is spent. The other time is largely down-time and although rejuvinating largely uneventful. We haven't had any planes for a while. People are getting annoyed with the delays leaving the ice. Commercial flight delays are pretty common for sure. The ice flights run on a schedule but the delays differ from commercial since they may be delayed a week or more based on weather and equipment. Hopefully we have a flight in from Christchurch this Saturday, maybe Sunday. I have a meeting this morning regarding re-deployment (going home). A lot of folks take vacation when they get off the ice. Several people I know will be taking at least a month in Africa this time. It is somewhat common to purchase a round-the-world airline ticket. Generally, you have a year or 6 months to take flights (number of flights limited) around the world. If you start in the southern hemisphere go...

I flew out to the US Coast Guard Polar Sea yesterday. That experience may be difficult to top. The guys with the red parkas and strange footwear were quite a novelty aboard ship. After all, these red parka visitors have been in Antarctica since October and they look like it. The crew of the Polar Sea (120 people) will be getting to town in the next couple of days after they get the channel cleared along with the Oden. Being underway on an icebreaking ship breaking ice in Antarctica was quite a thrill. The ship has three turbine engines producing 60,000 HP. Ice chunks the size of small buildings get blasted away in the prop wash. We continually saw a number of orcas, penguins, skuas,and seals. The crew was excited about all the wildlife and remarked that there was a lot more wildlife to see in Antarctica compared to the Arctic. I have a number of videos that show the power needed to break thru three meter thick (multi-year) ice. When our helo came we had to stop the ship, climb off onto...

I am headed out to the Polar Sea today by helo. We are going to install a couple of radio telephones so folks aboard ship can use the station satellite link and to call into town. It looks like we are really going to get stuffed in on the helo with some other folks. I will be heading to pole on the 15th. I will get some Diamox from medical before I head down there to help fend off altitude sickness. I am ok at altitude usually. I get a headache and I will not be able to sleep at all for the first night, but it is all part of the experience. The pole is at approximately 10000 feet above sea level, and the polar air is quite thin which makes the altitude equivalent higher. It is a stress on your body making extra blood cells and learning how to breathe for sufficient oxygen uptake. I have watched more movies on the ice than probably have in the last five or ten years. The thing that consistantly strikes me is the level of violence in these movies, really. I remember Taxi Driver was a...

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 thou...