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Week 3 - November 11, 2001 to November 17, 2001
Date: 11/17/01
Latitude: 80 degrees South
Longitude: 120 degrees West
Temperature: –18°C( 0°F)
Wind speed: 5 knots
Wind Chill: Not Given
Wind direction: Northwest
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
Today was the first full day in the field for most of the team. At the moment we are perched on the top of a small hill. Although really not any more than a bump, the hill is very noticeable in the otherwise flat terrain of the ice sheet interior. The hill is actually anthropogenic in origin –– until about 8 years ago, a small summer field station was located here. That station –– Byrd Surface Camp –– was the third station in this part of the ice sheet. It was built on the top of a hill to prevent it from being buried by drifting snow. The original Byrd Station was established in the late 1950s. New Byrd Station followed in the mid–1960s. That station was constructed inside a network of interconnected aluminum tunnels buried in the snow. With time, the weight of new snow gradually started to compress and buckle the aluminum tunnels and the station was abandoned in the early 1970s. All that remains of that station above the snow surface is the top of the drill tower used in the recovery of one of the earliest ice cores.
We spent the day organizing our scientific equipment. Mark began assembling the drill sled. Blue and Gordon configured their snowmobiles for precision GPS surveys and also installed the GPS base station that will operate at Byrd throughout the duration of our traverse. Markus continued preparation of atmospheric sampling equipment and Brian conducted a short but very successful test traverse with his deep ice–penetrating radar. Susan, Paul and Dan organized boxes for ice coring. Steve Niles, Allan and Pat began loading fuel and supplies onto the sleds and Cobi began organizing the new kitchen sled.
Both Challenger tractors are up and running. Preparations are going very smoothly and we expect to leave on Tuesday after receiving the final items of science equipment on Monday's flight.
Date: 11/16/01
Latitude: 80 degrees South
Longitude: 120 degrees West
Temperature: –22°C( –8°F)
Wind speed: 10 knots
Wind Chill: Not Given
Wind direction: Northeast
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
We are now at Byrd Station, the starting point for our traverse. The final group of team members made the 3 hr flight from Byrd and arrived in the early afternoon. For those of us returning from previous years it was almost like being home again – we moved back into our old bunks in the Blue Room and made ourselves comfortable for the next 6–8 weeks.
Markus and Brian have spent their first few days at Byrd getting their science experiments ready and are almost complete. Steve Niles and Lynn Peters have made excellent progress preparing our vehicles and shelters. A talented team of carpenters and mechanics also took part in the effort – most of them returned to McMurdo on our outgoing flight. We expect to spend the weekend preparing loads and sleds. A final flight bringing the remaining science cargo is scheduled for Monday and hopefully we can get underway to our first site shortly after that.
Date: 11/15/01
Latitude: 77 degrees, 51 minutes South
Longitude: 166 degrees 40 minutes East
Temperature: –10°C( 14°F)
Wind speed: 11 knots
Wind Chill: –23°C( –9°F)
Wind direction: Northeast
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
Excellent news – we are cleared for departure to Byrd sometime tomorrow, Friday. In preparation, many of the team members caught up on laundry, took showers (the last for a while) or had haircuts. We shall all go through 'bag drag' this evening. Bag drag is the Antarctic equivalent of checking in for a commercial flight – we take along our checked bags and also our hand carried items and all our cold weather clothing. Each person and all their gear is weighed. We get everything back, except the checked bags which are palletized ready for the flight.
After bag drag, Cobi has organized a small departure party for ITASE that will take place in the coffee house in McMurdo. Then, after a good night's sleep in a warm relatively comfortable bed, we will be ready for the real work of this trip.
Date: 11/14/01
Latitude: 77 degrees, 51 minutes South
Longitude: 166 degrees 40 minutes East
Temperature: –11°C( 12°F)
Wind speed: 19 knots
Wind Chill: –22°C( –7°F)
Wind direction: Northeast
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
The weather was just right today for us to take our snowmobile trip to Cape Royds and Cape Evans. There was a stiff breeze blowing down on the sea ice when we fueled up the machines, but nothing as bad as the last couple of days we tried to make this trip. Nine of us made the trip.
The ride out was fast and smooth. In some years, pressure ridges are more extensive on the sea ice and make for a bumpy ride. Our first destination was Cape Evans. Captain Scott established a camp here to serve as the base for his ill–fated expedition to the Pole, and the hut remains to this day. It sits in the shadow of Mount Erebrus and has views towards the Barnes Glacier and, across McMurdo Sound, the Royal Society Range. The inside of the hut is preserved almost exactly as it was left by Scott's men on their departure in 1913. Deterioration has been minimal because of the cold, very dry conditions. The kitchen is well stocked with food, many of the beds still contain sleeping bags and books used by the men, and best of all, there is a perfectly preserved dead penguin lying on a table between Scott's and Edward Wilson's beds. Wilson conducted some of the earliest scientific investigations of penguins when he was at Cape Evans.
Leaving Cape Evans, we snowmobiled back out onto the sea ice and passed the calving ice front of the Barnes Glacier on our way to Cape Royds. Like Cape Evans and Hut Point Peninsula (the site of McMurdo Station), Cape Royds is a small rocky area, free of ice and snow. When we arrived there, we gained new appreciation for the reason it is ice and snow free – wind. Very strong winds. The winds were so strong that many of us were able to lean into the wind without falling over. It felt like parachuting.
Cape Royds is notable for two things. One is a small hut built during Shackleton's Nimrod expedition in 1909. The second is a large colony of Adelie penguins.
Shackleton's hut is much smaller and less homey than Scott's hut at Cape Evans. The men staying there must have had to contend with ferocious winds and, during calmer conditions, the terrible stink of several thousand penguins.
There really are a lot of penguins living in a relatively small ice free area at Cape Royds. Periodically they head down to the sea ice and head for a lead, or crack, in the ice where they can get access to the water for food. This season in McMurdo Sound, ice conditions are some of most severe on record. The ice is much thicker than usual and there are consequently less open water leads. Part of the cause might be an enormous iceberg (the size of Connecticut) that calved from the Ross Ice Shelf about 18 months ago. The iceberg has been moving slowly west and is now very close to Ross Island. It is preventing ice in McMurdo Sound from breaking out. The implication of all this for the penguins at Cape Royds is that they now have to walk incredibly long distances – up to 100 km a penguin biologist told us – just to get to open water and catch food. Obviously this is a huge strain for the penguins and mortality is sure to increase. If we return to this site next season, we might find a lot fewer penguins.
We had good news this morning – Markus and Brian made it to Byrd last night. They arrived late – 1:30 am. With them on the airplane was the body of our new Challenger tractor. Re–assembly can begin, meaning that we will be leaving here to join Markus, Brian, Steve and Lynn at Byrd in two days time.
Date: 11/13/01
Latitude: 77 degrees, 51 minutes South
Longitude: 166 degrees 40 minutes East
Temperature: –13°C( 9°F)
Wind speed: 25 knots
Wind Chill: –33°C( –27°F)
Wind direction: East
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
Our plan to drive by snowmobiles out to Cape Evans and Cape Royds was again frustrated by strong winds. The weather otherwise was pretty good but on the sea ice the 35 knot winds were blowing a lot of snow. Visibility along our route would have been very limited. We now have a box full of uneaten baloney sandwiches sitting in our office – somehow it seems unlikely that they will last until tomorrow's lunch.
The good news is that one flight made it into Byrd today. It was carrying equipment and managed to take off before the visibility on the sea ice runway deteriorated (although the plane was diverted to another field camp to await clearing weather here, before returning to McMurdo). The second flight, carrying our new Challenger tractor and Brian and Markus, was postponed when the weather kicked up, but it is still scheduled to leave later tonight. It is about a three hour flight to Byrd, so it will be a late night for them when they finally crawl into their sleeping bags in the Blue Room.
Date: 11/12/01
Latitude: 77 degrees, 51 minutes South
Longitude: 166 degrees 40 minutes East
Temperature: –2°C( 28°F)
Wind speed: 4 knots
Wind Chill: –3°C( 28°F)
Wind direction: Variable
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
Today we all managed to escape from town for the day. Cobi and her colleague Ted Dettmar, from the field safety training program, took us to the icefall above the McMurdo Ice Shelf for some work on rope travel and crevasse rescue. These are important skills for us to know – although our satellite image mapping of the traverse route is selected for its lack of (detectable) crevasses, and we have a crevasse detecting radar installed on the lead vehicle – we can sometimes never be sure that we are in crevasse–free terrain. We all need to be comfortable in the use of safe travel and crevasse extraction techniques.
It was a beautiful day to be out. We started by roping up and traveling in teams of 3 or 4 as we ascended a steep snow slope to a plateau above the icefall. There are a few crevasses here that are suitable for practice. Although the weather remained sunny and bright, the wind up there was howling. Cobi and Ted ran us through a few drills and we brushed up on rope and pulley systems for extracting someone from a crevasse. Several members of the team had never experienced being in a crevasse before, so one at a time they slowly lowered themselves in; Ted held them tight on the rope. Once a little way down, they began climbing their way back out using the techniques they learned. Being inside an Antarctic crevasse is pretty cool, if you do it properly – there are all kinds of interesting colors and snow crystal inside. Falling in unexpectedly is definitely not cool.
We packed up the final items of our cargo and readied them in the system for transport to Byrd tomorrow. Brian and Markus will be flying out there tomorrow on the same flight that will carry the body of our new Challenger tractor. They will spend the next few days readying their equipment and experiments before the rest of us arrive later in the week.
Date: 11/11/01
Latitude: 77 degrees, 51 minutes South
Longitude: 166 degrees 40 minutes East
Temperature: –7°C( 19°F)
Wind speed: 5 knots
Wind Chill: –18°C( –0°F)
Wind direction: Northeast
Meters of ice collected: 0
Notes on daily life:
It is a phenomenon observed each season in McMurdo – the best weather always occurs on a Sunday, when the aircrews and the rest of town enjoy a day of rest. That's great if you want to spend your day off hiking or skiing but for those of us waiting for equipment to be airlifted into remote field camps we hope the good weather continues on into the week when the planes will be flying again. Anyway, it was a picture perfect day in McMurdo Sound today – the strong winds of yesterday had moved offshore and a dusting of snow last night made the surrounding hills sparkle in the sun.
Most everyone slept late this morning, except Blue and Susan who woke at 7:00 AM to make the phone call back to the museum (both went straight back to bed afterwards!). Brunch is served in the dining hall on Sunday, offering a tempting array of fresh baked waffles, bagels, smoked salmon, eggs of various kinds, and ham. Team members spent the afternoon watching movies or college football games taking place back home. Some worked on their computers and a couple took a walk over to Scott Base.
In the evening many of us attended the Sunday Science Lecture which this week was given by Andrea Donnellan of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She described her research into the crustal dynamics of West Antarctica using precision GPS techniques.