Two inch Drill
Today Lora and Joe left McMurdo bright and early and headed out to the base of the Silver City Ice Falls on the Ross Ice Shelf. They will spend the next two days digging, cutting, and generally living in the snow as part of their compulsory Snow School training. They will learn the essential skills that one needs in order to survive in the harsh Antarctic environment
Meanwhile, Andrei, Brian and I spent the majority of the day moving cargo and checking gear. We checked, double checked, and then triple checked our caged gear against our gear lists, but the numbers were not adding up. This was mainly due to the fact that our put-in crew (Josh, Rick and Cathy) had a separate event-number (similar to a TCN, but for fieldwork crews), and they pulled gear from our cage. After several long hours of consultation with the Science Cargo crew and the girls from BFC (Berg Field Center) we figured out where all our gear was.
After that we paid a trip to the MEC (Mechanical Equipment Center) and checked on our equipment there. I also reserved a small area of indoor floor space so that I could set up and test the two-inch drill before sending it out to Taylor Dome. The two-inch drill is a lightweight electromechanical drill designed to operate using solar panels and batteries. Built by Glacier Data for ICDS (Ice Core Drilling Services), it is a great tool for drilling shallow firn cores (<50m). By the time dinner rolled around the drill was half-built; perhaps IÃll finish it up tomorrow.