Happy Camper

I'm off to Happy Camper school tomorrow Yay! That's the 2 day survival school where we get to spend the night shivering in snow caves, tents etc to prepare us for field work. Should be fun I'll let you know.
Cheers\
Clay

on the ground

Looking back at the plane
On board "Ivan" the Terra Bus

even more getting there

C-17 we flew in on looking aft
and looking forward

more getting there

Check in area
Another view of the hangar

getting there pics

Sign outside of the Antarctic center NZ
Sign above the air national guard hangar

The Hut

So we made it out to Scott's hut yesterday evening at Deception Point. You'll find the early explorers weren't too pleased with Antarctica and gave either royal names or negative names to land features, Mt Erebus, Mt Terror, Deception Point, Holy Shit it's cold land, stuff like that. Anyway we had a really great tour guide telling us about the history of the 1902 expedition. The crew that was marooned and had to live there abandoned everything in place once they were rescued even leaving pans on the fire still with food in them. I'm not going to attempt to recount all the details of what happened between Scott and Shackelton it's easy enough to google and will do a much better job explaining just what an awful expidition it was. Anyway it was very neat to walk around inside a building frozen in time (literally) got some great pictures of the place (yeah yeah I know) Going hiking int he mroning weather permitting will write mroe later and fight the computer once again to upload.
Cheers
Clay

Busy week

Hey all sorry i haven't had a chance to write much things have been really busy this week. last night i volunteered to be a duty driver for "American Night" at the New Zealand base just down the road. It's such a beautiful drive over. Very stark but absolutley stunning. Weather turned south on us today and it's been snowing since I got up this morning. I'm supposed to hike out to Scott's hut (where he set up his first field camp for an attemtp to reach the pole) Not sure if the weather will cooperate but if it does I'll write mroe about it.
Clay

Sunday Night Science Lecture

This week's science lecture wasn't a science lecture at all. Instead it was how to shoot a nature documentary. The presenters work for the BBC and are filming their 3rd set in a trilogy of nature series called "Life" you may have heard of their first 2 projects "Blue Planet" and "Planet Earth." They spent abotu 2 hours showing clips from some of their film shoots including the snow leaopard scene and Great White Sharks going after seals scenes from Planet Earth. They're down this year to do some time lapse and landscape sets with some other people who're doing interviews with us locals. Look for "Life" in January/Feburary of 2010. They filmed the presentation If they put it up on the net I'll try and find the link and copy it.
Cheers!
Clay

pictures

I don't know why I can't upload the pictures every time I try and put them into a post the computer locks up. I've tried multiple times to get some shots up and from more than 1 computer. I'll play around some more this week. If I still can't get it to work I'll set up an acct on Flickr or somethign like that and post the link. Sorry! I know everyone is looking forward to seeing them.

more cold

So after reading the loving yet mocking "haha it's 90 degrees" commets I just have to say yeah...but I haven't been bitten by a Mosquito since I left FL so nyah!!!!!

Brrr

It got a little chilly today. the high was -9 but we had light wind that made the windchill -54 it's amazing how well the parkas can keep you warm. it was onyl miserable if the wind found any exposed skin. I really don't enjoy doing a Rudolph impersonation with the whole shiny red nose thing. I see now the joys of a balacava. Do you have any idea how long it took me to figure out that a Balacalva isn't a tasty greek dessert?

contact info

For thsoe who asked here's my regular snail mail address If anyone wants to send something please keep it light. The heavier the package the less chance that it will ever show up. Letters make it down within a few weeks though. Hope everyone is well. Things here are busy but fun

(Name), RPSC
McMurdo StationPSC 469 Box 700
APO AP 96599-1035

My 1st Science Lecture

One of the great things about working here is that every Sunday evening one of the scientists doing research presents an overview of his or her project. Today's lecture was about a drilling project. Basically they are drilling core samples from the sea floor looking for what the CO2 levels where 15-30 million years ago. during this time frame Antarctica went from a temperate to a frozen climate. By studying this it can help look at what current CO2 levels may hold in store for our future climate change.
Now for the spiffy facts. At one time the sea temperature here was around 67 degrees F.
Most people assume that Antarctica drifted south when the continents broke up. Interestingly Antarctica has been in it's current position for millions of years and the other continents broke away and drifted northward.
The Northern hemisphere's dramatic loss of Arctic sea ice such as what's happening around the pole and Greenland aren't likely to be repeated on the Antarctic ice sheets because of how cold it is. We are in such a deep freeze here that raising the temperature at the pole by 5 degrees would be the equivalent of trying to defrost a freezer that's at 0 by warming it up to 10.
Neat stuff!

It didn't take me very long to adapt to the cold. Yesterday morning we went for a walking tour around town and if there was a piece of skin exposed it burned. I was bundled up in "big red" the huge goose down parka, balacava, sunglasses, knit watchcap, neck gaiter, heavy insulated gloves and long undies. By the ned of the day I was jogging wearing nothing but a pair of sweats. Today is Sunday our time and it's our day off I'm off to snap pictures, go to a science lecture and hopefully someohow find out when the gators play and where I can catch the score if nothing else. You know it feels fundamentally right to have college football on sunday weird huh?

Ice Ice Baby

Well our flight made it in on the first attempt YAY!!! We were delayed an hour though thanks to ....engine trouble. I'm a bit sleep deprived and still trying to drink everything in. It's cold here (duh) but not unbearable I think it was -2 or 3 today it is quite pleasnt and "brisk" I think my coffee and soup habit may intensify though. Hopefully I'll be able to get some pictures uploaded tonight. I really haven't taken too many yet as I'm stillt rying to get the lay out of the place. Until then think warm thoughts!
clay

On my way South

So I went out to eat tonight with some of the crew headed down. It turns out our flight south was moved up to tomorrow. So if all goes well I'll be flying to the ICE tomorrow afternoon YAY!!!

gear issue

After a relaxing 4 hours of sleep woke up and went to the US Antarctic center for cold weather gear outfitting. Spent the morning trying on parkas gloves etc and packing. I call them the "holy fuck it's cold" clothes. Flights to the ice have been backed up for the last few weeks due to bad weather at Mcmurdo. We're the 5th flight to head down this season and so far they've only landed 1 plane. They're stacking the flights up though and right now it looks like we'll be leaving at 0600 local time Saturday morning.
Getting ready to head out to town and do the tourist thing. NZ is more beautiful than I imagined and that's just the view from my crappy next to the airport hotel room!

flying 1/2way aroudn the world

Got into LAX around 7pm local Qantas flight was scheduled for 1030 that night. Of course the plane broke down and they had to fly in a part from Australia. Finally boarded the plane at 130 am. then the rather dumb young lady sitting behind me made the mistake of asking for an airsickness bag. That prickled the flight attendants radar and next thing she knows she's being kicked off the plane for not being well enough to fly. Well of course in our post9-11 world her bags now have to come off too. SO we wait for them to open the cargo hold back up and find her bags. Finally take off around 230. 14.5 hours later We arrived in Sydney Australia. It was approx 10am local time Wednesday when we landed. Unfortunately our connecting flight to Christchurch left at 8 that morning. The next flight out wasn't until 630 that night. Qantas took care of us though put us up in a hotel for the day bought us lunch and a shuttle to and from the airport.

After close to 15 hours on a plane I was just a bit exhausted and too tired/stupid to figure out how to operate an alarm clock. So of course I overslept and missed the shuttle bus. Woke up with only an hour til flight time. Somehow made it to the airport and made my flight though YAY!! 3 hours and 2 more time zones later finally got into my hotel in NZ about 1 am local time. So yeah jsut a bit of a grueling day.

Training and flight day 3

today was a short one training wise just the typical HR stuff. went in at 8 then caught a bus to the denver airport at noon for a 6 pm flight.

Training day 2

This day covered the general environmental concerns importance of recycling etc. Nothing too earth shattering. and flu shots wheee!

Training Day 1

I was really surprised when we got to our first day of orientation and training. I was expecting there to be hundreds of people milling around. Instead there were only about 12 of us. Turns out because of the job I haventhere is an extra day of OSHA training required. Spent the entire day learning about fall protection, lock out tag outand other such industrial safety topics. It wasa good refresher course but man what a LONG day. Tomorrow starts the real "On Ice Orientation"

On My Way

I left for Denver on october 3rd. That was one heck of a hectic morning. The total allowable weight for the flight to the Ice is 75 pounds. That may sound like a lot but when you consider that's what you'll live on for 4-5 months it adds up quick.SO I spent the night before and the morning of the flight packing and repacking trying to get within the weight limit. I ended up ditching my 2 nice rolling suitcases for a backpack and sea bag....nothing like reliving old Navy days. I was feeling rather smug that the weight was at 72#'s then I got into Denver and was told that carry ons counted for the weight allowance too. I don't know what the heck I can do with my laptop and camera! I thinkI'll try and suck up to someone under weight limit and stow some of my stuff with them. The saga continues