Wow!! This turned out to be a really exciting day. I worked from 7:00 am until 5:00 pm. I met two of the doctors that work at the hospital here. Thankfully it was at lunch and not at the clinic. They both had very interesting life stories to tell. One of them was a former Navy pilot who was flying at the same time and sometimes the same places Deni and I were stationed. We had a great time sharing flying stories. Sadly I won’t see much more of him since he will be running the clinic at the South Pole. At Dinner I met a plumber and his wife from Taos, New Mexico, a kitchen worker from Elgin, Illinois and a woman electrician apprentice from St. Paul, Minnesota. She was formerly an accountant who decided she hated accounting and decided to change her career late in life. She said the hardest thing to do was give up the regular salary to go back to school and then to spend a 5 year apprenticeship to become an electrician.

This note is for Strait Idso. Did you know that here in Antarctica we are one whole day ahead of you. So if it’s Monday in North Dakota it’s Tuesday in Antarctica. Please say hello for me to all your classmates. Maybe I will get a chance to meet them someday.

The thing that we are all here in Antarctica to do is support scientists conducting research on this continent. I’ve read that there are 23 of us “support personnel” for each scientist doing research here. That’s a lot of helpers! One of the fun things they do is let us “helpers” watch what they are doing. Every Wednesday a researcher puts together a presentation on some phase of research he or she is doing. On Sundays they open the lab(it’s a huge building with an aquarium) up to we “helpers” so we can get up close and personnel with some of their experiments. This evening we met a researcher/professor from the University of California at Santa Barbara. She and her research assistants are studying Antarctic fishes looking into how global warming is stressing them and the affect it is having on the genome of fish. That may sound kind of boring but it’s really cool. The presentation was fascinating, and funny and very eye-opening. I was amazed at the number of people who attended. One of the interesting things they had with them and demonstrated in the aquarium was a robotically controlled vehicle (ROV) that was made by two young ladies attending high school in California. The ROV was constructed out of a number of interesting parts including cutting boards purchased at Target and an old Atari joy stick which was used as the remote control. The ROV was being used by the scientists to look under the ice in areas where they were collecting samples. (Actually the scientist was born in Minnesota and I recognized their “collection apparatus” as ice fishing poles much like I used when I was a kid with chartreuse plastic jigs for bait) She can’t fool me she’s just on an Antarctic fishing expedition. They did have a really neat ice fishing house they towed around behind one of those big treaded vehicles like you see in the movies. Heather you would have loved it. (the presentation not the ice house) I will attend more of these presentations and will let you know what I learn.

As porky pig used to say “Thththats all folks”

I think I learned in geometry that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. We believe that here. When it’s cold outside you find the nearest point between two buildings go out that door and walk to the next closest door. For me that’s like the triangle in your kitchen. I walk straight to the cafeteria from my dorm to eat breakfast then I walk down the hall to the closest door to my job site, I then walk diagonally to the closest door there and at the end of the day straight to the dorm. Side trips are allowed on warm days.

We have Weather conditions set each day. The 3 conditions we have are:

Condition 1: (Most Severe) when one of the following conditions exists:
a. Wind exceeding 55 knots
b. Wind Chill Below -100 degrees F
c. Visibility less than 100 feet.

When these conditions exist personnel remain in buildings unless approved by the station manager. All travel requires a minimum of two persons in company. Vehicles must be radio equipped and must check in and out with the firehouse. To get from the dorm to the cafeteria they stretch a long heavy duty rope. The rope keeps you from getting lost and also keeps you from getting blown away.

Thankfully I have not witnessed these conditions yet but people who have been here before have. They say it’s no fun. And I thought Hurricane Ivan was bad!!

Condition 2: When one of the following conditions exits:

a. Wind 48-55 knots.
b. Wind chill -75 to -100 degrees F
c. Visibility between ¼ mile and 100 feet, personnel are limited to travel within each complex. Vehicles must check in and out with the firehouse.
Haven’t seen this yet either.

Condition 3: (Routinely set) Personnel should exercise routine safety and exposure precautions.

I met a couple today who come down here each year. Of course they share their own room. They are full time employees and live in Charleston, SC when they are not here. They seem very nice.

I’ve also found that many people have nicknames. Life seems to revolve around food and the cafeteria. Today is “cookie day”. One of the weather guys is “cookie monster”. If you want to get a cookie you must get to the cafeteria before him. He has been known to package up all the cookies on a tray and then take the back to his room. Clearly this is a weakness that everyone knows about and they don’t mind messing with him, i.e. hiding his cookies, eating his cookies, you get the idea. Another guy is called “snacks” although I haven’t found out why yet.

Time to go to work.

Second day at work. It’s actually snowing a little today. I read somewhere that this is really a desert with an average of only 2 inches of precipitation per year. It’s still a little cold but people who have been here before say that by late December we will be walking around in short sleeved shirts. We’ll see about that. I took my first test today and should be qualified on my first position tomorrow. Things are gearing up. The majority of the airplanes arrive this Thursday so flight operations will ramp up as much as they can here. I will be working midnight shifts to start out with but since the suns up most of the time it won’t be too noticeable. It felt pretty nice today without the wind and an overcast to keep it a little warmer. I met a guy today who works on the phone system here. He owns a small telephone repair service. I asked what he does with his business when he’s here. He said he handles it through emails and voice mails and people he subcontracts his business out to until he gets back. He says most of his customers don’t know the difference. We have a TV in the Center (control room). I thought it was funny that Monday Night Football was playing this morning. I guess I could be a fortune teller now because I’m always 1 day ahead of you. Well I’ m headed off to work out then catch a little supper. I’m thinking about stopping by the library also.

October 16, 2006

First day at work. A little overwhelming yet exciting. It’s been a few years since I’ve been in a training program. This one is very accelerated due to the short time we are here. The people are all very nice. Each has an interesting story that brought them to this cold corner of the world. They dump you right in though. I spent 3 hours on the radio today talking to helicopters and learning where many of the remote landing sites are. Another C-17 came in from Christchurch with a whole load of new fresh faces. I feel like a veteran already. Life comes at you fast as the commercial says. It’s still cold, can you believe that? It’s really not too bad until the wind hits you in the face. I did check out the aerobics building today. It’s pretty well equipped and I think it will serve all my exercise needs. Well now the real work begins. That’s it. See I promised no more 3 page blogs.

PS I found the church yesterday. It’s a quaint chapel the seats 50 people at the most. Looking over the altar through a window you see Mt Erebus. It’s 50 Miles away yet you can see the snow being blown off the top by the high winds. The view is pretty spectacular and kind of reminds you how amazing creation is.

By the way in the TMI category the men’s restroom in my work area has a tattered copy of Uncle John’s Amazingly Absorbing Bathroom Reader. Feels just like at home!

Wow!! I’m on the ice. It’s 7:20 Sunday morning. Yesterday was an exciting and busy day. It began with a 5:00 am departure from the hotel and a short 1 km walk up to the Clothing Distribution Center. We were met there by the Center director a very nice yet drill sergeantly strict woman. She told us to hurry up and get into our extreme weather clothing (EWC) because there were weather concerns on the ice and the pilot wanted to get going early. So down to your underwear you go and then put on long johns, top and bottom, wind pants (like bib ski pants), heavy wool socks, bunny boots, a huge red coat with the hood with the rabbit fur around the outer edge, a red hat the comes down over your ears and Velcro’s around your neck, mittens with another set of huge leather mittens that go over the other mittens. You fill out a New Zealand customs form for leaving the country then pick up your 75 pounds of bags (4 in all) then head out the door outside and around the corner to get in line with 69 other people to wait to have your bags screened and sniffed by a drug dog. We then presented our passports and customs forms to a member of the New Zealand Air Force. Next we placed our checked bags on a large scale to ensure we had not gone over our 75 pound weight limit for checked bags. I was two pounds over but somehow they let me slide by. Then its up onto the scale yourself with your carry on bag (boy aren’t we glad they don’t make us do that in the States). I came in somewhere under 300 pounds. Our bags were then x-rayed and sent off to be loaded on the plane. At this point we were issued a dog tag style necklace with a number on it. I was passenger 79 (didn’t they make a movie about me?) Next we were allowed to go to a café on the property to get a quick bite to eat but were sternly instructed to be back at the terminal no later than 7:00 sharp. Did I mention that it was about 70 degrees outside and all that EWC was extremely warm. Breakfast consisted of a ham, egg and cheese English muffin and a glass of orange juice (easily as good as anything you get at McDonalds). I had breakfast with a guy who was going to Antarctica to do GPS mapping. He said the purpose of the mapping was to help the scientists move around the continent more easily and to better document where it was that they were conducting experiments. After breakfast it was back to the terminal to a lounge area where we were informed that we were being placed on a 1 hour weather delay. We had two options stay in the lounge and watch “Oceans Eleven” or we could leave the building as long as we returned sharply at 8:00. I took the opportunity to run over to the travel centers computer room. I tried to IM Deni but she wasn’t online so I sent her a brief email. I was able to IM Heather. We had a nice chat and then it was back to the terminal lounge. On our return we were all instructed to take our carryon and proceed to screening. Back in line with 69 people, bags x-rayed, body metal detected both by “the machine” and a customs official with a wand. We turned in our passenger number necklace at this point also and returned to the lounge. Back in the lounge they started to play a DVD for new arrivals on the ice and about Antarctic safety. About 1 minute into the DVD the person presenting received a cell phone call. He immediately shut off the DVD said be careful on the ice now get up quickly and move outdoors to board the bus to the airplane. Apparently there had been a break in the weather and the pilot was in a hurry to get in the air. (do I seem to be making a short story long here?) So, on the bus we go with our “big” carryon. You’ve probably already guessed. Small seats big people and carryons, heavy, hot EWC I’m glad it was only a short trip to the plane. At this point Deni and probably many of you are saying WAH, WAH, WAH we do that every week at the airport. As we pulled up in front of the huge Air Force C-17 though the excitement returned. (I did get pictures) We boarded the C-17. It looked like a huge cave with electronics and plumbing running throughout the walls and ceiling. In the back of the plane were several huge packing containers loaded with supplies and our baggage all headed for McMurdo . Inside, on each side of the plane were crew seats the back of which was against the wall so your feet faced into the center of the airplane. Down the center of the airplane were coach airline style seats, 5 across. There was no assigned seating so it was grab the best seat you can find as fast as you can. By the way there is no overhead bin space on this airplane so your huge carryon and your lunch bag had to go at your feet. No room to go under the seat in front. The lunch bag (small grocery bag) we picked up on the way into the plane. It contained a l liter bottle of water, a 20 ounce bottle of fruit drink, 2 sandwiches, 2 bags of chips, a large Kit Kat bar, a fruit cereal bar, an apple an orange, a large chocolate chip cookie, a huge muffin, one napkin (small) and one moist towelette. All this at your feet with these huge bunny boots on your feet and all the EWC gear on fitted comfortably into a coach airline seat. No worries mate it’s only a five hour flight to Antarctica!! After all the safety briefings which included how to use the emergency air, the flotation device, and something new, a plastic hood that you put over your head and inflated with air just in case the cabin filled with smoke. Anyway off we went. Takeoff and climb were uneventful. The woman sitting next to me explained that her job was accounting for all the alcohol and beer that were consumed in the entire continent. At one point I told the crew chief that I was a controller and asked if could go up to the cockpit. He said yes so up I went. The flight crew were very nice so I asked if I could come back up when we got closer to McMurdo so I could listen in on the controllers. Not only did they let me do that they let me buckle into the seat behind the co-pilot to watch the entire approach down to touchdown. What a view I had flying in over the continent. Visibility was great. Vast ice flows spread out before us. As we approached the base tall volcanic mountains rose up out of the ground. The runway itself is entirely ice. I asked if that made for poor braking action. The pilots just chuckled. The landing was amazing yet uneventful. By the way the pilot looked like he was about 16 years old and this huge plane was controlled by a joy stick that you would use on most video games. It’s truly amazing the responsibility we give to our young men and women in the armed forces. Finally we step off the place literally “on the ice”. The temperature us cold but with all the EWC on you didn’t notice. There was almost no wind which the locals (people who had been there more than 5 days) said was very unusual. We then boarded buses and headed off to the Chalet. There we received our welcome aboard briefing. At some point during the briefing a guy named Art gave me an envelop with a key inside and a room number outside. He had me wave at a guy in the back of the room who he said would show me where to go after the meeting. Sadly the guy I was waving to didn’t get the memo. He thought we were just being introduced across the room so he left after the meeting. So like a good sailor I followed everyone else toward some buildings. Long story short I ended up in the wrong building. The housing folks, once I found them, were very helpful in getting me to the right dorm. I promise I will never write this much in a single blog again!! At the dorm I met up with the guy who was supposed to escort me. He said he thought we were just being introduced and was sorry that he ran off and left me. Turns out he is a weather guy who has been coming here for 11 years. He said his wife is not real happy but puts up with it. He said she made some mumblings about spending his money this year while he was gone. I found my room ,219, went in and dumped my carryon bag. The room is about the size of a small hotel room. I share it with one roommate a guy named Brett who was away at work when I arrived. I left the room and found my way to building 140 where our checked bags were to be dropped off. Naturally they weren’t there but I did reconnect with the weather guy (Chester). He and a friend, Bill, said we should go over to the cafeteria to get dinner and then return to pick up or bags. Sounded like a good plan to me so off we went. Dinner was meat lasagna, green beans, garlic bread and a glass of milk. There were other things to choose from but that’s what I had. During dinner I met Dusty. He’s the guy who got me into all this. He kind of ducked when he introduced himself lest I hit him. I didn’t and we had a nice chat. After dinner we picked up our bags. I headed back to my room but when I arrived and reached into my pocket for my key it was not there. What I did find was a hole in the bottom of the pocket. You can imagine what went through my mind. The good and bad news was that the key had dropped down into the lining of the ski pants. I was finally able to push the key back up to the pocket. I got into the room unpacked, settled in, made the bed and finally changed clothes into more comfortable street cloths. I called Deni, watched a little TV and then settled in for a long winters nap. I bet you’re glad that’s over!!! It was a long but very exciting day. Was that one long run on paragraph?