Antarctic Medevac 2013: Take 2

Only 18 days had passed since the second last plane of the winter took off from Antarctica before the third last plane landed in the dark winter night.  It was just about enough time for much of the equipment to get put away from the last flight.

I walked outside last Friday morning to gale-force winds and blowing snow thinking that no plane would ever land in this weather.  I was not alone with those thoughts, but things were still set to bring a plane in later that day.  The other half of the town was out at the airfield putting the finishing touches on the runway. The weather forecast called for decreasing winds and increasing visibility.  I could look up through the blowing snow and see stars—there wasn't a cloud in the sky—but looking straight ahead there were moments when it was hard to see 100 feet in front of me to the next building in town.

These subsequent medevac flights have taken on a life of their own because of how close together they were, the people that go out and come in on them, and the mystery that they try to shroud them in.  They have even gotten nicknames: Medevac 1.0 now known as WHOOPS (Why Have Only One Plane Sent) and Medevac 2.0 has been dubbed OOF (Operation Old Flame because of some of the passengers arriving.)  

After a four-hour delay I fired up the Hagglund to drive out to Pegasus Airfield.  Since the Hagglund has tracks it was decided to use it to help transport people and baggage out since the road wasn't in the best shape for normal wheeled vehicles.  I enlisted the help of two others to help me open the giant doors (acting as sails in the wind) of the Science Cargo building, where we park the Hagglund in the winter.  After the vehicle was warmed up and moved outside it only took one person to close the doors.  The wind had stopped.  We could stand outside and look at the stars without goggles and a face mask.  In a matter of minutes a terrible ground storm turned into a cold serene night.  I say night, but it was only 2pm. 

The C-17 was set to land at 6pm.  Everyone was poised and ready next to the runway when we got the call to turn off our headlights.  All that was left was the glare of the runway lights pointing to the north and the distant lights of McMurdo and Scott Base.  The stars of the Milky Way were in full view in the cold clear air.  By this point in the evening only one cloud had developed to the north—directly in the flight path.  Far in the distance above the clouds I could make out a faint flashing red light.  There was a different type of anticipation for this flight than there was for the last one.  For WHOOPS there was the excitement of a plane coming in and the dread of why and how the plane was coming in.  But OOF carried a different excitement with it.  It carried fresh food, firefighters, and a bunch of cargo.  There wasn't the dread since the patient wasn't in such a critical condition as before.  It was as if USAP was finally deciding to correct things from last time.

The lights of Pegasus Airfield await the C-17 (the white dot in the lower left corner)

The flashing red light of the distant C-17 slowly grew brighter and brighter and then completely disappeared into the only cloud in the sky.  Nothing else in the sky moved except for the exhaust floating from the pipes of the many vehicles it takes for such an operation.  My eyes were fixed upon the cloud trying to guess where the red light would reappear.  Despite the hum of numerous diesel engines it seemed silent because that sound has become so normal over the last seven months.  My heart rate slowed for what seemed like quite some time until the red light of the plane reappeared and still seemed very far off.  The rest happened very fast so the plane wasn't as far away as it had seemed.   My radio sputtered an announcement to have the runway lights turned down to 50%.  Then the flashing red light flared as the bright white spotlights on the plane were turned on.  A voice from the radio said to have the runway lights turned off.  I wonder what was seen from the cockpit through the night vision goggles.  It looked as if the plane was heading straight toward the group of people and vehicles sitting near the fuel tank beside the runway, but it landed perfectly on the newly groomed ice runway. 

The plane turned around and it was go-time for everyone.  They offloaded one pallet of cargo from WHOOPS and the plane was on the ground for 40 minutes.  This time they took 7 or 8 pallets of cargo off and it seemed like the plane wasn't on the ground for much longer thanks to the elite team of former and newly trained cargo handlers.

Offloading cargo from OOF

The plane soon took off and winter started again with new people and fresh food for the third time in just over two months.  Auroras on the eastern horizon welcomed the re-restart of winter.  The relative calmness felt after the plane took off ended not long after arriving back in McMurdo.  The wind had picked back up in town and somehow word had spread about the pallets of fresh food (locally known as freshies) arriving in town and a large crowd had gathered to help unload everything. 

Despite the ensuing gas from not having eaten fresh food in months, the mood at lunch the next day was livelier than it had been all season. Simple fresh food had quite the effect on an already jovial table of people crazy enough to spend the winter in Antarctica. 

Green Inspiration

In honor of the delicious banana I had for breakfast and the salad I'll be having for lunch (thanks to medevac 2.0) I figured I'd put up a few photos of last few living things I saw in Christchurch about three months ago.

Antarctic Medevac Flight 2013

In the few months before coming down to Antarctica I was told by a surprising amount of people to throw all my logic out the window before I got here.  “Nothing there makes any sense,” they told me. I am still surprised every single day about how nothing at all makes sense, but somehow things still work.  Many of us joke about make sure we choose the most illogical solution to any problem just so we can stay with the status quo of the station.   Many of the people that are down here or have ever been down here has this same feeling or at least something close to it, but nothing every changes. Little that happens here makes any sense and I don’t understand why.  

Last week we had a medevac flight come down to evacuate a worker who needed further medical care.  It wasn’t that our medical staff couldn’t handle this person’s condition (they do amazing with the few resources they have); this person needed more advanced long-term care than could be provided here.  The United States Antarctic Program (USAP) has proven again, as it has in the past, that if something really is wrong they will get you out of here. 

This was by no means a good thing.  We’d be losing a valuable member of our already small community. It also meant thousands of man-hours of work to get the runway cleared of snow and get equipment up out of the cold and running to support a flight.  Most of this was done in the extreme cold and limited daylight of the winter.
  

It was also an opportunity for USAP to correct a few mistakes it had made and to maybe even get a little extra cargo down since major cargo flights won’t start until mid-october.

Instead an empty C-17 was sent to New Zealand from the US.  It was then loaded with a bag of mail, a few (but not all) of the CAT equipment parts that were needed, and some ducting and a secret box of fresh food for New Zealand’s Scott Base.  None of the much-needed medical supplies or fresh food for the Americans was brought down.  This 800-pound pallet was all that was shipped down-leaving 90,000lbs of unused cargo weight.  I also fully understand that the whole point of this flight was to evacuate someone and they wanted the plane on the ground for as little time as possible.  

The plane had more cargo going back to New Zealand than it did coming down here.   Besides the person that the medevac was for we lost four additional people—this included one third of the firefighters.  McMurdo now with its 139 people and 100+ buildings only has four firefighters for the next 4-5 months.  Rumor has it that two replacement firefighters were in LA about to board a plane to come down here when they got a call to go home because the C-17 was coming down a day earlier than planned.  Imagine quitting your job, packing and getting all the required medical checks in a matter of days to rush down to Antarctica two days before the last sunset.  Then being told right before you board a plane to go home. 

I won’t rant anymore because I don’t want it to overshadow what the people of McMurdo did to make this flight happen and to save a life.

By this point, much of the mechanical equipment and vehicles have been put to sleep for the winter.  This mean all the airfield fire trucks, fuel equipment, runway lights and all the other strange machines that it takes for a plane to land here had to be brought back to the land of living for this flight.  Untold hard and painful hours were spent out at the runway digging out the fuel pits and plowing snow off the ice runway.  I had a relative small and easy job in this process (simply bring supplies over to the clinic when they were running low on items) so I have a huge amount of respect for everyone who put in more countless hours in this. 

It is pretty amazing what people will do for another person.  For a few days many people didn't even know who they were building the runway for.  Things like this make me proud to be a part of this community.

Things are slowing back to normal now with the population now at 139.

Aurora Australis Time-lapse

This is my first attempt at a time-lapse video.  It shows 3 hours of Aurora Australis and meteors on April 14, 2013.  

What if the Sun Never Came Up Again?

Just two months ago I watched the sun set for the first time in 2013.  The transition from 24 hour daylight to a real day and night cycle to the ensuing darkness has been a quick one.

Walking toward the last sunset

Having a real day and a real night has made me feel more like a real person.  I felt less like I was in a strange place at the bottom of the world.  I felt more at home with a normal cycle of light; even though I can usually feel at home almost anywhere (and nowhere at the same time). The 24 hours sunlight left nothing under the cover of darkness.  There was never a time that light prevented you from doing something.  I could always see where I was and on every clear day I could walk outside and be reminded of where on earth I was.  But now that is gone.  The night takes over my mornings, the alpenglow is taking over my lunchtime and the twilight clings to my walk home from work.  But all this is trending toward darkness for all.

The sun barely peaks out behind Mt. Erebus on April 23, 2013

Excitement over the last sunset

I know I'll be excited to see stars and everything the night has to offer every time I walk outside, but I didn't realize how great the real day/night cycle was until the sun finally set.  If I can't see the sea ice and the mountains it will be hard to fully feel where I am.  What else will the darkness bring?  Will my world really only exist within the small beams of the street lights and headlamps?

Liz tries to catch the last of the sun

I've thought a lot about this while stepping along the crunchy snow in the dark hours after an alpine start to climbing a mountain.  Your world starts out so small: just the few feet that the headlamp illuminates.  The only other light around is what the stars shoot down and the only visible feature is the ominous silhouette of the mountains that surround you.  But, slowly over the hours of climbing a whole new world emerges.  The stars disappear as the sky turns to blue and orange and the mountains turn pink and white as the darkness rescinds into daylight. This happens in a matter of hours.  I'm going through the opposite of this in a matter of days to weeks.  This process will happen again...taking days and weeks...in August.  It's all part of the adventure of living in this place I've chosen to call home for the year.

On April 23, 2013, a small group of McMurdo residents took an extended lunch to search for the second to last sunset.  The last sunset could only be seen from far out on the ice shelf.  Getting out of town was rejuvenating after long hours working in shaded McMurdo.  Everyone was super excited to really see the sun for the last time in months.  We spent about two hours staring at the sun and taking in the last rays it had to offer.  It felt like a new beginning with new friends that would endure the same darkness as I would.  Our eyes did burn for hours after we returned to town though.  As a child I was always told not to stare into the sun.  We stared into the sun for over an hour trying to burn that last image into our minds.  Two days later I blink and think I can see the last view of the sun burned into my imagination.

High winds decorate our last sunset. April 24, 2013. 

Alpenglow for Lunch

Today the sun rose at 11:27 and set at 2:17.  I didn't see the sun itself because McMurdo is tucked in a little hole in the hills, but I did see the pink glow of meek sunlight on the surrounding mountains and Ob Hill.  The sun sets for the final time in two days.  I hope to see it just one last time before the darkness engulfs us.

I've walked out to Hut Point to take in the sunset quite a bit in the last few weeks and I've hoped to see a seal every time.  They were there almost every day this summer, but most of the seals have moved to other waters for the winter.  Luckily I caught the last straggler.

It feels super bizarre to walk outside at lunch to alpenglow on the surrounding mountains.  But it does feel like a normal Montana winter when I now go to work in the dark morning and finish work when the sun has already set.  It will feel strange again when it is still dark at lunchtime too.

The juxtaposition is interesting with the industrial looking town in the foreground.  I'm excited for the darkness, but I'm also excited for this same type of light to come back in August because it will be even more amazing after a few months of darkness.  

I entered a photo contest...

I have a few photos from the last few months that I really like so I decided to pick a few and enter them in a photo contest.  It would be awesome if you have an extra minute to go and vote for them.  

The Milky Way photo is at: http://www.greatoutdoorscontest.com/bin/Rate?image_id=2011300249 

This penguin photo is at: http://www.greatoutdoorscontest.com/bin/Rate?image_id=2011300248

Thanks for the help!

My First Aurora Australis

I wanted to wait a few more days to post more photos, but after last night I simply can't wait.

I was in a hurry to leave McMurdo and get out to a small hut on the McMurdo Ice Shelf called Square Frame.  Square Frame is a large insulated box with a few windows that sits on top of a man-made snow drift and contains a few beds, a couch, a heater, propane stove and card table.  It is maintained by the Kiwis, but is set aside for one weekend a month for the Americans to use.  The USAP used to have a hut near here called the A-Frame, but that blew away in a storm years ago and I think the Kiwis decided to mock us by putting up the Square Frame.  No one else signed up on Saturday night so we got the place to ourselves.   

Square Frame with Mt Erebus in the background

The sun set about an hour before we arrived at Square Frame, but the few clouds in the sky were still highlighted in orange.  The rumors of auroras and a meteor shower (and a clear night) left me eagerly anticipating the darkness.

One of my first Milky Way & aurora photos

It was great to be out of McMurdo and again enjoy the simplicity of no electricity or internet.  To pass through the twilight hours I beat Liz in a few games of cribbage and started watching the movie Encounters At the End of the World.  It's a movie about the people who work at USAP and about being down here.  After spending the last six and a half months down here I could only shake my head at what Werner Herzog (director & narrator) had to say about his little bit of time down here.  I would highly recommend watching the movie on mute with some great music in place of his negative tone and terribly accented dialog.

Just like a little kid, every few minutes I would get up and run to the window to see how dark it was outside and see how many stars were out or if the auroras were starting yet.  

New Zealand's Scott Base and the aurora 

Finally it came to the point that I decided it was either dark enough or I couldn't handle Herzog's voice anymore and it was time to go outside and take some photos.  It took some time to set our cameras and layers of clothing ready to go.  

Amazingly there was no wind and the temperature felt fairly warm (for Antarctica) so it was pleasant to stand around outside for awhile.  I imagined some of the photos that could be taken, but I had no idea what would actually show up in my camera after that first shot.  I've always drooled over photos of the Milky Way and auroras.  After recently doing some research I had an idea of how to capture them.  But what appeared on the cold, tiny LCD screen blew me away.  I wanted to keep taking the same photos over and over again just to prove to myself that these photos were real.  

I went back in to warm up and finish the movie and prepared to head out again.  I wanted to take photos throughout the night, but wanted to get some sleep also.  I hooked up a remote and put that in a mitten filled with hand warmers.  I also put hand and toe warmers all over the camera (concentrated around the battery) and wrapped the whole set up in a Patagonia Nano Puff Jacket, MicroPuff Jacket, DAS Parka and a pair of puffy pants.  I set the camera to take 30 second exposures with 30 seconds in between for 180 shots.  I didn't think the batteries would last that long.  This worked!  I'll put together a time lapse movie of what happened and post it soon.

One of the photos that my camera captured while I was asleep.

If this is just a glimpse of what the winter has to offer I'm even more excited about the darkness and trying to hone my star and aurora photography skills.

This was a learning experience.  I think I know how to do it better next time!

Antarctic Sunsets Part 5

The days have dragged on and on this week.  For most of the week I couldn't figure out why the days suddenly seemed so much longer.  I didn't know what suddenly changed....

Last weekend we "fell back an hour" to end daylight savings time.  Between this, and the days becoming so much shorter, the sun now rises after I go to work and sets before I get off work.  I look out the window in the early afternoon and see evening light which makes me feel like I should be getting off work soon.  But hours later the sun finally goes down and hours after that I finally get off work.  

Scott's Discovery Hut & McMurdo (the unwatermarked version of this one goes on the McMurdo Station report to Washington D.C. next week)

A storm approaching from the south.

 I guess I'll be able to take a few more sunset photos next week AT LUNCH!  

Antarctica Sunsets Part 4

Sun dips behind Hut Point and Scott's Hut on 4/3/13

There are only 18 sunsets left.  I know those 18 days are going to fly by and many of them will be obscured by bad weather, but I already wish the sun was set.  We're losing 16 minutes of daylight each day and it seems like such a long drawn out teaser for the darkness.

The sea ice breaks out of McMurdo Sound with Mt. Discovery in the distance.

4/3/13

 I feel pressured by no one but myself to take as many sunset photos as I can right now because soon it'll be so dark that I won't know where I am.   

4/3/13

I keep forgetting that I am in Antarctica, but when it's too dark to see that I am in Antarctica where will I feel that I am?  Strange to think about not seeing where you are in the world.

The ghosts from Scott's Expedition are emerging this winter

4/3/13