Nowhere To Go But Up

It doesn't really snow much at the south pole, but the wind sure does cause some pretty cool drifting. Pushing my amateur photography skills to their absolute lowest level, I have attempted to capture an image of the drift forming in front of the station. Instead I got a reflection from the ice crystals that are always hanging in the air and vague blurry image of the posts that the station rests on. Before the sun went down, the snow in front of the station was pretty much level with the bottom of the posts with only a slight grade towards the pole marker. Now, the drift has grown to be about level with my head when I'm standing at the bottom of it. So about a 6 ft (1.9 meters) high drift running about 200 yards (200 meters). That's going to be a real drag to clean up in the spring.

The Blur recently posted this on his site and since I have nothing of significance to report, I'm posting my results here. Oddly, we got the same answer, so I'm starting to think the following

A) The south pole attracts a certain kind of individual.
2) The test yields only one type of result.
iii) The Blur and I were seperated at birth.

We're having an international chess tournament here on the Antarctic continent. Winter-overs from various stations are playing each other via email. That's right folks, the gripping sport of chess has been taken to new extremes with the advent of the electronic era. Just when you thought it couldn't get any slower... One of the matchups is with a person who only speaks Spanish, which is a challenge since none of us speak any Spanish. I'm lucky and I'm matched up with a gentleman from Casey Station, which is Australian. I speak Australian ok. Pictured below is our team posing during this weekend's don't-call-it-Christmas In July party.

One year ago today was a pretty miserable day for the most part; a miserable day in paradise. The day started fairly late, as I awoke in a motel along a highway in downtown San Jose, Costa Rica. I had flown in the night before with my girlfriend to attend her best friend’s wedding. We had met some of the other wedding guests at the airport the day before and a few more wedding guests at the motel. This was no accident; we were all scheduled to stay in the same place so we could travel together to the costal town of Dominical. Arriving at the motel bar, we proceeded to drink local beer and specialty drinks until everyone had arrived. Not a bad night, but that was a year ago yesterday. A year ago today I was working off a little bit of the previous nights festivities and adjusting to the thick humidity and smoggy air of downtown San Jose. It was a sunny day and everyone was starting to gather in the lobby to pay for their night’s stay and wait for a bus that was taking us out of town.

The bride and a couple of friends were driving in a rental car, but everyone else was riding in a bus together. Everyone else included friends, family, and extended family of the bride and groom. Being on a bus together was supposed to give us all a chance to get to know one another. We were waiting outside and I realized that I knew only about a quarter of the people there and they were mostly riding in the rented car. I was going to be on a bus with my girlfriend and 13 strangers. I remember waiting a long time before our ride arrived and I wasn’t sure when it was actually there because a bus never showed up. Our “bus” was actually an extended cab van. It came equipped with two drivers and seemingly no shocks. It was designed for 12 people, but would be carrying 16.

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this, but I’m a tall guy. Not big really, but tall. I don’t mind riding in cars for long trips, but I like to have a little legroom. It was painfully obvious when we first got into the van that I was not going to have any legroom. I had the smallest person available sitting across from me, but it still wasn’t a very comfortable seating arrangement. There were four rows of seats, two facing each other. I was sitting in the forward seating, facing backwards. I would end up regretting the decision to ride facing backwards. All of our luggage, and there was as much as you would expect for a wedding party, was stacked onto the roof of this vehicle. Three people were riding in the front (where there were only two seats), and three people in each row of seats behind, with an extra person filling in a gap somewhere.

We took off late and started driving through the city. The top speed of the loaded down van was probably around 40-45 km/hr. The entire thing shook constantly and shook more with each weaving turn through the city. I asked how long it should take to get to the coast and I remember hearing three hours. We stopped right away at a bank so everyone could change their money. I had changed my money the night before in the airport, which turned out to be the absolute worst place to change money. I think I lost about $150 in a bad exchange rate. Even the guy at the counter the night before was surprised at how much money I had changed. I was tired, live and learn, etc. While we were stopped, several people made their way into a nearby store to stock up on snacks for the trip. I found a bottle of Johnny Walker at about a third of the price I would pay back home, so I scooped that up along with a few snacks and some water. Everyone meandered around the store for a while, while others were changing their money. We were stopped for about 45 minutes. We finally got everyone organized and back into their respective places in the van and restarted our journey.

It didn’t take too long for the congested cityscape to give way to lush, green countryside. It was an impoverished looking area, but quaintly beautiful. I proceeded to have an occasional nip from my bottle of scotch, eat some snacks, take in the view, and acclimate myself to the gyrations of the van as it lurched along. The roads in Costa Rica are poorly maintained, teeming with potholes and uneven surfaces. The group was festive and there was much story telling. I quickly realized that we wouldn’t be strangers for long and that I wasn’t with a very dull group. Most of the bride’s family came from my home state of Indiana, so I enjoyed listening to the stories of home.

As we plodded along for awhile, it became evident that we were going to have to stop for a bathroom break. We were passing through a remote area when it started to rain. It rains a often in Costa Rica. We were getting a gentle, warm rain that would normally be soothing but in this case was causing everyone to squirm in their seats with the urge to relieve themselves. We stopped in a small town, don’t ask me to remember a name of a town a year later, and everyone got out to head into a grocery store. More goodies were bought, bladders were emptied, and time ticked by. I asked how long we had been driving and was told three hours. I asked how close we were to Dominical and was told that we were almost to the mountains, and it was just over the mountains.

We started off again after another 45 minute break. We started heading up the mountains soon after we left the last town. The mountains were stunning, simply breathtaking. As we ascended into what appeared to be the heavens, the overloaded van slowed to a sluggish pace. It was painfully slow moving for the next couple of hours. I’m sure the driver had his foot to the floor on the accelerator, but we were probably moving at around 10km/h. As we were heading uphill, I had to brace myself against the seat in front of me to keep from sliding into it. I was facing backwards and the rocking motion of the vehicle was starting to take a toll on me. My stomach was souring and I became very quiet as I focused on keeping myself from becoming ill.

We reached what appeared to be the top of the mountains when we came across a rest stop in the clouds. We were well above the level of the clouds and the air was cool as we stepped out to visit a small restaurant. Nobody had eaten anything besides some of the local fruit picked up at the grocery store for the past several hours and we were all getting pretty hungry for something more substantial. We were having lunch, though it was late afternoon. The food tasted good, it was simple and unhealthy. Everyone’s mood picked up a little being free of the van and nobody, even me despite my desire for the whole thing to be over, wanted to get back in anytime soon. We had a long lunch and soaked in the views.

When it came time to get back into the van, I looked forward to the fact that it was literally all downhill from that point. I would be resting my back against the seat rather than propping myself against the seat in front of me. Also, we should be able to go quicker on the way down, since we had gravity on our side. I was completely wrong on both points. We actually were moving slower on the way down. The roads were wound and curved in every direction. With the slithering path in front of him, the driver was forced to use the brake incessantly. I would argue that his tapping action on the brake was a bit excessive, but I wasn’t driving. I was being jolted back and forth directly behind him though and my hopes for my stomach to settle went out the window…soon to be followed by my lunch I feared. I again had to strain to keep myself from flopping into the other passengers. As we spastically snaked our way down the mountain, the sun faded away.

People were starting to get antsy. We were 7 hours into a 3 hour drive. Nobody had said anything since we left the last rest stop. It was getting dark. Someone pointed out the need to use the bathroom again and that we should stop. The driver said that we were almost there and the person with the urgent need pointed out that there was almost a puddle in the van. We stopped along side the road, in what appeared to be somebody’s drive way. I didn’t really want to get out, but then I didn’t want to be the one person who didn’t and needed to stop again five minutes down the road. We walked along the long driveway. Most of the guys just relieved themselves in some foliage. The ladies walked down further only to discover a house at the end of the driveway. The people living there seemed entertained by a bunch of gringos peeing in their driveway and offered to let the women come inside to use their facilities. I guess it beats having them pee on the bushes. Their house was for sale, for what many Americans pay for a new car. The homeowners were thanked and we climbed back into the van. It was dark officially.

We kept driving and at some point the copilot started pointing out thing of interest in the darkness. Most people no longer cared enough to try to look out the window. We continued along through a town and we were told that we were almost there. A little ways down the road, after leaving the town, we came to a “T” intersection. There were police there checking cars for I don’t know what. We went through with no incident and turned left down another highway. A short drive later, we pulled into a gravel driveway. Everyone fully expected the travelers in the rented car would be sitting there, wondering where we were. They were not there yet, but arrived just a few minutes after us. They apparently had an ordeal similar to ours.

We walked into the hotel, Boca Verde or some such name, that we were staying at and unloaded our luggage. Actually, we walked into the bar area, which was open air. It was a cool night with the rains from earlier having subsided. We each checked in and surveyed our surroundings. The sound of an unseen ocean could be heard and lightening was flashing. The bride-to-be led my girlfriend and I out to the beach. It was completely dark, but with each flash of lightening the area around us was exposed for just an instant. I could make out sharply rising hills, covered in forests. There were tiny lights sprinkled on the hillside; homes of local residents I assumed. In front of us stretched a sandy beach opening up into a cove. The middle of the beach was home to a large rock, probably at least my height and 10 feet in diameter. We were there at low tide and were told that during high tide the rock was completely under the surface of the sea. The lightening was dazzling, showing the crests of the water being driven by the gentle breeze. The bride to be asked us if it was worth it and despite the arduous drive, I had to admit that it was. My girlfriend wished me a happy birthday and we returned to our room to finally get our vacation started.

We're hovering around record low temperatures here. Currently it's -103F (-75C for those of you stuck on the metric system). Normally, when it gets cold outside, we don't notice much of a change in the station. When I say cold, I'm talking about -80F (-62C) or lower. When it gets cold and stays cold it starts to have an effect on the station conditions. Mainly, it gets cold inside the station too. It just seems to take a few days to seep in. We have to worry about our pipes freezing and it's noticeably colder in certain parts of the station. The first floor is just plain chilly. When I work in the store, I hear nothing but complaints from customers about the temperature. I sit in my room to watch a movie and I start to curl up gradually as the movie progresses (my room is on the first floor). If you leave a drink in the window sill, it will be a meal when you return:


Many people wonder: can you tell the difference between -50F, -80F, and -100F or is it all just painfully cold? The answer is that you can definitely tell the difference, just like you can tell the difference between +50F, +80F, and +100F. Maybe you can't see the difference the same way, such as the lack or presence of foilage for instance, but you can feel it very plainly. What makes it difficult is the wind. Often when it's -50F, it's very windy and when it's -100F it's very calm, so the windchill isn't too far off from one another.

We had another Hash run last night. Last night's run was the same as the other runs really except for three differences:

1) I caught the hares. Oh yeah. Really, the whole idea is to catch the hare. The singing, dancing, running around following signs, and consumptions of refreshing beverages only give you things to do when you're not busy catching the hare. This is the first time this season that the hares were caught. Apparently it happens at least, but no more than, once a year.

2) I got to demonstrate how much my camera sucks. It is not a bad camera and I would recommend it to anyone looking for high-quality pictures on a budget. Unfortunately, it's not rated to -90F. After about three trips outside at those temperatures, the camera no longer has a sense of what you're looking for when you're pushing the buttons on top. It just sits in a stupor. When it finally wakes from it's slumber, you end up with pictures resembling this one....

The camera also only holds about a dozen pictures at a time, but that's my fault for not buying the memory upgrade.

3) This happened....

In an effort to distance myself somewhat from the recent nudage and just because, I decided to steal this from Scott.

Finally, our IT guy is starting to put up videos from our WHIFF a couple of weeks ago. Check 'em out.

When I started this blog, it was intended as a way to keep in touch with friends and family back home. Somewhere along the line, it took a weird turn into me showing my bum and gallivanting around naked. I could say that today was a return to the core intent of this blog, but that would be untrue. Instead, you should prepare yourself for more pictures of me in my birthday suit.

The fact that it is cold in Antarctica is lost on nobody. It's really cold. When it reaches the lowest temperatures at the south pole, we celebrate uniquely as only a polie can. We have a sauna on station and the bottom of the earth outside. We put those two things together in the best way we can. When the temperature drops to -100F (-73C) we turn the sauna up to 200F (93C). We disrobe and sit inside the sauna naked until we feel like we're cooked then go outside to the pole. The experience gives us a 300F degree (160C) change in temperature in a matter of seconds.

My morning started with a call from our met guy, Jeff at 5:30am. The call went something like this:

Phone rings, I take a stab at where I think it is. I'm unlucky and actually find the receiver.
Me, "UGHgrhhshch".
Jeff, "It's minus 100".
Me, "WGFFHLL....ywqzpnpp".
Jeff, "You're on the list to call, sorry".
Me, "thdwy".

I lay in bed and try to see if I can integrate the though of -100F into my dream, which consisted of me lying in bed dreaming about being warm and comfy. The thought pretty much destroyed the dream, so then I began to think. Thinking consisted of reliving my life up to this point to decide how I got to be called at the south pole at 5:30am to be told that it's cold outside, which it always is. I vaguely remembered telling Jeff & Don to call me if it got really cold because I wanted to go run outside in it.

The general rule for the temperature/wind dance at the south pole is that if it's cold, it's not windy. In past seasons, there was little (maybe 3 knots at most) or no wind when it got below -100F. This morning, as I sat in the galley eating some colon-blow cereal before traipsing outside, the television scroll was telling me that it was hovering around -100F with 10 knots of wind. That made for -144F (-97C) windchill. This was not inspiring. I saw Denis & Bob, who would only be up that early if they had stayed up overnight. I asked if they were going and they said yes. I decided to make my way down to the sauna.

The sauna was already as hot as, well, a sauna. There were four people already sitting naked in the sauna. Three of them had been in there awhile, which you could tell by the perspiration, while the fourth, Lane, was obviously only there a litle bit longer than me. Shortly after I arrived, the sweaty three headed out the door as the inaugural members of the 2006 300 Club. They were gone for about six minutes I would guess. They came back in a very awake state and no missing extremities. Lane and I were considering going, but then more people started arriving into the sauna, which lowered the temperature below 200F. We had to continue waiting as more and more naked folks joined us.

After two of the original three had left and there were six new members of the club starting to warm up, I told Lane that it was time. I was wearing just my sandals and a concerned look on my face. Lane was wearing, hell I don't know, I didn't check him out. Mostly nothing I would guess. I was cupping one hand over my mouth to try to avoid burning my lungs and the other hand over the family jewels to avoid freezing all of my soldiers before they've been to battle. The two of us headed out the door from the sauna room, then out the door leading to the beer can. I was navigating down the stairs and I assumed that Lane was right behind me. I hit the bottom of the beer can and out the door, closing it behind me. Just outside the beer can is a large (probably about 8ft high) snow drift. I had to run around that rather than use my hands to climb it. I say run, but I was moving at a fairly leisurely pace. I crossed the 30 sustrugi-filled yards or so out to the pole marker. As I was rounding the south pole marker I turned to see Lane, just leaving the beer can. Maybe I was running faster than I thought. As I made the trip back towards the station, I stepped into a soft snowdrift. That wasn't so good for my exposed toes. I made it to the beer can and walked back up the stairs. I was greeted by a flash from a camera from Don.


I made it back to the sauna to a group of worried soon-to-be-300-clubbers. They asked questions like "How was it?", "Were your feet cold", and "Where's Lane?". I answered each question by trying to catch my breath. People were touching my back to see if I felt cold. I think I was gone for three minutes. I sort of feel like I need to do it again because it wasn't quite as traumatizing as I thought it would be. Eventually Lane came back in and the other group headed out. I got to be photographer for that group. You'll have to take a look at Jeff & Denis' blogs to see any of those photos.

It's windy at the south pole. There's almost always a few knots of wind with the average running around 12 knots or so. The past day has been particularly windy, with wind gusts up to 27 knots.

One of my jobs at south pole, as I have mentioned, it to monitor seismic activity. I look at earthquakes all around the world. Pictured above is a demo seismometer that we have sitting in the science lab. The monitor on the top left is displaying (blurrily) the actual data from the SPRESSO vault, 4 miles from the station. The monitor on the right is displaying data from the small functioning seismometer that is located in the case on the lower left of the picture. It will register if you open and close the nearby door, jump up and down in front of it, shake the table, and roll around on office furniture in the lab (we've never actually done that, of course). A zoom in photo of the right hand monitor is shown below:


As you can see, near the top of this photo there is just the occaisional opening and closing of the door and people walking by registering on there. Then, about halfway down, it starts to get much more noisy as told by the bolder/darker squiggles. This is from the increased wind shaking the station (see, my train of thought has a caboose). The wind picked up late last night and continued to blow mightily for the next several hours. This is why we bury the real seismometer beneath the snow, to avoid picking up wind noise. Here is a picture of the demo seismometer:


The real seismometer is a 7 foot high tube, about 6 inches in diameter. It works on the same principle as the demo, though it uses very small weights and counter weights and then amplifies the signal using electronics. There is also a surface seismometer (which is still below the surface in a vault) that looks like a dish pot. This is the one that I am actually able to see and manipulate. As the ice shifts, which it does quite a bit in Antarctica, the surface seismometer gets tilted off center. I get to go out when it is too far off center and bring it back to center/level. Here is a picture of me doing just that, earlier in the season:

This is a certified picture-free, link free posting. The same cannot be said for parenthesis.

I have mentioned a few times (I could link to when I said it, but you'll need to just go search my archives...you should do that anyway, I have written some really good stuff if I do say so myself) that I don't really get any days off down here. I don't complain about this, because a day off would be boring. Usually though, when there is a day off for the non-science folks, then it's actually busier for me. Not because I'm picking up the slack for everyone else or doing some sort of extra duty, but because there's almost always cool stuff going on that I want to do. There are parties, movies, dances, classes, competitions and various other gatherings (I could link to an example of each, but I'm not gonna) that happen to be right in the middle of my work day. I get to shift my schedule and hustle a little extra to make up for the time I want to spend doing other things.

This weekend was an exception. For all of the non-US resident readers out there, this weekend is Independence Day weekend (no link for you). Traditionally back home this means hot dogs, fireworks, and really bad fashion statements. It's a fun family and friend weekend. Since the holiday falls on a Tuesday, we made the previous Saturday a day off. Two-day weekends here are usually highly anticipated with several events planned out weeks in advance. Unfortunately, we just had our mid-winter celebration so I think a lot of people were evented-out. The only two events planned for the weekend was a birthday party and a Lazy Swayze film fest (yes, it was a tribute to Patrick Swayze, complete with a Patrick Swayze impersonator....oh, I really wanted to put a link and a picture there, but I promised not to). Due to the lack of anything truely intriguing, I got together with a few friends to have an impromptu 'Christmas in July' film fest (we didn't call it that, we just got together and watched some movies). We watched 'Bad Santa', 'Elf', and 'Dodgeball' (in lieu of a link, how about Googling that stuff yourself, eh?). OK, the last one wasn't really in the spirit of the film fest, but did you catch the impromptu part of it?

The other unfortunate thing about having the rest of the station off is that it's hard to find help when you do need work done. Some people aren't leaving their rooms for anything short of a fire alarm, smoke, intense heat, screams from outside, and the need to go pee. With almost everyone else off this weekend, I got to help make a cryo run. This is where my story begins.

The Dark Sector (ohhh, really wanted to slap a link on that too, must resist) requires cryogens (no links, just have to look it up yourself...ok, here's a hint: liquid helium) every six days to keep their instruments (nope, no link there either) running smoothly (I probably would have provided a link to some soft serve ice cream or the like). The Dark Sector is about a third of a mile away from the station, across the runway used for landing planes in the summer (I have pictures, but I'm not sharing them right now). The cryo shack (linkless) is located just behind the main station (pictureless). Cryogens must be delivered to the Dark Sector, which is part of what Cryo Mark (a picture of Mark would be dandy) does for a living.

The process of delivering cryogens goes like this: 1) A crack team (read: whoever is standing around) is assembled. Two people, in addition to Cryo Mark, are needed to make the delivery. This time it was Bob and I lending a hand. 2) A snowmobile is fired up and a sled attached to the back. 3) We ride out to the Dark Sector to pick up empty dewars. 4) While the dewars (the dewars are large and heavy, I have pictures of them, but well, you get the idea) are being retrieved by two of the members of aforementioned crack team, the third member (me) drives the snowmobile around in circles. The snowmobile must be kept moving or it will freeze up and then you'll have very cranky mechanics coming to glare at you and think nasty thoughts while they haul it back to the garage to have all of the fluid lines replaced. 4) The dewars are loaded on the sled and returned to the cryo shack to be refilled. Everyone checks that they still have 10 digits since they can no longer be felt. 5) Mark fills the dewars, this takes about an hour. Feeling returns to the tips of your thumb, assuming that it is still attached. Snowmobile is left in the garage to keep it warmish. 6) Crack team + snowmobile + full dewars return to the dark sector. 7) Helium in gas form is very light. Helium in liquid form is heavy. The empty dewars from before cannot be carried up the stairs (who's idea was it to put stairs in this whole process anyway?), so they are brought up to the second level of the DSL (Dark Sector Lab, clever, eh?) building via a hoist. Sometimes the hoist is frozen because it's only rated to 0 degrees F or some such ridiculously high temperture. In the event of a frozen hoist, the dewars are carried up the stairs. During this long endeavour, member #3 of crack team is busy driving in circles on the snowmobile. Thumbs become useless appendages. 8) Crack team returns to the main station once the dewars are safely back in their proper place. 9) Screams heard as thumb tissue begins to thaw (good place for a link to what frostbite looks like, but it's not going to happen).

Anyone interested in the cryo tech job for next season?