jules in antarctica: February 2011

In early January I had another "quick trip" to a field camp. Although this time, two nights turned into seven nights as can happen easily when on these trips. We waited several nights in a row, for a plane to leave McMurdo 8pm, 9pm, 10pm, 11pm, and midnight-- only to be called with a cancellation due to a mechanical issue with the plane (ok, one night we did have poor weather/ visibility at camp). I duly appreciate the layers of attention and protocol for allowing planes to fly safely on this continent, but sometimes it can be mysterious as to why it's so hard to get somewhere. So I kicked off the year, Jan. 3rd, at Byrd Camp which is a three hour flight from McMurdo via an LC-130 Hercules plane. Byrd is in the middle of West Antarctica and the camp is supporting about 30-40 staff and science grantees.

Weather coming in to camp

Weather arrived, it lasted about a day.

The grantees at Byrd work on the Polenet project which studies ice sheet data in Antarctica and Greenland (http://www.polenet.org/). They are based here, but fly smaller planes out to different sites to set up GPS and seismic recording stations. During my visit, they were a bit behind on flights due to weather at various locations, so they were also pacing around waiting to really get to work.

Passing time. I'm yellow.

I found this in the Galley in the middle of West Antarctica. I can't get away from this place!

Byrd camp is set up a lot like the previous camp I was at, CTAM, although it began last year and will probably continue for a few more years. There is another camp called WAIS (Western Antarctic Ice Sheet) only about 80 miles away from here and they mostly support ice core drilling (a huge project and they just finished their goal of the second deepest ice core sample from 3,332 meters!).

There is also the very beginnings of a new camp past WAIS at Pine Island Glacier (PIG). This year is dedicated to staging the camp so it can be set up for next year. That translates to a ground traverse of heavy equipment vehicles pulling cargo and fuel bladders from Byrd to PIG.

It has been in the last several years that traversing is becoming a viable means of transportation for the US Antarctic Program. The South Pole Traverse from McMurdo has about 3-4 successful seasons, and the new PIG traverse is the next biggest one that I know of. Pulling fuel via large tractors is actually more cost effective than flying all the fuel needed to support camps (or the Pole). To back up a bit... fuel is shipped down on a large tanker ship to McMurdo at the end of every summer season. This fuel is stored and used in town, but also needs to get to the South Pole and 3-4 major field camps, get delivered to various fuel caches in the area, as well as support C-17, LC-130, Twin-Otter planes, Basler planes, and helicopters. This season's South Pole Traverse brought almost 100,000 gallons of fuel to the Pole- saving about 28 LC-130 fuel delivery flights.

So, while I was at Byrd, the PIG traverse came back from PIG to load more cargo and fuel for their next PIG trip (all of which was originally flown out to Byrd from McMurdo). The traversers, although pretty excited about the unique opportunity they have, actually say driving is...
pretty boring. It's of course flat, white, and relatively dull without scenery to look at. They know where to go via GPS and the three of them just follow in a line. This part of the continent, the plateau is pretty stable. (I know that the South Pole traverse heads over the Ross Ice Shelf and up a glacier through the Transantarctic Mountains to the Polar Plateau which have areas of crevasses which need to be monitored with Ground Penetrating Radar to cross safely). Part of the real work with traversing is making sure that vehicles stay working and the hauling system doesn't break down. Every year they try to improve the hauling technology to keep friction and drag down to a minimum and maintaining flexibility for riding over sustrugi or rough snow. Turns out the weather on the way to PIG is generally very nice, but the actual camp location is very windy and tiny bit miserable (note to self for next year-- skip PIG camp).

This is what it looks like when the traverse gang showed up