Anna McKee

WAIS Divide Camp at 79.47S latitude, 112.06W longitude
Wednesday, December 16th
Hi Everybody,
Today the wind picked up and I am now experiencing conditions unlike I have
ever felt before. The wind is at about 20knots, so the temperature feels
much colder. I must cover all of myself in order to stay outside for more
than a few minutes. Gloves I have been wearing until now do not suffice and
I am digging for more layers in my bags. I am really in love with my Big
Red (the Big Red is our high loft extreme weather jacket). Today I spent a
bit of time in and around “The Arch”
The reason that this camp exists is to retrieve 3400 meters of ice from the
enormous ice sheet of West Antarctica. Numerous scientists and institutions
in the U.S. will receive samples of the ice and test it for a variety of
isotopes, gases, dusts, elements and biological materials. This ice needs
to be kept as intact and cold as possible. The drill needs to be aligned
within millimeters and be able to cut through ice that is well under
freezing.
I thought I had an idea of the complexity of this before coming here, but
watching the procedure in the Drill Arch gave me a much better impression of
the level of engineering and technology behind this feat. The arch is
divided into two parts, the drilling area and the core processing area. They
are kept separate for safety and to keep the ice cold. Once the ice is
pulled up (the drill is now at 1544 meters and counting), it is pushed
through a hole in the wall into the processing area that is maintained at
-25degrees C. During all parts of the procedure, the ice is cradled in
trays to minimize the risk of fracture. The transfer is like a birth.
Because I am here early in the drill season, each piece of ice that comes up
is like a baby, everyone looking, as if to count fingers and toes. In
reality, they look to see the condition of the ice and to see how the drill
is cutting – to know if anything needs to be tweaked.
The drill was redesigned this year to be able to cut longer lengths each
trip down. Since it takes approximately 40 minutes to travel to current
cutting depth, I understand why they want to optimize the amount retrieved
at each pass.
In the morning I sketched in the arch, mostly to observe the process. The
first sketch was awkward, due to my bundling up and the unfamiliarity of it
all. In the afternoon, I worked in the ramp leading to the back entrance of
the arch with a bit more success, though the wind chased me inside too
quickly. The drifting is beautiful and the sky is bright with blue patches.
Tomorrow, I hope to go out to the backlit snow pit. Send warm thoughts
south!

This post is coming to you through a low bandwidth GOES satellite, in plain
text email, set up by my very clever niece Christine (thanks!!)
Monday, December 14th – I flew in a LC-130 or “Herc” to the WAIS Divide Camp
at 79.47S latitude, 112.06W longitude – high on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet
Plateau. It was an evening flight and I was able to sit in the cockpit much
of the way. For 3 and 1/2 hours, we cruised above a flat white mass.
Looking down, at first it all seemed even and monotonous. But the light
caught both clouds and surface textures to create patterns and textures,
occasionally bouncing back bright reflections. It was similar to flying
across an ocean, with even wave patterns. Once, I thought I saw an ice
stream in the sheet. An ice sheet is an area of the ice sheet that moves
more quickly than the surrounding mass, looking a bit like a river cutting
across a plain.
I was warmly welcomed by the camp, many of whom came out to meet my plane.
There was a bit of time to get leftovers from the chef (who, by the way, is
rumored to be the best chef in Antarctica) and a quick tour of the camp by
ice core handler Peter Neff, a graduate student at the University of
Washington. Then off to bed, the first night in a structure called a Polar
Haven, which is affectionately known as “the oven”.
Today I mostly settled in, though I did help Yvonne, our medical staff,
whose duties include weather relay to McMurdo. She set off a weather
balloon to determine cloud ceiling. It is elegant, simple science. A
balloon is filled with a specific weight of (30gm) Helium, released into the
sky and timed until it disappears. On a snow runway, the plane can’t land
safely if visibility is less than 1000 feet, so this information is critical
to prevent a turn around, which wastes fuel and everyone’s time.
The camp is laid out like a small village, with the Drill Arch and
generators out on the edge of town. I will describe the drilling complex in
more detail in my next post. The community space is a series of structures,
some old military James ways, others newer versions of rac-tents (fabric and
steel structures). There are separate heated tents for science, operations,
medical, a spacious galley and a combo recreation tent and shower module.
There is even a laundry machine. Most of these folks are here for 2 months,
doing very cold, laborious work, so laundry is a necessity.
On the edge of town is a small tent suburb, laid out in a grid with a map in
case of condition one (white out) weather. Though I was given a mountain
tent at McMurdo, two of the science team left today, so I moved into one of
the more spacious, warm tents with an insulated floor – cushy. I am looking
forward to snuggling into my own space after sharing sleeping quarters in
McMurdo.
It is a bit cold in the evening hours, when the sun is at its lowest point,
but happily, the sun is high in the morning and the tents become warm and
toasty. I will take a hot water bottle to bed with me (not as nice as my
husband, but it will have to suffice) to pre-heat the sleeping bag. Tomorrow
will be an active day. More then!

uh-oh!  The day of my flight, there is ground fog!  It is a bit hard to see in this photo, but look at that swath of purplish-blue between the mountains and the sea ice.  I am not due to go out until 14:15, so maybe this will burn off, but I suspect it is not quite like the early morning fog in Seattle.  The fog is pouring in from the south, where I am told the worst weather comes from.  It has been so mild and calm here, that it is interesting to see a change.  Too bad it comes at an inconvenient time.

Yesterday, I ran around getting my gear together, but also had time to join a tour to Discovery Hut.  This is Scott’s hut just on the edge of McMurdo, at Hut Point.  I can walk out there any time, but must join an official tour to see inside.

It turns out, this is just fine with me; the place is a dump!  Super smelly carcasses hanging everywhere and tattered clothes; guys are such slobs! ;-)  I really appreciate my EWC (extreme weather clothing).  Its quite an improvement from 100 years ago.

On the walk back to town, I reflected on the processes of historic accretion.  We know more about Scott’s and Shackleton’s expeditions in part due to the artifacts they left behind.  Roald Amundson, on the other hand, traveled light and left very little behind, aside from a tent at the pole – long buried in the ice.

Our current ethics dictate that we also leave no trace on the continent, or at least minimize our trace as much as possible.  So I think it is ironic that one of the best planners and stewards (whether that was his goal or not) of the heroic age is the least well known.  I suppose this is an obvious truth about the preservation of stories, but it felt particularly poinant as I wandered through Scott’s tailings.

Now I am off to make last minute preparations before my flight.  You will know if I got out soon. – Ciao from The Ice!

The next day, I awoke early, so got the whisperlite stoves going and soon we had hot water for cocoa, instant coffee and oatmeal – yummy.  The rest of the morning went by quickly.  We broke camp and then practiced calling MacOps (radio into headquarters).  “MacOps, MacOps, MacOps – this is Happy Camper, do you copy?” The photo looks like I am searching the sky for an answer, but I am simply following directions from my instructor.

After fun with the UHF radio, we donned buckets and tried to find our instructor outside, to simulate searching for a person in a white out.  I had seen this scenario in Herzog’s movie Encounters at the End of The World, but couldn’t imagine how completely turned around one can become.  Fortunately, I had a skilled team member in the lead and he actually found the instructor.

The time went by very fast and soon enough we were headed back to town.  I had a quick shower and then joined a tour of the pressure ridges.  This is an area next to Scott Base where the pressure from tides and the transition of sea ice to land has caused the sea ice to uplift.  It is spectacular; though I was tired from the past two days, I was glad I went.  We walked along the ridges for about a kilometer, all of us snapping our cameras.  Near the end of the walk, we came upon a female seal and her pup.  The wildlife is very cute here.

The days at McMurdo have been very busy and full.  I spend an inordinate amount of time simply keeping track of my gear.  Between organizing gear, attending trainings and touring the area by foot, I have not had much spare time to go through photos and create a slide show.  Tomorrow I fly out to the WAIS field camp, when my real work begins.  I will also have a bit more time to process my photos.  If my flight goes as scheduled, I will have time for one more post.  Otherwise, I fly out at 6:15am, and will be out of range for all but plain text.  My descriptions will have to suffice until I get back to the comforts of McMurdo around the new year.

Friday morning I and nine other lucky souls began Happy Camper School with our very clever Kiwi (New Zealand) instructor Billy.  She is in the light green jacket.  Fortunately, it was a Ski Doo camping experience, so we didn’t have to haul our stuff out onto the Ross Ice Shelf, where we spent the next 24 hours.  An ice shelf is a large mass of perennial ice, fed by land based glaciers, that extends out over the water.

This training course is given to all USAP participants who might  go into the field for any reason.  Weather can turn nasty very quickly, so we need to know how to use survival gear, communicate with the station and experience what it is like to sleep on the snow.

We set up our camp a few kilometers from New Zealand’s Scott Base.  The snow was several feet thick over about 2oo feet of ice.  All around us, islands rose up to define this immense expanse.  McMurdo sits at the end of Hut Point Peninsula on Ross Island.  We were on the east side of this point toward the windless bight.  Mt Erebus was to our north, in the middle of the island.  Across the ice to our south sit Black Island and White Island.  Farther to the northwest, we could barely see Mt Discovery.  To the east the massive shelf and sea ice create a flat white horizon.

The sky was mostly blue and bright as we set up, with no wind – we couldn’t have been luckier.  Setting up the large Scott tents was made easier with many hands.  I had to imagine what it would be like in high winds with two cold people.  A different experience. We soon had our entire camp set up, snow on the “cooker” and I was finally able to create a studio shelter and try to sketch.  Unfortunately, the weather has its own schedule and just as I began to a nearby hillside, a fog dropped on it like an eraser on a dryboard. – Check back for Happy Camper – day two!