Bright

Looking out from Cryo. Kind of looks like an alien landscape.

Sorry about not posting in a while. Things have been getting busy lately. As you can see, the sun is up, which is exciting and uplifting. And with the sun has also come weather. We've had two storms since sunrise, neither of which were bad, but made for poor visibility and lots of wind. And anytime it hasn't been storming, it has been unseasonably cold (e.g. in the -80s and -90s). Someday we'll get warm temperatures and sun at the same time. It'll be amazing.

At the beginning of this week, we had September emergency drill. Since the weather was warm enough to run vehicles, the drill was out at cryo, which was a little bit stressful for me. Lots of running around, making sure none of my equipment got damaged as the fire and medical teams wandered around trying to take care of our two casualties.

Jay, getting ready for the drill. "Intestines" made from latex glove fingers
stuffed with cooked chicken, and then covered with fake blood.

The scenario was that the LN2 plant exploded, causing a cryogen leak. Jay suffered a head injury and evisceration, while our other patient, Jim, got hit in the arm with flying debris, causing a fracture.

Fire team dragging Jay to safety, through the fog-filled
cryo building.

Other than that excitement, I've been busy at cryo, trying to get things ready to hand over to Flint once he gets here on the 27th. I did the preventative maintenance on the LN2 plant, which was a lot like changing the oil on my car, except messier since whoever designed the machine put the oil inlet in the most awkward spot possible. I finally emptied out the first LHe dewar, boiling off the last 100L or so and pumping that into the gas tanks. I'll probably start boiling off the second dewar in a week or so, since the NSF would like to pull the dewars as soon as possible, in order to make room of a new experiment.

Outside of cryo, I've been keeping busy trying to plan my vacation. I got my ticket info last week, so that has made planning a little easier. Right now, I am scheduled to leave Pole on  Nov. 2nd (1 month and 1 day away!), but since weather tends to be extremely variable this time of year, I've been told not to make any solid plans until the 15th. If I get off the ice before then, great, that'll mean time to do some hiking and rafting. After the 15th, I'll be picking up a bike in Auckland and heading down the east coast of the north island, with a 32K trail race on the 17th, which I am really looking forward to. On the 23rd, I'll head home, making it to St. Paul by the 26th, with a layover in AZ to visit my grandma.

With leaving a little more than a month away, I've realized how quickly the last eight months have past. It has been an incredible experience, and I am glad that I decided to come down here.

One of many beautiful sights at the South Pole, the early morning sun
over cryo.

Sunrise

Almost full light out in the dark sector. Also, check out the snow
drift, MAPO Mountain, that built over the winter. It is about as
tall as I am.

So, we’ve had a fairly eventful couple of weeks here. The equinox is on the 23^rd, so it is almost fully light out, at least when the weather is good. I switched back to day-shift at the beginning of the week, which was a little rough in terms of sleep, but it is nice to see people and feel like part of the community again. We’ve also started getting ready for station opening. The runway has been groomed and flags have been placed marking out the crossing zone (between the station and the dark sector), and for where the South Pole Airport will get placed once it gets dragged off the berms. Let’s see, the window covers came down on the 10^th, so we’re not living aboard a submarine anymore. That has been great, particularly at dinner. At that time the sunrise has moved into view, and since the windows are tinted, the colors tend to be intensified, making for some pretty surreal oranges and pinks in the sky.

In decent weather, we get colors like this.

For Sunrise weekend, this is what we got. You can see a vague outline of the
station, about a 1/4mi from cryo, where I took the picture.

We celebrated Sunrise this last weekend, with Sunrise dinner on Saturday night. A group of us kicked off the long weekend by setting up the drive-in movie theater in the gym.

Lots of sci-fi/fantasy showing this weekend.

Sunrise dinner tends to be less formal that the other winter holidays, so this year’s theme was a 50’s-style greasy spoon, complete with the bus-boys/servers dressed like greasers. 

My dinner table, with menus/games and crayons.
L to R: Chris (not pictured), Jared, K-ris, Heather, Doc, Guy, Tracy, me (not pictured)

The projector had also been set up in the galley, so Grease played during dinner. JP also debut his short film, “A Warm Place”.

Blue Moon (a picture post)

Early dawn at the south pole

So this week was a blue moon, which means that it was the second full moon of the month. Down here, we did didn't get a great view, since it was pretty cloudy, but here is what it looked like:

Other than that, an uneventful week. The sky is brighter and all but the brightest stars are gone. We've had some days with incredible color.

Dark sector silhouettes

Another day of sunrise over the station