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Hey Mike,
All set for WINFLY? The hoards are coming! It should be getting pretty light out these days. I hope you get a good show of nacreous clouds. Not to rub it in, but we had some wunnnderful direct sunlight today. It was -14C but the sun felt warm, for the first time in a long time. Your turn is coming, and how!
Pretty slow on the bulletin boards these days, I think everybody is out enjoying the summer up north… And us Ice people are gearing up for the onslaught. I was poking around on the web a few minutes ago and found a link to an Antarctic cruise on a three-masted bark, the Europa (URL: http://victory-cruises.com/europa.html). Wow! If I thought I might not be coming back for a long time I would probably get on it. Not your ordinary short pleasure cruise, they spend some serious time sailing around. There’s one later that goes to South Georgia and Ascension Island — I’d just love to be on it. Can’t get enough of this place…
Tonight’s the max for the persid meteor shower, and (amazingly) the sky is mostly clear. I’m going to hike out to the glacier here and plop down to watch for a while. Alpha Centauri is straight overhead, with Jupiter in the north and Venus setting brightly in the east. The pack ice finally came in, so with the partial moon we can see ice to the horizon. Most cool. Last night a bunch of us took a jump off the pier, maybe the last time we can do that with all the ice around. Yeeehaaa!
HERE COMES THE SUN, FOR YOU TOO!!
glenn
Yo, Glenn —
You about ready to harvest that latest bunch of bananas? Should be gettin’ pretty ripe by now. Damn, I wish McMurdo was in the tropics, like you all are…
atlasGlenn, the Europa definitely looks better than the average Antarctic cruise, thanks for pointing it out.
As for the sun here at Pole, there is a slight glow on the horizon, but it probably is just another one of those forest fires out on the banana plantation 🙂 We had some nice auroras yesterday, and the temps have dropped back into the mid -90s…ah yes, time for another dish of our excellent LN2 ice cream! No drooling please…
We’re still deep into the winter with 10 weeks to go….hope all of you coming or going on Winfly have a good safe trip!
Daylight is near. The photosensors on the streetlights are turning the lights off at lunch now. We are still getting -40F degree days, though. I’m a delta driver for winfly and they have been using us to pack down the shortcut road to Pegasus. It’s been so cold that the tires go flat as soon as they get blown up. We sat around for four hours last week while the mechanics tried to blow up enough tires to get some machines running. It never worked. We hit condition one for cold that day. -100f windchill.
We’ve come to the conclusion that condition 2 for cold is way worse than a condition one storm.
Nacreous clouds are out almost everyday now. The northern sky was almost blood red this afternoon, so you know the sun is just a peek a way.
The tanned people are next. Starting on saturday.
Lorie and I are looking at land in Northern California. If we buy you’ll have to come visit.
cheers
mikeAs I type, I am in Mcmurdo. We had the first flight of the season yesterday. It got in without a hitch. The temperature warmed up above zero, which made it especially nice. Working out at the airfield in fifty below sucks. The sun is supposed to be up now. We can see it shining on the mountains across the bay, but we still have Erebus in the way for us. Today or tomorrow it might get high enough for us to see it at the airfield. It will be another few weeks before it hits MCM.
Mike
is there any way you can find out who leaves on which flight? when does the last flight leave? My boyfriend is down there and I would Like to know atleast what flight he is taking… he wants to surprise me, but I would like to know what flights he’s on.
The truth of the matter is that you really never know for sure until the plane takes off with you on it. Todays flight was canceled for weather and it may cancel again tomorrow based on the forcast. It’s not uncommon for flights to be delayed up to a week or two. Once a big storm dumps snow and big drifts on the runway, it’s not safe to land a plane until it gets cleared off. Also the temperature has to be warmer than -50. If it gets colder than that the flaps and landing gear hydrolics can fail. Nobody wants a plane landing in those conditions. Once a flight gets delayed and you have more than one plane that is late, the passenger lists change as priorities take over.
Management and key personnel and station critical cargo get high priority. Science groups and their cargo get priority. Most of the rest are low on the list and get slotted in where ever.
Every year there is someone leaving the ice who plans on the weather being good. They will buy tickets to the states only to find themselves still in McMurdo when their flight leaves. Anyone who has been here for a while knows better and plans on staying in Christchurch for a week or so. That way if you get stuck in MCM by storms for a week you still have no pressures about missed flights.
Best to wait the waiting game and see your boyfriend when he makes it.We’re all here waiting on word about the weather now. Heard tomorrows flight may not go if the storm has not passed and been cleared, see what happens.
Lucky.All three passenger flights are in. One more cargo and we are done. Yesterday was the most beautiful day. The sun finally peeked over erebus and we all go to see the sun for the first time since april. It’s about time hey.
We are ready for the mainbody crowd next.
mikehi mike,
so glad some folks are looking forward to mainbodies! just got my deployment itinerary e-mailed to me & got shivers of joy! It’s been 7 long months & I can’t wait to be back on my Ice home again…
OG, look for a chick with long red hair & glasses at LAX…
‘Becca, on Ice they will give you tons of info about your return ticket during the redeployment meetings – there are LOTS of options!
see ya’ll soon!
marsha
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