So the winter begins- "We live, as we dream-- alone"
Coming Home From Work
The last fortnight has seen the complement on base dwindle as the summer season wrapped up with the last joining the Shackleton a week ago, leaving the wintering team alone on base. Unsurprisingly the last few days of the summer became a frantic rush to finish jobs and ensure everything that needed to leave was packed and ready to go.
The Long and Winding Road
The Ernest Shackleton returned for second call, having been back to the Falklands in the interim, along with undertaking a science cruise in the Weddell Sea. On this occasion it also carried a dentist, Burjor, whose main role is to perform check-ups and sort out any dental problems on those who are wintering for two consecutive years. It is also an opportunity for those about to winter to have a further check-up to ensure all potential problems are sorted before the winter begins, for though I received some emergency dental training as part of my time before coming South, problems are much better sorted by a true dentist before they get out of hand.
Return to the Shackleton at N9
Given that the surgery on the Shackleton is equipped to double as a dental surgery, it meant that we all had an opportunity to travel up to the ship. I stayed overnight to sit in on all of the dental work and improve my skills, meaning that I got to enjoy the luxuries on board of lettuce, a long warm shower and bottled English bitter- missed even over the six weeks since I was last on board.
Challenger 1 and 2 Ship-side
It also resulted in a fantastic ride on the back of a sled pulled by the large Challengers that have been brought in this year in preparation for the heavy plant work required for the Halley VI build, serenely crossing the 50 kms of the Brunt Ice Shelf to the ship with a limitless expanse of ice to the south, bright sunshine overhead and the ice sparkling as if covered in thousands of diamonds. A journey much more comfortable than the five hours back by Sno-Cat, whose suspension fails to deal with the sastrugi with comparable ease.
Jim (Z-Carpenter) Out Digging
After five days of waste and other out-going cargo being exchanged for incoming drums of fuel for the winter, time came for the last of the summerers to be taken up to the ship, which with a pyrotechnic display of expired flares, slipped its moorings and disappeared off into the fog.
The Last Summerers Leave Base
They were, however, not the last outsiders to leave Halley before our nine months of isolation. The skiway provides a refuelling stop for those planes looked after by other Antarctic operators, going to other destinations within the continent, particularly Queen Maud land. The German operated aircraft Polar 2, departed through here a few weeks ago and this left the last plane, a Basler, which services the large number of international bases to the east (a long way to the east!- see map), to depart; it arrived here just as the Sno-Cats were leaving so I stayed behind to provide fire and medical cover for the ski-way. Its arrival around the beginning of November will mark the break of our isolation.
As the Basler Takes Off, Winter Begins
I also had the opportunity to escape off base again to help with some exciting science work. Tom, who as part of a collaborative project between a University in Braunschweig, Germany and BAS, will be spending his winter flying an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), a first in the Antarctic. Packed with both meteorological kit and infra-red sensors, it will be flown over the sea ice during the winter to enhance understanding of the physical processes that underlie sea ice formation (read more here).
Tom, Alex and the UAV
In the interim, the priority is to get it flying autonomously (under auto-pilot guidance) along a GPS determined itinerary, easy enough in Europe but sastrugi and cold temperatures conspire against that here- resulting in a few hiccups. For safety reasons the UAV is flown several miles off base with operations run out of the back of a converted Sno-Cat, which provides a warm haven when the ambient temperature is around -20ºC, as it has been since the ship departed.
Assembling the UAV on Site
With a two metre wing span and a weight of 5 kg its not a small thing to get off the ground, which is achieved by the use an elastic bungee and two lithium battery powered motors.
"Airborne!"
The absence of the summer team and the withdrawal of the ski-doos as the temperature drops, has meant that the base is suddenly much quieter. The eighteen of us that are here for the winter can all sit around one big table for meals. Before long, however, the numbers on base will drop off further as groups of four all leave for the pre-winter trips for a week at a time. I leave in a fortnight but before that there is plenty of organisation of the medical supplies to take place and medical research projects to sort out.
The Long and Winding Road
The Ernest Shackleton returned for second call, having been back to the Falklands in the interim, along with undertaking a science cruise in the Weddell Sea. On this occasion it also carried a dentist, Burjor, whose main role is to perform check-ups and sort out any dental problems on those who are wintering for two consecutive years. It is also an opportunity for those about to winter to have a further check-up to ensure all potential problems are sorted before the winter begins, for though I received some emergency dental training as part of my time before coming South, problems are much better sorted by a true dentist before they get out of hand.
Return to the Shackleton at N9
Given that the surgery on the Shackleton is equipped to double as a dental surgery, it meant that we all had an opportunity to travel up to the ship. I stayed overnight to sit in on all of the dental work and improve my skills, meaning that I got to enjoy the luxuries on board of lettuce, a long warm shower and bottled English bitter- missed even over the six weeks since I was last on board.
Challenger 1 and 2 Ship-side
It also resulted in a fantastic ride on the back of a sled pulled by the large Challengers that have been brought in this year in preparation for the heavy plant work required for the Halley VI build, serenely crossing the 50 kms of the Brunt Ice Shelf to the ship with a limitless expanse of ice to the south, bright sunshine overhead and the ice sparkling as if covered in thousands of diamonds. A journey much more comfortable than the five hours back by Sno-Cat, whose suspension fails to deal with the sastrugi with comparable ease.
Jim (Z-Carpenter) Out Digging
After five days of waste and other out-going cargo being exchanged for incoming drums of fuel for the winter, time came for the last of the summerers to be taken up to the ship, which with a pyrotechnic display of expired flares, slipped its moorings and disappeared off into the fog.
The Last Summerers Leave Base
They were, however, not the last outsiders to leave Halley before our nine months of isolation. The skiway provides a refuelling stop for those planes looked after by other Antarctic operators, going to other destinations within the continent, particularly Queen Maud land. The German operated aircraft Polar 2, departed through here a few weeks ago and this left the last plane, a Basler, which services the large number of international bases to the east (a long way to the east!- see map), to depart; it arrived here just as the Sno-Cats were leaving so I stayed behind to provide fire and medical cover for the ski-way. Its arrival around the beginning of November will mark the break of our isolation.
As the Basler Takes Off, Winter Begins
I also had the opportunity to escape off base again to help with some exciting science work. Tom, who as part of a collaborative project between a University in Braunschweig, Germany and BAS, will be spending his winter flying an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), a first in the Antarctic. Packed with both meteorological kit and infra-red sensors, it will be flown over the sea ice during the winter to enhance understanding of the physical processes that underlie sea ice formation (read more here).
Tom, Alex and the UAV
In the interim, the priority is to get it flying autonomously (under auto-pilot guidance) along a GPS determined itinerary, easy enough in Europe but sastrugi and cold temperatures conspire against that here- resulting in a few hiccups. For safety reasons the UAV is flown several miles off base with operations run out of the back of a converted Sno-Cat, which provides a warm haven when the ambient temperature is around -20ºC, as it has been since the ship departed.
Assembling the UAV on Site
With a two metre wing span and a weight of 5 kg its not a small thing to get off the ground, which is achieved by the use an elastic bungee and two lithium battery powered motors.
"Airborne!"
The absence of the summer team and the withdrawal of the ski-doos as the temperature drops, has meant that the base is suddenly much quieter. The eighteen of us that are here for the winter can all sit around one big table for meals. Before long, however, the numbers on base will drop off further as groups of four all leave for the pre-winter trips for a week at a time. I leave in a fortnight but before that there is plenty of organisation of the medical supplies to take place and medical research projects to sort out.
Sunset Over the Piggott
As winter draws in, sunsets return
