a new name

Since I'm no longer on the Ice, I figured I should change the name of this blog to reflect my status. I imagine as I continue to post here, I'll change the name again, in an attempt to remain "current".
In the meantime, adieu to the Adventures on Ice. Bring on the adventures in da 'bus!

traffic

Well, at least now we know:



If only we could all get on the same definition of "constant speed" and "safe distance"!

Gotta love the "real world".

Life, back atcha

Two weeks later, I look back at my "exciting" return:
moving into my new house, getting the landlord to finally Finish my new house, finding out why I never wanted to be an accountant (by doing the accounting for 5 mos travel), paying bills, cleaning my new house, buying paint, unpacking.... Going snowshoeing with Jess, and imagining the Royal Societies in the distance. Trail running at Highbanks and (pleasantly) surprising myself with my time/distance. Receiving calls on my cell phone and catching up with people about wedding plans, new job plans, and the lot.
Having Grandma tell me about Nate's birthday wish (my first cousin once removed). His sisters go to the hotel for pool parties and such for their bday parties, but Nate's always been a bit different; Randy calls him her little old man. For his 9th(?) birthday, all he wanted was to be picked up from school in a semi. Luckily, Ben her bro, drives semis, and arranged to be there Friday to scoop him up from school and take him and his cousin to the (oil) rig (Ben runs). They had a blast.
Seeing children, both at church and helping my friend Laura with her 3-mo-old twins. Seeing my advisor, and my group-mates. While the idea he had about me combining some old gamma-ray knowledge I had with my newer cosmic-ray understanding probably won't pan out, at least he was thinking and suggesting things for a final chapter or two of my thesis! . Swapping missing folks back in the states for missing folks from the Ice and traveling.
...
So it's not exactly backpacking Arthur's Pass, climbing hand-over-fist up the waterfall in the mist and then down the pass, past verdant alpine scrub clinging to rock beside a rushing creek. Or hiking up to Ball Glacier in Mt Cook, cavorting with crampons and ice axe (for the first time ever!), exploring crevasses, and then slowly route-finding down the ridge beside Mt Cook itself, listening and occasionally watching as almost hourly rumbling heralded the collapse of yet another snowfield or scree slope. Neither has it been the unknown of hitching around the South Island, knowing there's enough in my pack for the evening, no matter where I find myself (ok, barring a $100/entree restaurant with black tie dress code. :). Greatest perhaps is the contrast with the simplicity of McMurdo, where the food was ready even if it was a bit aged, the room ready, if shared, and the tasks of the day well-defined and straight-forward
...
Yet, the great unknown lurks just around the completion of this last task (finishing my degree), luring me with vistas of more mountains to climb and gardens to grow (starting with herbs this spring!). Perhaps the great adventure isn't so far off after all; perhaps I'll manage a few mini-adventures in the meantime. Just to keep in practice. :)

a Returning

I returned this morning to Columbus, with a plane change in Chicago. Temperature on landing in Chicago: +15 F. Weather on driving to my new house in Clintonville: grey and beginning to snow. A bit of me wondered, am I back on the Ice? But no, we wouldn't have gotten 4+ inches today, with more on the way. Or perhaps we would:

...A BLIZZARD WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT THROUGH 4 PM SATURDAY...

... THUNDERSNOW WILL ALSO BE POSSIBLE FOR THE NEXT SEVERAL HOURS...PRODUCING PERIODS OF HEAVY SNOW.

I thought I'd heard a boom while out shoveling....

THE SNOW AND BLOWING SNOW WILL REDUCE VISIBILITIES TO NEAR ZERO AT TIMES CAUSING WHITEOUT AND BLIZZARD CONDITIONS OVERNIGHT.

It's beginning to look a lot like Antarctica, out there in the snow

BEFORE THE STORM DIMINISHES SATURDAY AFTERNOON YOU CAN EXPECT TOTAL SNOW ACCUMULATIONS OF 10 TO 15 INCHES.

Anyone want to make a quincy with me? Snow wall? We could sleep quite cozily, all through the storm....

DO NOT TRAVEL UNLESS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY. CONDITIONS CAN DETERIORATE RAPIDLY IN BLIZZARD CONDITIONS.

Condition One is Condition Fun!

This is pretty much the worst weather I've seen all winter. Humm.... Skiing anyone?!

In the meantime, we can all surf over to Google Maps 'Bike There' Feature Request Petition and tell them, if the snow ever melts, we'd love to know the best bike routes through town.

an Ending

It's 3am Sat 9 Feb, and this is may be my last actual post from the Ice. My rotator flight leaves at 8.30a, transport is at 7.30a, and I should be up there by 7a. The rotator flights are the LC130 ski airplanes. They take the New York Air National Guardspeople here and there around the Ice and off continent, and are responsible for supplying Pole. Since it's almost too cold now to fly anything into Pole and the season ending in a few weeks means they need to get people off Mactown Station fast, we have the opportunity to fly with our service folks. It's an 7-8 hr flight vs 5-6, and the toilets are fold-down curtained seats, but it'll be an adventure! And I might even be flying off with the helo I road in with. Now that would be something!
It's been a good send-off. I've gotten most everything done that I wanted to, including saying good bye to lots of folks, talking one last time, face to face, with Anne and Peggy, and finally having that heart-to-heart with Betty.... and finishing the bottle of wine! They say your flight won't leave unless you're hung over in the morning. I don't think I'll be that, but close enough to go!
I am totally excited to meet up with Rob tomorrow in Christchurch and do some tramping. Right now it looks like we'll head for the Dusky in Fiordland. After talking more with Anne and Peggy about it (they did it a little while ago), I think it'll be Hard, but a great challenge I am up to. I am looking forward to the adventure, views, beech forest, and stories I'll be able to tell afterwards.
It's been a fully satisfying trip. I'll leave you with this......
Things I'm looking forward to when I get North:

• Fresh food. Having fresh fruit whenever I want, and having it not be rotten in parts.
• Trees. Green.
  
• Humidity
• Humidity.
• Privacy and more people, though I will also miss the community down here!
• Playing pickup in my cleats, on grass.
• Indian food.
  
• Stars (although I "saw" the moon yesterday during the Very Cool solar eclipse)
  

Thanks for following my adventures, and come back for more notes on what I've been up to!
In the meantime, I should get some sleep.......

a little irreverant humor

When they still had it, Matt Davidson's cartoons were published in the Antarctic Sun. Budget cuts. The NSF berthing is where the DVs stay. GAs are General Assistants, and generally do much of the grunt work, from shoveling to hauling, hammering, sweeping, and whatever else needs doing.

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This one's from Scott Nutter...

HEMA is a Dutch department store. The first store opened on 4 Nov, 1926 in Amsterdam. Now there are 150 stores all over the Netherlands. HEMA also has stores in Belgium, Luxemburg, and Germany. In June of this year, HEMA was sold to the British investment company Lion Captial.
Take a look at HEMA's product page. You can't order anything, and it's in Dutch, but just move the mouse over the cup and watch what happens.

interesting links

A few interesting links I've been perusing lately... and many thanks to those who mentioned many of them to me!

Nerds: a really interesting take on nerd behavior and how to deal with it. Think you're not one? Read on....

AA: Antarctic Adventurer. At 24, Danny is the youngest SAR (Search and Rescue) team member I think ever on station. SAR folks are the mountaineers who make our lives out in the field safe and as such, get to go on many sweet adventures. Check out his notes on Room With a View. Galen was my Snow School instructor. Live vicariously.

Diversity: It's what's for productivity.

SciFi: Closing in on cyborgs.

Charge!: Fine British history... or at least literature. Like the noble British Arctic and Antarctic explorers, this is another example of how the Heroic Age might have been less glorious but more livable. (More on that in a waiting game: part 2. Various entertainments.)

Intimate Objects: An interesting look at long distance relationship aids collaborated on by a friend from undergrad. Who knew?!

Happiness and goals.

the waiting game. part 1: Mission, Eventually.

Since Sat 19 Jan, we have been primary mission, backup, and backup for the backup for the Twin Otters. Backup for the backup? When the weather (or other events) prevents the primary mission, they go to the backup mission. Sometimes even that won't work so rather than scrap the whole day, they try for a 3rd mission.

Unfortunately for us, when the weather was beautiful (I was out at LDB in my tank top and snow pants and definitely not complaining! :), we were on secondary backup. We were told we'd be primary towards the end of this week (23-25 Jan). Thursday, so far our only day as primary mission, we were canceled due to a low which moved in Wed, bringing both cold (low teens & twenties) and cloudy conditions with fairly high winds (15-25mph, with gusts up to 30 & 40mph). With the instrument so near the Ice edge, it experiences quite coastal weather, so the low sucks in warmer air across the ocean, bringing moisture over the Ice, where it's apt to condense out as snow or fog. I actually saw fog here early Sat morning.

Word came down earlier today that we'd be on primary again for Sat/Sun, but as of Fri night, we're secondary backup for Sat, and somehow I doubt we'll get anything better for Sunday. What are they doing instead of helping us? Pulling in field camps scattered around the area, assisting in the Bassler recovery (the bigger plane all us balloonatics had hoped to use for our recoveries before it crashed just after New Year's... oops!), and taking more scientists out into the field.

People like Shelly, my roommate, who's helping maintain and upgrade U Wisconsin's automatic weather stations, which provide most of the long-term, wide-area weather information down here. She's adding snow-depth sonars to several of the stations to attempt to gauge snowfall; frequent strong winds make this trickier than it seems. She spent ~36 hours at Pole last week; they'd been schedule for 4 days but were delayed with weather and other people's flights.


The worse the weather in any given week, the further behind schedule everything gets, so that the absolute delay is probably something over a week now. Delays are common down here, but the weather has been particularly bad this year: a fairly large snow storm every few weeks, and lots of gray skies. ...almost feels like Ohio! Luckily, highly variable weather conditions mean the skies will clear eventually, and usually after a day or two wrapped in fuzz, enough sky clears to see the sunlight dramatic on the Royal Society Mountains, giving hope realized in a few more days of sun on Mactown itself.

So perhaps sometime next week we'll get started. In the meantime, ATIC and BESS wait for us to finish before they even begin, and Jan draws to a close. Luckily, I have been moderately successful at keeping myself entertained. Look for more on that in Part 2. of the waiting game saga.

touchdown!

On the fateful morning of 16 Jan 2008, Dave and Phil, our Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility (CSBF) compatriots flew out with Scott, our eldest Ice CREAM science member to see just how far our balloon was from the Ice edge. Some of Dave and Phil's maps in McMurdo said 45 miles, some in Palestine, Texas (CSBF commanding facility) said a mere 35mi; none agreed.

Flying the LC130 yielded a 65mi measurement of reality: just far enough to be mostly safe from landing in the drink, where the whole would be unrecoverable. I am sure joy and whooping echoed through the big plane. None of the big boys were interested in recovering it on the far side of the Transantarctic Mountains, which would have been our next opportunity, and both further from Mactown and at high(er) altitude.

So in a "textbook perfect" termination operation, CREAM III came back to Earth. First the payload and balloon were separated and the payload parachute deployed, then the Helium released from the balloon itself. Both bits landed near each other on the flat white Ross Ice Shelf some 160 nautical miles from McMurdo. Check out Scott's blog for his impressions and pictures.

You can still see it mapped here. CREAM I had 3 revolutions and made a record 42 day flight. While there was a big push from our science PI and relations to go for a 3rd round this year, non-science folks both here and above them determined the resources for recovery would very likely be unavailable by the time CREAM III returned once more to the McMurdo area. So we have a solidly above average almost 29 day flight, in a good recovery location.

And eventually they'll tell us the recovery plan! They ask for our patience as they try to juggle terminating BESS, the remaining balloon, and finalizing recovery plans for us and for ATIC, which was terminated near Pole shortly before CREAM landed. Once plans are in hand, it's waiting for good weather and for resources to become available. Resources? We need 3 Twin Otter flights to recover our ~6000 lb instrument (including ballooning paraphernalia); the Otter can carry ~2500 lbs at a time.

So in the meantime, we wait!
... I feel like I'm getting good at that!


Quote from Dave Sullivan, who's been ballooning down here for 17 years, and 30-some around the globe.

disillusionment

I just attended a reception in the NSF chalet here in Mactown for the visiting members of the congressional science committee. They had just returned from visiting the Pole, where the South Pole Telescope danced for them and they signed their names on IceCube detectors as they sank into the hole. Other people attending included a cross-section of Raytheon workers and grantees like myself. The main commonality of the minglers however was that they belonged to one of the Congresspersons' states. (There was one congresswoman from CA normally on the defense, homeland security, and budget committees.)

After a little while, we were all whistled into a semicircle where the organizer passed out blue velvet bags containing some sort of heavy metal medal and done up with an Antarctica patch and pin. Each congressperson was given their minutes' impromptu speech which fell into the theme of 'we're in awe of what you smart people do, and thank you'. Deviations included 'your research leads to innovations and technologies which keep America as the (western) world leader', 'the teamwork displayed here is a model we should carry back to all people at home', and 'it's good to see technology used for something other than killing people' (CA congresswoman).

Thanks for the recognition, certainly! We were even told we give 110% and the taxpayers certainly get their money's worth. But please, take us down from the smart-people pedestal and just try to listen and understand what we're telling you, in simplified terms for your benefit!, about what we do. You don't need to patronize, just ask questions when you don't understand something. It'll help us get off the pedestal and learn how to talk to you so you actually do understand, and then we might actually begin to get somewhere in making the world a little better place.

When I asked my specifically more benign question: how did you like the Pole, of Tennessee congressman, he told me it was cold and that the SPT moved around. I inquired what he thought of IceCube. He said they were drilling holes to detect impulses of ... neurons... Neutrinos? No, he said, neurons. Neutrinos, I said more emphatically. He mumbled and wandered off. His speech touted the importance of science and technology in keeping the US at the top. The disjunction between true understanding and stated principle was unnerving and made it hard to believe his sincerity.

Another question: If funding science research is such a good bargain, why aren't we doing more of it? In fact, why did Kathie Olsen, deputy director of NSF, relate that she got a phone call after the holding budget passed this year in the House and Senate with ~7% increases over the presidential bill, that it had suddenly been cut by $350 million? (More on that from AAAS: shortages and overall NSF structure and budget stats.)

People who come to the Ice do so for many reasons, but perhaps common to most is a desire to explore, to adventure, to go outside one's comfort zone. To do so, they accept certain responsibilities and hardships, whether the boring janitorial work of cleaning bathrooms and common areas every day or the possibility of being caught in extreme bad weather while out in the field doing research or the lack of unexpired foodstuffs. Regardless of their personal history or training, they are very often interested in learning why their fellows are here, and what sorts of science they are supporting or sharing lab space with. This is the "esprit de corps" lauded by one congressman in his speech.

Yet I wonder how well their own ~2.5 day pampered visit brings them into that spirit. They travelled over 30 hours (roughly 2 days), just to get here. In total, they will spend almost twice as long in transit as on the Ice, "inspecting" the science they allocate money for. At least one DV worried more about getting off the Ice than on it. Rather than scientists, their reception attempted to connect them to their voting constituents. Perhaps this reflects the reality of politics; perhaps the speaker attempted to suggest his own compatriots try to adopt this lauded system. Perhaps I am having trouble believing that.

The question I asked only of my first congressman was why he chose to be on the committee. I appreciated the sincerity of his answer. His state has some resources which would benefit and grow if hydrogen were promoted as a fuel source. He envisions using next-generation nuclear power plants' super-heated water to efficiently create hydrogen to be used in car's fuel cells. I wonder if anyone has actually calculated the energy throughputs in such a system and compared them to current auto-energy usage. I wonder if all committees are used as special-interest forums. The congresspeople all agreed that the House Science and Technology Committee was one of the least partisan of all committees.

In his speech, he said the natural law is for all standards of living to come to a median value, and that we, being currently at the top, certainly didn't want that median to be lower than we have now. Which means that either the bottom comes up (benefiting his work with the foreign relations committee) or even better, both the top and bottom move up in parallel, and we stay on top. Wow. Let's rule the world? Or, us versus them? He said, it's a harsh reality, but if you bump along in high school (he likes to talk to high schoolers, to encourage them to get into technology fields), you'll bump along at the poverty level for the rest of your life, unless you find a back door. (He certainly encouraged seeking back doors if you have messed up.)

May I offer a different paradigm? It's a global economy, even if the governments are slower to recognize this and act accordingly (they just have a lot of historical baggage and are understandably slow to change). Putting others down just for cheap clothes and throw-away consumables will only hurt us in the end. Slaves have more to contribute than a broken body, but they can't do it until we free them, and yes, that is half the oppressors' responsibility. Together, we may be able to be proactive stewards of our environments, both "natural" and "man-made". By using our resources efficiently, we may be able to safe-guard some for future generations. By communicating with gentle, honest words rather than fists and guns, we may discover commonalities that make us all humans and honor the differences that make us all unique, allowing us to better define and work towards our goals, both individual and societal. Rather than us and them, me and we. This, perhaps is the esprit de corps found here, when we are at our best.

I don't think my honest congressman is a bad person, but the state of politics he is part of and a party to, which I have attempted to sketch here, scares me. Partly, it is the sense of powerlessness, though I have recently tried to assuage that by participating more in the political system and by attempting to share science and my hopes for a revised system with anyone interested. The general disinterest shown by the "top dogs" seems to point towards my naivety; I hope instead that my small patch of picture is not as dismal as it seems from here, that the spirit of adventure will free us from our fears and help us tackle our big problems together.

merry, merry, merry, Merry!

And a very Merry Christmas to you! or, Happy Peace to All People Day!

Christmas in McMurdo has involved many happy times. It kicked off with a happenin' town holiday party Sunday night after work in the vehicle maintenence facility, a big metal box transformed with tinsel, plywood cutouts, Santa in his sleigh, a trash-material Ruldolf, and various other decorations into a celebratory hall. The party kicked off with carols from the Holiday Party, including traditional Deck the Halls, The First Noel, and The 12 McMurdo Days of Christmas. A few choice lines: On the nth day of Christmas a penguin gave to me, ... 7 hours resting, 6 days a-working, 5 skua eggs, 4 free meals, 3 , a pair of bunny boots, and a flight on a C-130! Then of course we wished them a Merry Christmas, but we wouldn't go until we saw some fuzzy penguins. :) Scotty, my heater-maintenance friend, made my eggnog a little happier and dancing wrapped up the night.

The next morning we climbed to Castle Rock under beautiful blue skies, and I remembered not to be grumpy on such a glorious day. While curling up before a fire with a good book also sounded lovely, the fire is banned and the book just involved more sitting around. I spent the rest of the afternoon working on my Christmas gifts for folks here (3-d, cut-paper snowflakes) before going to dinner. The tofu with apples, allspice, and rosemary was topped only by the chocolate lava (think flourless chocolate torte-like goodness in a cupcake paper).

After dinner Kevin, Rob, Yoann (my French recovery colleague), and I enjoyed the hilarity and thoughtfulness of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. The Tom Stoppard play was brilliantly acted, and all of us were delighted with the bits of physics dropped in it. Paper boat in a bathtub, watch the rise and fall as he starts to get out and sees it himself. ... I would highly recommend this even if you don't like movies. And it was good enough that even Yoann, who has serious work ahead of him for basic English comprehension, enjoyed it.

We ended the night with the lessons and carols service. I sang again with the choir, which continued to exceed my expectations. The readings rang too much with "thou shalts" for my taste, particularly given the decrees daily passed down from on high without regard for reasonableness here. But I was in it for the music, which satisfied.

Christmas morning I slept, and slept... and slept! It was lovely. Then the choir had one last gig: singing over the radio to the field stations and South Pole. SP and Siple Dome checked in, and South Pole even sang, impromptu, carols back to us. What a way to spread the joy. :) At dinner I distributed my snowflakes and hugs, then I chatted with Anne as her partner Peggy worked at the Coffee House.

Tomorrow it's back to the regular. I'll go out to LDB with Yoann and get out the recovery tool kit and other bits, ski with Anne at lunch, and bring the linux desktop back to Mactown for continued work. I'm looking forward to Thursday, when the 2 soccer teams I picked up with play in the finals. Even if we don't win, it'll be great to run around with teammates. ...Speaking of which, plans are still in the works for some outdoors ulti. !!

Friday and Sat I have snow school, where they teach us how to survive and build igloos... or at least piles of snow to crawl into! And supposedly there's time to build a snow bar into the snow wall. :) Sunday and Monday we have another 2-day weekend for New Years, and I have high hopes for more joy and revelry.

Which will make a nice contrast to mourning my Grandpa's passing. It was too soon and I miss him dearly. At least tech will help out again: I'll be calling my Aunt's cell to attend the funeral.

And so I wish you a season of peace: not the absence of noise and bustle, but the stillness within it.

launch attempt #2

We successfully completed all our tests early today and are now just waiting on the winds to die down before heading to the launch pad. At that point it'll be ~2hrs before launch, still with the possibility of being canceled. More then...

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Well, the winds are good and we've just gone out to the launch pad (1.30p NZT). Expect 2 more hours for ballooning stuff: laying it out, filling it up, etc. and then weather will tell.
Things are looking up... especially now that I've had a nap!

Also, for those interested, everyone else's Thurs flight out is now delayed until Fri at 4a (NZT), so they'll have a little more time for packing, if weather allows and needs be.

In the meantime.....

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And it's away at ~4.30p NZT! I hope you got to see some of it!

It was a pretty much perfect launch. The balloon inflated, they released it and it made a deep note as it caught the wind, then the payload just lifted off the pin and everything floated gently into the blue sky.

Now we wait for it to reach float altitude (2-5hrs) before turning on the instrument and starting our science tuning.

and then...

...as we finished up our instrument check-out, the low-level atmospheric (just above ground level) winds picked up from the south, beginning to blowing hard off the continent, canceling our launch opportunity for today.
I am sad for my fellow compatriots who will likely not get to leave on Thurs now. At least we get to sleep soon!
Next launch opportunity in a day or two.
Over&out.

Launch?!

Well, today I had a nice Sunday of freshies for brunch and a pressure ridge tour. Then we CREAM folk met for dinner and then headed out to Willy Field on Ivan at 9p. We have begun our pre-launch sequence under the midnight sun and hope to fly at 7a Mon (NZ time).

You can watch it happen! (or not, depending on how the winds go -- so far so good!) In ballooning, this is about as much notice as you get.... wake up one morning and off you go. Also, the local weather conditions as observed and reported by Ross, our local weatherman.

As to why we've waited until now to launch, as you see in the following plots, the stratospheric winds have only just set up over the pole, giving us reliable circular orbits.
Dec 10:
Dec 15:

Wallops Hilarity and, A Leave-Taking

It was a balmy summer's day in McMurdo when Bryan, Nick, and I ventured forth to LDB, so they could see our beautiful payload and the rest of business at my workplace. Imagine our surprise when we found this tableau laid before us....


That's Erebus in the background. When the boss is away.... Fortunately, we also saw it being staged (I took the pic) and all I can really add is, my, what a beautiful sense of humor.

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On a slightly more sad note, Nick, Bryan, BLee, Rusty, and the rest of Stacy Kim's awesome banthic research group (ocean bottom studies) left today.* It has been awesome laughing and making music with Nick and BLee, talking physics with Bryan, and dive-tending for Stacy and Rusty. I hope at least a few of the friendships I form here will last. I mean, who wouldn't want a friend to crash with in California or Canada? :)

*The background I should've written a while ago; apologies!
Bryan is an undergrad major at MIT, signed onto this group because he's built a bunch of robots and programmed their tethered underwater camera-carrying vehicle (ROV).
Dive-tending is basically just helping them put their gloves on and then pulling their tanks and weights when they're done. I hung out in the hut with BLee while they were down. If they don't come up in their allotted time, we sound the alarm. Their dive went safely, if less productively than earlier in the season because visibility has been reduced by almost 2 orders of magnitude (to only a few to 10 ft) due to the algal bloom precipitated by the increased sunshine through the thinning sea ice. It was cool to see it once; I think I'd get a little bored doing it more than a few times.
Nick is an undergrad at Monterey Bay, CA and was here doing his senior research project on the pile of poo the navy left in the sound before McMurdo got its waste treatment facility. He used the ROV to map the extent of the pile as well as helping Stacy with her research by diving. He's done a bunch of other things, including being a park ranger in Yellowstone.
BLee lived on a nuclear submarine as a mech for 18mos and was the ALVIN pilot for many years (small manned, early extremely-deep sub). He lives near the Bay of Fundy in Canada now and coaches soccer, passionately. :)

More on the adventures which've kept me from blogging soon...

Over&out.

antarctica and the moon

Probably the most significant question looming for me after watching the antarctic premiere of Werner Herzog's Encounters at the End of the World Thanksgiving Sunday, was, why do so many people say that coming to Antarctica is like going to the moon? Is it even a true statement? Few humans (30-some) have ever even been to the moon. I doubt that many of the people making such statements have listened to first-hand accounts of or done substantial research into the lunar experience. Even our big red parkas aren't as cumbersome as a space suit, and there's an atmosphere we can breathe. So why this assertion?
The woman drawing the blinds on my sunshine in the galley during my after-yoga dinner reading said, We're having a movie in here in a few minutes. I looked at her. You could close them when it's about to start. I nodded. Shortly thereafter, a British accent came on said something about space travel and it being another premiere, this time southern hemisphere, and I sat back down with my cereal as the movie started, blinds fully extended. Perhaps, I thought, I'll find some answers to my question in this tale of the Apollo moon missions.
The documentary did a good job putting the space mission in the context of its time, showing clips of Kennedy, both speaking and in coffin, race marches and other protests, and bombing (napalm?) in Vietnam. As Herzog started making movies in the 60s, perhaps he did at least watch the first steps on the moon on TV in July of '69. One of the astronauts spoke of how he felt guilty for missing "his war", while his fellow pilots fought and died. Hopefully he found some refuge in one comrade's response that this was the one good thing Americans could be proud of at that time. As In the Shadow of the Moon progressed, it conveyed a fair picture of the astronauts' personalities, preparing us to hear their reactions to their travels, while pretty good movie music made the old preparation and launch footage dramatic. (Come to think of it, it was the kind of music you could write a figure skating routine to. :)
I took a short nap and woke to their reactions. Mike Collins, the Apollo 11 command module pilot impressed me the most with his humanity and dry humor. He said he was not scared; the time to be scared was when something actually broke, but worried constantly. While he was disappointed to go but not stand on the moon, he enjoyed the sensation of being the only person on the dark side of the moon, while 2 + billions waited on the other side. Unlike what most people said, he was not the loneliest person in the world then, with Houston talking in his ear most of the time.
Other astronauts realized the fragility and insignificance of the world: he doesn't complain about weather or traffic anymore, or were moved spirituality, the belief in the existence of a benevolent god, or even to Jesus: "my walk on the moon lasted 3 days; my walk with Jesus lasts a lifetime." They described how lucky we are to have this beautiful jewel hanging in the blackness of space to call home, how you can see pollution from space now as you could not then, and how small the earth is from the moon: you can cover it with your thumb. Perspective.
But in direct answer to my question regarding antarctic and lunar similarities, the film was rather silent. Instead, the best resonance seems to be in the human effort required to reach into the unknown and the human reaction to being alone in a vast and rather inhospitable place. (Vast... such a small, seemingly simple word for such an enormous concept!)
It took solid, smart leaders like Amundsen and Shakleton to meld and motivate their technically skilled companions to survive on this continent and make the pole. Kennedy captured the heart of the nation and challenged Americans to make the moon in a decade, a huge expedition which killed the first 3 Apollo 1 astronauts in testing because they didn't consider carefully enough the combination of poor wiring and a pressurized, pure Oxygen cabin atmosphere. (spark = poof, fire) Scott and his polar party paid the ultimate price for their poor decisions, dying of starvation, exhaustion, and exposure ~10 mi from their furthest-out food depot.
Today, we have gone from the drive and spirit inspired by Kennedy's challenge to make the moon in a decade, to enough monetary crises that we won't have space flight capability for at least 4 years, starting in 2010, while transitioning from the shuttles to Orion. Bush's mars proclamation seems a cheap imitation.
At least we're still working on the idea, despite failures. And perhaps, we'll again find a hopeful reflection of humanity like Collins did: during their journey around the world after returning from the moon, he said he was amazed to hear people everywhere saying "we did it" not "the Americans did it", though the challenge began as a political competition. 'The world was united, at least for a little while'.

weather, or not

Weather changes rapidly here.
We walked into breakfast and walked out to the shuttle. On the way in, the weather was fine, calm and clear. On the way out, it had begun snowing smaller, dryer flakes.
Whether or not we hang test and launch depends on the weather being fine, so no hang test yet today. Of course, that may change again soon enough, but for the moment, I must admit to a sense of relief, not so much that we're delayed, but that I won't be asked to leave after only being here 2 weeks. There's still so much to do and experience!

Big News!

We are coming into the final stretch of our preparations for launching the balloon carrying our instrument to 132,000 ft. We will hang test (practice launch procedure) tomorrow, and then come back again at 2.30a to start the launch procedures Tues.
If our systems all work during the hang test and the weather and anticyclone (circumpolar winds) allows us to launch Tues, it'll be another CREAM CSBF record: the earliest launch ever, by 4 days. (The first record was for CREAM I having the longest flight at 42 days.) You can check out the pathfinder balloon's track; it was launched today.
Exciting hard work.
Luckily, there was much fun had previously, including kite skate-skiing yesterday!

Penguins

Here are the penguins I have seen in Antarctica so far, in order of appearance:

Tonight is the wind's.

A pictorial history.