Thursday 30 December 2010

This desert

Written 30/12/10

The sun does wax and wane a little as it circles over our heads, but
it?s just past mid-summer and it stays high up. It throws shadows at
midnight but it?s going to be another month or so before we first see
it touch the horizon. We had two twin otter planes land for
refuelling en route from Mario Zucchelli to KC (or Casey, I?m not
sure!) an Australian base a couple of nights ago. They took off again
at one in the morning in bright sunlight.
Right now as I look out my window the sun is shining in. It?s at it?s
lowest, and shadows pick out the snow?s sastrugi close by, that blend
into ripples reaching out to the horizon. Different patches of snow
have different shades and textures, reminiscent of gusts of wind
blowing up dark patches of ripples on a loch. When the sun is high in
the sky the snow returns to being a completely featureless plain.
It?s a desert, really, of petrified water. And the sun and the air
will still scorch you and dessicate you as severely as any other desert.I took a stroll with two of the astronomers last Sunday, to the
American Tower. It?s a 150 foot high mast about a kilometre from the
base, made of flimsy feeling aluminium tubes. It really shook as we
climbed it. From the top we had a fantastic view of the base, and the
flat plain it stands on. It was unexpectedly pleasant to get a taste
of verticality.They explained that Concordia is such a good place to view the stars
because There is so little moisture in the air. Water in the air
bends sunlight and, and particularly bends blue light from the sun
down towards us ? that?s partly what makes the sky blue. And as our
air is so dry, the telescopes get dazzled less, and the image is
distorted less. Images in humid regions get distorted just like the
bottom of a swimming pool as forces slosh the water around. One,
Richard got me to hold my thumb up to obscure the sun. I was
astounded to find the sky around it was virtually black, the blackness
of space leaking through the daylight. So even during the daytime
their instruments can penetrate the sky better. And of course at night
the view is unparalleled.The dryness has an unexpected consequence ? we get electric shocks all
the time. It turns out the humidity in the ?normal? world helps
conduct away static charges we generate all the time. I mean, back
home I get static sparks occasionally, once in a blue moon. But here
it?s all the time. Every time you move, really. We put strips of
aluminium tape on all our desks leading off to radiators or other
earthed structures, so that when we go anywhere near electronic
equipment we discharge ourselves before accidentally wiping our hard
drives or scrambling the processing. And as I walk around I?ll touch
my elbow or arm to walls to discharge myself before touching anything.
Because, if the charge flows away over a large surface area it
doesn?t hurt like it does when it arcs from a fingertip. It?s
remarkable how fast that became instinctive!
ChristmasChristmas here was really fun. Of course each and every one of us felt
the sadness and, for me some guilt, at being so far from our loved
ones. But our consolation instead was our good friends here and
everyone pulled together and made it a really great time. The vening
parties have been really funny. Our chef, Georgio, worked in London
before coming here. He earned a couple of rosettes working at La Luna
in Godalming, England, and really he?s superb. For Christmas eve and
Christmas day he put on fantastic meals; langoustines and smoked
salmon, fois gras, roast turkey, honestly so much good food I would
struggle to list it all. I think he hit on the Christmas traditions
of most cultures round the tables ? French, Italian, US, Canadian, and
me!
Of course he's had his work cut out with my nut allergy, as they
only use peanut oil here! So every night it has become a ritual that I
have to ask what's safe and what's not. It took them a while to get
used to this, but I made up my mind always to be sure to be gracious
and never complain if there's not much I can eat. And that's brought
me a better reward than I imagined. Georgio, great man that he is, is
now finding ways to cook everything without the oil and I'm very
grateful for that. But I still can't relax - you never know when some
mayonnaise might catch me out!So I hope you had a great Christmas too, folks, and that you have a
fun night planned for Hogmanay. I?ve no idea what kind of a party
will happen here, but going by Christmas time, I?m sure it?ll be messy.
And I wish you the best for the new year.
PS
Got word that the guy I evacuated off the base is doing well, still on
antibiotics for a pneumonia and going home soon. I?m pretty sure I
treated my first case of high altitude pulmonary oedema, although
it?ll only ever be a clinical diagnosis (wow it can progress fast). I
have to say serious respect and thanks to the crews of Concordia,
Mario Zuccelli, and McMurdo bases, and the two air crews. They all
pulled together to achieve an evacuation that was definitely as
efficient as anything we could have done from the rural hospital I
worked in last winter on the Isle of Lewis in Scotland.
Happy hogmanay folks!----------------------------------------------------------------
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Saturday 25 December 2010

Away mission

written 23.12.10

The equipment for my experiments haven?t arrived yet. The gear for
one half of my work will arrive in early January, and the other half
won?t arrive until the end of January. That?s just the logistics of
getting gear designed, tested, readied, and trained on in Europe, and
then shipped to Concordia via Hobart, Australia, and Dumond D?Urville
station on the Antarctic coast, and then transported over the the ice
to us. It?s a huge logistical operation that through the summer
season seems to occupy two full time staff just in Concordia.
The Astrolabe (or the ?Gastrolabe? to those unfortunate enough to have
had to make the 6 day voyage aboard) is the French supply and research
vessel currently en route from Hobart with some boxes for me on board.
I?m told she is a fin keeled, flat bottomed ship, so that she can be
manoevrable enough to get into Dumond D?Urville?s tight and shallow
waters. The price is that on the open ocean she rolls and wallows
terribly. And the Southern Ocean is not at all kind to a rolling and
wallowing boat, and the sea sickness can be terrible. Hence the
?gastro? nickname.
In the meantime, I do have some responsibilities to meet but really,
I?m having to work to find ways to fill my time.
So I?ve been spending time helping others with their experiments
wherever I can, hoping the goodwill will pay off when I need them to
co-operate with mine My experiments are on humans, and so therefore
must be voluntary. ESA relies on the goodwill of the crew to
participate in them.
So today I offered to go help dig a hole.
There are seismologists here with earthquake detectors buried in the
snow, and one, 5km away from the base, needs to be checked to make
sure it is positioned properly. We need to make sure it?s perfectly
flat. So we have to go and dig it out. But leaving Concordia is a big
deal and not undertaken lightly.
It?s a beautiful sunny day and we can see for miles, but this is a
completely flat, featureless plain at around -30. If the weather
closes in, the wind covers your tracks with drifting snow, the range
of vision to a few hundred metres or in severe weather centimetres,
the temperature immediately drops down to a windchill -50 or below.
You wouldn?t last long in that.
So we don?t take chances. Fully geared up in down suits, layered
gloves, Sorel snow boots we ride out in a Kassborer tracked vehicle
equipped with two GPS systems, radios, satellite phones, and down
sleeping bags. Seven wheels down each side with wide tracks, it?s a
mobile box that roars as it inches over the snow. It?s slow but it
cruises over anything, and it jerks and sways over the sastrugi. When
you arrive, never, never switch the engine off because you?ll not be
able to restart it. One of the group that comes has been struggling
with acute mountain sickness so I quietly pack an oxygen cylinder and
some diamox just in case.
We drive out until Concordia is an indistinct speck on the horizon,
and in the middle of this featureless plain we arrive at a set of
solar panels standing to a lonely post. We dig down 2 metres through
snow at first and then ice. The effort at this altitude is startling.
You feel great, but the life just drains out of your arms so fast.
Within minutes you?re gasping for air. With the briefest fof rests
you feel normal again, but restart the work and again within minutes
you?re exhausted. It?s very frustrating, and you have to acquire
patience to cope, otherwise you?ll burn out. Pace yourself, Eoin.
It?s not something I?m good at. The digging takes hours. The sun
burns down. No ozone, I remind myself, keep re-applying the sunblock.
2 metres down we find the sensor. We lift off the large rudimentary
wooden cover, and underneath the sensor is a 40cm diameter solid black
object shaped like a tall upturned bowl. We lift a fitted cover and
underneath is a spirit level. It?s still centred perfectly. Well
that?s good news. We can fill the snow back in and go home.


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Thursday 23 December 2010

Concordia

75 degrees 6 minutes South, 123 degrees 21 minutes East
Atmospheric pressure 670kPa
Sorry, I tried to post this on the 16th of december, but it
bounced back for some reason. I'm trying again
I pull out my sats probe as soon as I'm out of the plane. Oxygen
saturation of my blood is 85% (At sea level it's about 98%). I climb
a flight of stairs and my sats drop to 80%, with a heart rate of 140.The first day is great, I feel fatigued and short of breath but
excited to be here. I'm met by Ales Rybka, the guy I am taking over
from, a Czech military doctor. He helps me with my bags and takes me
inside the base.
I get a tour, some food, and straight away Ales wants to start
training me on the job I am to take over. I discover why I bumped
someone else off the plane ? Ales is due to leave in three days, and
there really is a lot I need to be trained in before he goes. We get
some good work done that evening.But we run into a hitch, as the next morning I wake up with quite a
bad degree of acute altitude sickness. It's inevitable, everyone gets
a headache and feels dizzy, nauseated soon after they arrive. But I
get a bit of bad luck and suffer it a bit worse. I'm vomiting, and
for 48hours I'm unable to keep down water even. If I get up the room
spins, and there's a strong feeling of pressure in my head.For Sunday I can't do a thing. I'm keeping a close eye on myself.
But my co-ordination is normal, gait, speech, all normal. I'm
communicating normally, so I suppose cognition is normal. OK, so keep
sipping water, keep your head down and wait for it to pass.But This Is Antarctica, right? I was badly delayed getting here and
now Ales will be leaving in two days. I need to learn how do all the
water sampling for the grey water system. It's a recycling system
that keeps our water (therefore energy) needs down through the winter.
It's one of my responsibilities, as it's a system designed by the
European Space Agency as they explore the technologies they will need
on the Mars mission. And Ales, the only guy who knows how to do it is
due to be on a plane in two days now. So on Monday I get on with it
in between bouts of vomiting, and once we are done I head to bed, and
later get up and get back on again. 24hours later and the vomiting
has passed, the nausea settled and the pressure gone.Phew, that was seriously unpleasant.
Everyone here is short of breath when we climb stairs, and has
difficulty sleeping. But I'm well again and it feels great to have an
appetite. Food tastes good again! It's just something we all have to go
through. I'm pleased to find my sats are up to 88% as my
haemoglobin's behaviour is altered by body's changes in response to
the low pressure, but it's a long way off the 97-98% of normal.The base? The base is superb.----------------------------------------------------------------
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Saturday 18 December 2010

Transferred!

It looks like my ability to attract sick people continues.
We just made an emergency transfer of a patient from the base to to a
New Zealand hospital.
It's never happened before in the history of the base.  It only took
a week of me being here.    Blimey.
Never made a transcontinental transfer before!
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Concordia

Judging by the map on the lowest floor I'd guess we're roughly 600 km
from the geomagnetic south pole and over three times that distance
from the geographic south pole. Vostok, the Russian base, is the
closest Antarctic habitation, roughly around 500 km away.
The base is built on ice 3,200 metres deep, which rests on land that
lies a little below sea level. It's accumulated through 900,000 years
of snow fall (I have been given a tube of water that fell as snow here
the same year Jesus died). Concordia was built here because Dome C,
as the region is called, has the best view of the night sky on the
planet. It's wind is low, weather is very stable, the Aurora
Australis is rarely seen here. Last winter the temperature fell to
-84. The coldest temperature ever recorded on Earth is -89, at Vostok.Concordia consists of two cylindrical towers connected by a bridge at
the lowest floor, with an outbuilding at one end housing most of
the generators. Each tower is 14 metres tall and three storeys high.
They stand three metres above the snow on legs that can move
individually up and down, to compensate for any snow subsidence that
could tilt the base, and so that the base can be raised up rather than be buried,
as the snow collects year after year. The walls are made of insulating material
capable of coping with a roughly 100 degree centigrade temperature
difference between the inside and the outside.
The lowest floor is pretty industrial looking. Or maybe more like
the engineering compartments of a ship. Rooms with generators and
machinery; pipes run parallel along the walls in a colourful chaos of
trunks, branch lines, bundles and tangles and gauges. Around the level
you see the squat, massive rams for moving the legs, each at the
bottom of a pillar that disappears into the roof. There are workshops
and technicians offices tucked in between the major structural
elements. The corridors are lined with hanging goose-down suits and
insulated boots, message boards, maps, signs, sinks, racks, shelves,
electronic server stacks, pots, cabinets, cables, tanks and exposed parts of the
building's frame amongst the pipes. You can hardly see the walls. The
floor is steel and quite quiet to walk on. There is a hum from the
machinery but not loud. The corridors are comfortably wide enough and
the main corridor zig-zags, which I think helps to make the place feel
larger.Steep aluminium flights of stairs lead up into the towers. One tower
is designated the noisy tower and is closer to all the machinery, the
other designated the quiet tower. Upstairs in the noisy tower are a
small but pretty decent gym, a games/cinema room, and on the top floor
the lounge, kitchen and cafeteria. In the quiet tower is a very well
kitted out hospital and offices at the bottom, the middle floor houses
16 bedrooms and the top has the radio room and laboratories. The walls
are made of well fitted, clean new looking metal panels coated in
beige or green. And there is a pleasant spread of pictures
everywhere, held up by magnets. In our bedrooms the furniture is made
of a very good looking dark, thick plywood,.
There is plenty natural light in all the rooms that we occupy, and it
feels like there is plenty space. Architecturally, this place is
impressive. Of course to maximise space you often find things like the
showers in odd places.The base is abuzz. The lowest floor is very busy. People everywhere
moving efficiently and cheerfully about their work. Scientists going
between instruments outside and labs inside; technicians maintaining
and upgrading the base; There are 32 people staying inside the base,
and maybe another 10-20 staying outside in heated tents and working in
and around the base by day. And yesterday a 'raid' arrived; a convoy
of snow adapted vehicles and trailers on tracks and skids that have
made a 10 day journey from Dumond D'Urville with supplies, whose crew
now add to our numbers.Mealtimes are a very friendly hubbub. The chef used to cook in a
London restaurant in the city, award winning. Good food, good humour.So this is home, for the next 363 days.
Or therabouts, this is antarctica after all.
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Tuesday 14 December 2010

Flying up

Written 11/12/10

They tell me on the 10th that I won't be flying up to Concordia for a
few days. Then at 10pm they tell me I'll be flying up tomorrow. Oh
well! This Is Antarctica, as some of the more grizzled guys are fond
of saying. I go and pack my gear.

The following morning I'm in my goose-down jacket and salopettes all
ready to go. But the flight is delayed indefinitely; a decision will
be made 'later' about whether the flight will go. Aye, TIA.
And at 2pm at last we are go. Now I really can't wait to get there.

We are going to go by Twin Otter aircraft. It's a small plane, it'll
carry five of us and a lot of cargo to Concordia. We driven out to
the sea ice airstrip where the plane has already arrived. This
airstrip sits in a bowl, high rocky slopes on two sides, and a steep
glacier with an ice cliff at the bottom on another. The pilot tells
me it's going to be a steep climb-out. No kidding!

We haphazardly stack boxes, cases and bags toward the front of the
plane. Webbing straps criss-cross the pile. There is a strong smell
of aviation fuel in the cabin. I climb in last and find myself
sitting in a cramped seat behind a large battered aluminium case with
unreadable stencilling on it. Above it and to either side black cases
jut out at crazy angles. There's nowhere else to put my rucksack
except just dump it on the floor in front of me. A hand waves above
them; the co-pilot telling us we're going to take off.

The aircraft's motors rev up hard and the skids start scraping across
the ice. The plane crosses the ice and comes right up under the ice
cliff. We see a flock of 20 penguins run-waddling away from the plane.
Then it turns and immediately accelerates, the ice sheet flashing past
breathtakingly fast. The plane pulls up hard and flies right over the
outcrop and Mario Zucchelli base, out over the sea, and then it banks
hard and flies straight up the glacier.

We fly through the 1000m mountains right by the coast, and then
climb up above the 2000m icy peaks further inland. Glaciers flow down
from every side of every peak, flowing into a sea of ice that bathes
the landscape. My last thought, as I fall asleep, is that this is how
Scotland must have looked once.

When I wake up we are flying over a flat desert of snow. A completely
flat disc. Waves of snow form static horizontal lines from one edge
of the disc to the other. But there is one feature out there. This
plane can't make the five hour flight to Concordia without refuelling.
So somewhere out in the wilderness is a fuel dump. It is an
abandoned stack of barrels, an empty cabin, and a pisten-bully that
flattened out a runway.

We land on the second attempt, leaning over to one side, and lurching
from one crazy angle to another as we bump down the strip. The
engines rise to a deafening roar to drag the plane over the snow to
the barrels. We get out to stretch out legs. The snow is soft, dry
wind-blown sassafrugi, that has drifted over the airstrip and made it
so uneven. Straight away I'm struck by how the edge of the snow-plain
describes exactly the same curvature as the sea horizon does. There
is literally nothing else in any direction. At all.

And then we load up, the plane drags itself into the air again and we
have another 2 and a half hour flight to Concordia. Another bumpy
landing. And when I climb out I find the towers of Concordia right
beside me. I'm here.

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Mario Zucchelli Base 74°South 164°degrees East.

Written 10/12/10

This time last year I was at roughly 60° North and 5° West (I used to
know the position, but I can't remember exactly) in Stornoway. Now I
really am as exactly on the other side of the world as I think it's
actually possible to be. On land, that is.

Mario Zucchelli base (formerly called Terra Nova) is run by Italy, and
is manned from October to March. It's been built out of prefabbed
units that look for all the world like containers, and stands right at
the sea shore on rock.
The temperature yesterday was actually 4 degrees above zero, despite
being at virtually the same latitude as Concordia.

The landscape here is very familiar to a highlander like me. The
hills here have been heavily glaciated and really, lack of vegetation
aside, are shaped remarkably similarly to the Cairngorms in winter.
The rock is granite, rough as gabbro. But unlike Scotland the wind
has sculpted boulders into the weirdest shapes. I've never seen
anything like it before. Some large boulders have had their
undersides scooped out to make shapes like shells. Others have thin
roofs centimetres thick and protruding a foot out or more, usually
with edges that curl downwards. When Antarctica was in the tropics
all those millions of years ago this place must have been fantastic
for rock climbing.

The wind has been blowing hard here, and worse up at Dome C. So,
although we were meant to arrive and fly out the day we got to
Antarctica, we have had a four day lay-over. We've been put up in 12
bed dorms in wooden chalets. Everyone is very quiet and considerate
and it has not felt uncomfortable.

It's beautiful here. (if you keep your back to the base!) It stands
on a rock outcrop, with only a thin rim of ice around the shore. The
sea is the deepest shade of ink blue I have ever seen. To the east, is
an ice shelf formed by glaciers, with quite impressively high looking
cliffs of ice where the ice meets the sea. Daily, flat icebergs break
off it and drift out in a conveyor belt current over the horizon. To
the west of the base, rocky cliffs and stacks.
The sun stays high in the sky 24 hours a day only even casting a
shadow after 10pm. It's not as strange as I expected it to be. But
as it remains so strong, you'd forget to go to bed unless you remember
to keep an eye on the time.

There are inquisitive Adele penguins here. This morning I sat on the
rocks at the shore to watch three penguins mooching around together on
the ice rim. And one by one they all wandered straight up to have a
good look at me. One got close enough to peck my jacket. It thought
about it, but I was watching and I think that put it off. It stood
about a foot away and bobbed it's head this way and that, sizing me
up. They are amazingly nimble as they waddle around on the rocks.
And yesterday some of the guys cut a hole in the ice shelf to do some
fishing. The ice there is more than a metre thick and the twin otter
plane can land on it. Later, a couple of Weddell seals popped up
through the hole and lay on the ice to sunbathe, utterly unbothered by
the humans working metres away.

The Italians who run the base are a very friendly bunch of people. I
think there are about 80 people on the base right now, including us in
transit. But there are always people in transit.
What I'm really beginning to like about Antarctica as a whole is that,
although nationality is probably emphasised more here than anywhere
else I've seen, the co-operation is beyond anything I've ever imagined.
Koreans, US, Italians, Canadians, French, British, everyone seems to
pool resources. We are made very welcome. And the food is good too!

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Mario Zucchelli Station 74°South 164°degrees East.

Written 10/12/10
This time last year I was at roughly 60° North and 5° West (I used to
know the position, but I can't remember exactly) in Stornoway. So I
really am as exactly on the other side of the world as I think it's
actually possible to be. On land, that is.Mario Zucchelli base (formerly called Terra Nova) is run by Italy, and
is manned from October to March. It's been built out of prefabbed
units that look for all the world like containers, and stands right at
the sea shore on rock.
The temperature yesterday was actually 4 degrees above zero, despite
being at virtually the same latitude as Concordia.The landscape here is very familiar to a highlander like me. The
hills here have been heavily glaciated and really, lack of vegetation
aside, are shaped remarkably similarly to the Cairngorms in winter.
The rock is granite, rough as gabbro. But unlike Scotland erosion
has sculpted huge boulders into the weirdest shapes. I've never seen
anything like it before. Some large boulders have had their
undersides scooped out to make shapes like shells. Others have thin
roofs centimetres thick and protruding a foot out or more, usually
with edges that curl downwards. When Antarctica was in the tropics
all those millions of years ago this place must have been fantastic
for rock climbing.The wind has been blowing hard here, and worse up at Dome C. So,
although we were meant to arrive and fly out the day we got to
Antarctica, we have had a four day lay-over. We've been put up in 12
bed dorms in wooden chalets. Everyone has been behaving very
considerately and it has not felt uncomfortable.It's beautiful here. (if you keep your back to the base!) It stands
on a rock outcrop, with only a thin rim of ice around the shore. The
sea is the deepest shade of ink blue I have ever seen. To the east, is
an ice shelf formed by glaciers, with quite impressively high looking
cliffs of ice. Daily, flat icebergs break off it and drift out in a
conveyor belt current over the horizon. To the west, rocky cliffs and
stacks.
The sun stays high in the sky 24 hours a day only even casting a
shadow after 10pm. It's not as strange as I expected it to be. But
as it remains so strong, you'd forget to go to bed unless you remember
to keep an eye on the time.There are inquisitive Adele penguins here. This morning I sat on the
rocks at the shore to watch three penguins mooching around together on
the ice rim. And one by one they all wandered straight up to have a
good look at me. One got close enough to peck my jacket. It thought
about it, but I was watching and I think that put it off. They are
amazingly nimble as they waddle around on the rocks!
And yesterday some of the guys cut a hole in the ice shelf to do some
fishing. The ice there is more than a metre thick and the twin otter
plane can land on it. Later, a couple of weddell seals popped up
through the hole and lay on the ice to sunbathe. We got up pretty
close to them too.The Italians who run the base are a very friendly bunch of people. I
think there are about 80 people on the base right now, including us in
transit. But there are always people in transit.
What I'm really beginning to like about Antarctica as a whole is that,
although nationality is probably emphasised more here than anywhere
else I've seen, the co-operation is beyond anything I've ever imagined.
Koreans, US, Italians, Canadians, French, British, everyone seems to
pool resources. We are made very welcome. And the food is good too!----------------------------------------------------------------
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McMurdo Base, Antartica

Typed 8/12/10

So I've arrived in Antarctica!
And my luck in getting the best possible journey continues.
Following our lovely 5 day sojourn in Christchurch we boarded a US Air
force C-17 and flew to McMurdo Base. It took 5 hours and I have to
say was the smoothest take off and flight I have ever known. There
was onboard coffee and a pretty decent lunch! The noise, however was
deafening even through the ear-plugs we were issued with. The plane
was packed with around 120 people and pallets of supplies, in one
cavernous space.

The runway is laid out one the ice shelf near to the base. Apparently
the C-17s land on ice that is 2-3 metres thick. There are several
metal cabins including a couple of control 'towers' with typically
slanted windows. But they are all on skids and shortly will have to
be dragged further away to a safer place as the ice thins thought the
summer.
We can only see a tiny bit of the Ross ice shelf, the main part is
obscured by the outcrop McMurdo stands on. But we can see Mount
Eribus, the volcano, with a pretty lenticular cloud gracing it's
summit like a conical hat.

There are two Hercules C-130 planes and a twin otter parked up, and a
helicopter buzzing around up at the base. It's a busier airport than
Inverness!

McMurdo stands on the steep-ish slopes of a rocky outcrop at one side
of the Ross ice shelf, and at the site of Scott's original camp. It's
run by the US and is by Antarctic standards huge. It looks like a
factory complex with several independent 2-3 storey buildings. Pipes
and cables run as far as the eye could see. Apparently it even has an
ATM. This is something I will learn more about; Antarctic bases are
not pretty. But they do have amazing views and McMurdo is no
exception. It looks over the ice to some very graceful mountains far
over the other side.

While others are taken straight to planes to ferry to Mario Zucchelli
station, I and a few others are taken by the oddest bus I've ever seen
with massive wheels into McMurdo Base, to the communal area. It's
nice to rest for a few hours, have some food and tea. The driver,
Nathan, kindly gives me some stamps so I can post some cards. Thanks
Nathan, I really appreciated it.

Some guys made the trek to see Scott's hut but I missed the
opportunity to go with them, so I stay at the base and just relax. At
5pm, we're bussed back to the airstrip where we're given a hot meal in
one of the cabins. And at 8.30pm, I and three others get in a small
squirrel helicopter for the trip to MZS.

We flew over the ice very low to avoid the worst of the fierce
katabatic winds that roll down from Antarctica's high plateaus. Even
staying low we got batted about a bit. Fun fun fun.
We flew over thin sea ice, thick glacier ice, hills and right at the
very edge where the ice broke off into floes. Often you would see
thick bergs that had been trapped by sea ice and were stuck as if
struggling toward the edge where they would be free to drift and be
what they were meant to be.

And all too soon that magical flight was over, as Mario Zuccelli base
came into view.

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Friday 10 December 2010

Antarctica

Ok. I apologise, I've been a bit slack. I got to Antarctica and I
didn't post up a blog.
I really apologise. But I've been having a whale of a good time.
Here's what has happened...The C-17 from Christchurch to McMurdo was supposed to be postponed for
a few more days. Then we were called into a meeting on Monday evening
to say it would go the next morning. Cue frenzied packing!The next day a group of NZ military ground crew ran an seeemingly
absurdly standard check-in system, except that my boarding pass was on
a chain around my neck. All 120 passengers were wearing down suits
that would insulate us at minus 60, in twelve degrees above, and in
drizzling rain. Safety, of course. In case the plane makes an
emergency landing in the middle of Antarctica nowhere. It wasn't very
comfortable though.Then, after checking in we were allowed back to the hotel for
breakfast. Very civilised.
At 9am we boarded the plane for a 5 hour flight to McMurdo. Smoothest
flight ever!
And as we poured out onto Antarctica's surface I have to admit it
seemed a bit anticlimatic. The ice is still just ice, the hills in to
distance look just like other snow covered hills. And as we were so
well kitted out, it wasn't the least bit cold. But the image of that
huge plane sitting on the ice, with two other hercules aircraft nearby
was seriously impressive.Instead of going to Concordia, we were to go to Mario Zuccelli base, a
coastal base the other side of the McMurdo Sound, part of the Ross ice shelf from McMurdo station
(McMurdo station stands where Scott of the Antarctic established his first
base in 1920). And I got pretty lucky for the next step.Whilst some got straight in a twin otter to go to MZ, I and a few
others had to wait a few hours and so we were taken into McMurdo for a
quick visit. It's a big base, essentially a town. But it looks like
a factory complex that would stand in a very industrial area of town.
It ain't pretty. Quite a few 2- and 3- storey buildings. Pipes and
cables run as far as the eye could see. It stands on the steep-ish
slopes of a rocky outcrop on the edge of the ice shelf, and has a
spectacular view all the way over the ice to some very graceful,
pointy mountains the other side. From the town we could see where
Scott's hut stands, but we didn't have time to go down to it.The runway is on the ice, which they tell me is around 3metres thick.
And can land a C-17, that's stronger than I thought ice could be.
The control tower and the outbuildings to service the planes are out
on the ice too. They are all mounted on skis so they can be moved
when the ice thins later in the summer.Myself and four others made the two hour flight to MZ in a five seater
helicopter. We flew over the ice very low to avoid the worst of the
katabatic winds that roll down from Antarctica's high plateaus and can
get very fierce. Even staying low we got batted about a bit. Fun fun
fun.
We flew over thin sea ice, thick glacier ice, hills and right at the
very edge where the ice broke off into floes. Often you would see
thick bergs that had been trapped by sea ice and were stuck as if
struggling toward the edge where they would be free to drift and be
what they were meant to be.And all too soon that magical flight was over, as Mario Zuccelli base
came into view.Sorry to have to stop now folks, but I've just been given notice of a
last minute change of plans, I am to replace one of the others
travelling up to Concordia tomorrow - no explanation why. I'll have
to tell you about Mario Zuccelli base when I get there. At last, at
last I'm going to get there.Radio silence will probably resume for a couple of days...
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Monday 6 December 2010

Christchurch

On landing at Christchurch after 3 days on the go we were greeted with the very welcome news that the runway at McMurdo base was unuseable, and so we would not be able to get to Antarctica for several days. I'm not sure why – someone said weather was poor, someone else said the runway needed repair.
So we've had a wonderful summer mini-break in Christchurch for the last few days. I absolutely love this town. The centre reminds me of Cambridge a little, with a lazy little river lined with willows and the occasional tourist punting along it. It's been warm – 23 degrees but with occasional rain, and humid, just like Cambridge in the summer.
Following the last month of rushing around like crazy, I just had no wish to get in a car to see New Zealand's scenery or pursue any adventure sports. I've preferred instead to rest and enjoy some time in the town instead. I visited an exhibition of Scott's and Shackleton's Antarctic heroics. Food for uncomfortable thought.

But tonight we got the news that we'll be flying out to Antarctica tomorrow. We, and I, have gotten lucky.
We fly by American C-17 (big, big plane) to McMurdo Base. That's lucky because it means we can take all our personal luggage out with us, rather than it coming by overland traverse in January. And from McMurdo we fly on to Maria Zuccelli base, and this is where I have gotten extremely lucky as I'm due to be one of four going by helicopter flight round the coast from McMurdo to MZ. And from there we go on to by Twin Otter I think to Concordia.
Excited, trepidated, just keen to get on with it now.
Concordia, here I come!

Sunday 5 December 2010

Hong Kong

We took the train into the city to spend a few hours in Hong Kong between flights.
The place smells like New York.
High rises as far as the eye can see into the sea-haze. Great looking from a distance. I wonder how much of that is poverty stricken slum, up close?
It's hot, humid, sticky and in a hurry.
I suppose some people must like it. Or else everyone would just leave, right?

The journey starts

It will take seven flights spanning four continents in four days to get there. Glasgow to Heathrow tonight, then Paris, Hong Kong, Auckland, Christchurch tomorrow and into the day after. Then from Christchurch to McMurdo base in Antarctica, a big US base and finally a twin otter plane to Concordia the following day.
But it starts with a delay because of snow at Glasgow, and for a fraught few hours there is a chance the flight could be cancelled.

Bad start.

They let me sweat for a few hours, providing me with helpful answers such as 'Is the flight going to go?' 'Well, we want it to go' and 'How likely is it to be cancelled?' 'We hope it won't be cancelled' Good grief.
It goes. I land at around eleven. My hotel flatly denies that I've paid for a room for an hour before miraculously remembering it and giving me my room. I'm in bed by one, and back up again at four thirty. I decide just to go to the airport and check in for my 7.30 flight to Paris before eating any breakfast.

Bad choice.

The airline tells me that because I don't have proof of my military flight from Christchurch to Antartica they won't let me on their plane from Heathrow to Paris. But it's 6.30 in Paris, the office is shut. I can't get that proof.   Finally the fourth person I speak to pays enough attention to my tickets to figure out that they've been talking rubbish all along. They leave me fifteen minutes to get through security.

And with that I'm out of the UK, and of course from then on there isn't any more incompetence.
I have to admit I can hardly believe my eyes when my bag does appear on the belt at Auckland.
Four others of the winter-over crew are at Charles De Gaulle airport and flying on the same plane. It's surprising how good it is to see the guys again. I only knew them for the four days of the predeparture meeting in Paris in October, wow it must have been an intensive time.

The hardest departure

My fiancee and I treat ourselves to a night in a spa hotel near glasgow. It's lovely. The morning we leave we have the swimming pool to ourselves. It's got big windows round three sides that look out onto lawns and forests that are covered in quite a thick layer of snow.
Trees. There's not going to be any trees.
My fiancee has been wonderful. Is wonderful. She has always been totally supportive of me going. She gets it that it's something I really want to do, but the thought of being apart, she's struggling with it.
I'm glad she holds it together, I don't think I could have otherwise.
As soon as I'm in the taxi I text her, and immediately it's less painful, less of a separation.
She texts back. We can be in touch daily.

Departures 2

12 hours later I stand at the railway station in Kingussie, waiting for the last train to Glasgow.
Snow drifts down silently and thickly, there is no wind at all.
The tungsten lights give a warm glow to the platform.
It's dark and still and absolutely silent.
I love it when it's like this. So peaceful

So difficult to leave.
But I remember the day I left Kingussie to go to Cambridge.

I had wanted to be a doctor for a very long time and I'd worked hard to earn my place.
But I loved this place so much. When the day came to drive south I struggled to persuade myself to leave. I drove out of the town's limits and drove 2 more miles at 30mph, on the brink of just turning back. Eventually, a simple inspirational song on the radio tipped the balance. I sped up and went to Cambridge.

I remember these things as the train pulls in. My legs feel like lead as the doors open.
I force myself to remember all all the good that has come out of my time in Cambridge, how much I love being a doctor. How glad I am that I did go. I get on the train.

I'm always leaving this place.

Departures

In the middle grade rota in Raigmore Hospital, there is a one month block in every four where you either do nightshift or are off, and that is my last month in the hospital. You are the most senior medical doctor present in the hospital (surgical, anaesthetic and A&E middle graders are also in). So it's been a while since I've seen most of my colleagues. You're based on ward 6a, the Acute Medical Admissions Unit where the new medical patients are admitted to, but going wherever else in the hospital problems arise. Medical HDU, the wards, CCU, A&E, always working alongside the nurses caring for each patient but going alone to the next. Prowling the darkened corridors, it actually becomes a lonely job. The staff I know well are all on AMAU, but elsewhere in the hospital generally the people you work alongside are strangers, more or less.
But it is all a single team. The staff members come and go but the team never changes, night or day, any day.
Final nightshift.
Final shift.It goes well; not too many admissions. Those we admit are not unstable. Diagnoses seems straightforward, and my junior is efficient and astute. Each one gets seen, diagnosed, treatment, and then moved into a bay and allowed to sleep. It's rare to have such a slick and unflustered night, and it feels wonderful to be so free of pressure.
There is one extremely ill patient who I spend most of my time with, who has already been in a critical care area for several days. Those who are very unwell frequently develop new and equally severe problems in other organ systems that have been just about coping until one finally gives in, and then one after another a cascade of failures can occur. Just fix and fix and support and support, hope the original insult can be recovered, and the patient will usually recover and go back to their unwitting walk along a knife edge. This complication is really serious. The nurses, I and my surgical colleague work hard to resuscitate them. It's a very long and tense night, but we get the patient through it.Lights are switched on, eight o'clock and the day staff come in. Familiar faces flood in to the hospital. Colleagues come in and I hand over care of all the AMAU admissions. I get lucky; they don't want me to come on the ward round. I go to check my unwell patient. Still perfusing. The nurses I worked through the night with have already left and fresh staff have replaced them. The closeness of the night's team is gone, replaced with the bustle of new people taking over.And I sit at the front desk, discussing on the phone the next steps for my patient. All the hospital's resources available, only a phone call away. The surgical ward round; consultant, juniors, students troops in. We relate to the consultant what has occurred through the night, discuss, a decision is made. Plans, details worked out. Three team members on the phone simultaneously, arranging, informing, contingency planning. And then as abruptly as they came in, they troop off somewhere else. The day SHO for the unit arrives, shakes off his coat and finally I am done. It's time to hand on the night's responsibilities, and leave.The staff changes, but the team will remain the same, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. I can't tell you how sad I am to give up my part in that team.I sit back in my chair, alone again somehow, as staff buzz efficiently backwards and forward around me. It's very difficult to get up and leave. The staff have little time for goodbyes, but everyone gives me a cheery wave or a hug and warm wishes.
I can't really see the future right now. I really don't want to leave this place that I have worked so hard in, and so many people I like so much, with whom I have shared such high highs, and such low lows.But I do leave. And as I walk out the front door it gets easier, just as it always has done, moving from one hospital to the next. Into the sunshine, and the night's cares fall away a bit.