Hailing Frozen Thoughts

Hi All,

I’m back in the United States and actually back at Oregon State University taking classes, but I want to wrap up my blog and finish telling you all about my experience on the ice. The following blog post is from approximately the first couple weeks we were on the ice, rougly November 9th, 2011. Information about animal deployments and retrievals were updated later in the season however.

I had originally thought that I could write a blog post every day and try and keep up with it, the truth is I hardly have time to eat and sleep when we’re working in the field and I’ll just have to do the best I can at the moment when it comes to the blog. But, that in itself is part of the experience. If you’re doing research and it’s field season – it is all systems GO from the time you arrive until the day you depart.

We have deployed 13 packs of telemetry gear and thus worked 13 different animals. We have recovered 9 animals and relieved them of their gear. 2 adult non-reproductive females and 11 juvenile seals (juveniles are usually “yearlings” 1 year old seals). Juveniles are extremely easy to spot out because in mass, they are essentially the same as a pup, only over the past year they have changed quite a bit morphologically and turned into a long thin skinny seal, weighing approximately the same as a pup. Juveniles are supposed to be extremely difficult to find and therefore study, but this year there have been quite a few sightings. The general rule of thumb before we started on Sunday was that no matter what the plan was, if we found Juveniles they were first priority.
The project is more of a baseline or exploratory study, which means we are looking at a wide range of factors and animals in order to see what information we can find about Weddell seals in terms of their thermoregulation (heat regulation).

There are four groups of animals that we are studying:

Adult non-reproductive females (without pups/not pregnant)

Adult post-reproductive females (had a pup this season, but that pup is now weaned and no longer with the mother)

Juveniles (yearlings)

Pups (recently weaned)

For this season our goal was/is to work with 2 post reproductive mothers, 2 weaned pups, 2 non reproductive females, and 9 juveniles. We’ve already tagged and collected data from 11 juveniles and we have tagged 2 non reproductive females. Which means we still have 2 mothers and 2 pups to go, but obviously we have done more juveniles than what we originally were shooting for. But, this year has been “the year of the juvies” because they’re not usually seen… ever…

We’ll have to wait until later in the season to ensure that the the mother and pups are in fact “post reproductive” and the pups are in fact weaned. It is too early in the season at this point for any of the pups to be 34 days old at this point. 34 days is was written into our proposal as the youngest pup that we will work with and when we are confident that a pup is fully weaned. There is another science party group that has been doing a population study on Weddell seals for over several years, actually a few decades I believe. Their group tags all the Weddell seals in the area and the information they provide us is not only helpful, but critical in terms of determining the first pups of the season and ages of seals that we work with.

Our study is spread out over two field seasons, this year and next, and will include studying 40 animals in total. Our goal for this year is 10-15 and to finish the rest next year. Because this is the first year of the project it will have taken us longer to get set up and situated than it will next year.

A typical day on the ice:

We travel in two parties, the Piston Bully goes first because it drives about 5 mhr with Jo and Allyson and the skidoo party comes up next with the rest of us. Skidoos (snow mobiles) are obviously faster and much more fun (when the weather isn’t threatening to throw you off your skidoo and blow you onto the top of Mt. Erebus).  We leave in the late morning (sometime between 9-12) and work until past dinner (anywhere between 6-9). We don’t usually go out in the mornings, because Weddell seals don’t usually haul out onto the sea ice until the afternoon. Afterwards, we return to lab and do as much as we possibly can to prepare for tomorrow. For me, that usually means downloading photogrammetry photos, cataloging them, and making sure they are useable photos within the Photomodeler program. Somewhere in there we have to eat dinner (which is often saved for us because we’ve missed dinner time) and head back to the dorms to get a bit of sleep before the next day.

Markus, Jo, and Allyson usually decide what kind of animal we’re going to be looking for that day and where we are going to be scouting for them. We’ve had really good luck our first week, we haven’t had to do much scouting in vain. Upon arriving at a site, usually what happens first is that Markus, Jo, Allyson approach prospective animal for a better look and upon discussion decide whether an animal is appropriate or not. A big thing we look for is that a female is indeed NOT pregnant, but since we’ve already tagged our two non reproductive females for the season the negotiations will fall to whether that particular juvenile or mother and pup are appropriate. Jo then takes a FLIR (infrared image) of the seal as we gently coax the seal to walk (or crawl, or flop, or “phocidulate” as we have as a team have been prone to call it) away from a crack or other seals into a clearing.

After the initial photos someone, usually Markus, approaches the seal with a head bag with long ropes looped to the bag. Markus and one other person place the head bag over the seal’s head and Markus then takes both leads on the rope, straddles the seal, and tucks the seal’s flippers behind the rope. We estimate the weight of the seal and Rachel approaches the seal with an allocated amount of anesthesia drugs and administers the initial dosage. After this, we refer to any additional meds given to the animal as “top ups”. After allowing the drugs to work their way through the seals body for a few minutes, Jo usually enters the scene to take blood samples. We then roll the seal onto a weighing sling and bring in a gigantic tripod to weigh the seal with. If all goes well, the animal stays fairly inactive for this procedure and we get an accurate weight on the animal. The weight will be helpful when making the energetic models and is also helpful for the continual allocation of anesthetic medication administered by Rachel. We then lower the seal onto a pad that prevents the seal from lying directly on the ice during the procedure, thus saving some of the seal’s heat from being directly lost.

Once the pad is down, I enter the scene to commence photogrammetry. We lay down four large metal rulers that have been pre-marked at 90 degree angles as close to the seal as possible. We also wrap 8 strategically placed ropes around the animal with marks that will help me to distinguish marks on the animal in the future when I am trying to make 3D models of the seals.

Then, it’s time for the onion to be put up! The onion is an amazing invention that a gentleman in Alaska created to the specific needs Jo, Markus, and Allyson needed for the project. He invented this tent especially for our project and it folds down and can be put up in literally under a minute. Five minutes if you include anchoring it to the sea ice. We can put the onion up around the seal and Rachel, who has to stay with the seal at all times to monitor the seal’s condition, and place all of our gear and ourselves in the onion in only a few minutes. The onion protects us from the wind and gives us a protected area to work in. It saves us time and saves our spirits. On Friday we worked in 50 mph winds in the onion and although it was cold, most of us still didn’t have our big reds on, which gives you an idea as to how sheltered we really are under the onion. The onion allows us to work in conditions that we wouldn’t be able to other wise and there have been times when other teams have had to turn around and call it quits, while we continued to work successfully under the protection of the onion. It’s genius.

After the onion is up and the gear is in, it’s go time. Rachel places a intravenous catheter into the seal, which allows us a continuous direct link to the main vein of the seal. From here on out it is through this catheter that Rachel will administer top ups and any kind of emergency drugs if that were ever necessary. After the catheter is secured Markus begins to shave little circular patches of hair where the Heat Flux Sensors (HFS) will go Jo is beginning to Ultrasound the seal at different locations to determine the seal’s blubber depth. Roger and Markus begin working at setting epoxy and the telemetry gear onto the animal. A total of two packs with four (sometimes six) HFS are placed on the animal. After Jo is finished performing ultrasounds, Jo and Allyson work with Rachel on refilling syringes of drugs and saline to keep the animal under a constant and consistent anesthetic state. Eventually, just after a “top up”, Markus, Roger, and John administer a stomach pill directly into the stomach of the animal. By placing a tube directly into the stomach and plunging the stomach pill through the tube until it falls into the stomach. This pill will give as a continual reading of internal body temperature of the animal until the pill is either passed or the animal regurgitates the pill. John is documenting the procedure on data sheets (later in the season I will be taking over this job) and usually helps out in a variety of different situations and I am usually at the head of the animal monitoring breaths per minute and reporting any and all signs of activity or alertness to Rachel. I am also taking a lot of photos documenting our procedure and the work we are doing. Plus, I step in when I can.

Some of the roles are flexible and hopefully as the season progresses I’ll have an opportunity to switch into different positions and experience first hand some different roles in the project.

This is usually the point where we start to pack up and put the onion away as well as all of our gear. Some days we’ll move on to deploy gear on another animal or retrieve gear from another animal. How many animals we work in a day will depend upon weather, how quick we become, and how long an animal as been out with gear.

Potential problem:

When you’re not really sleeping and you’re mostly just working and you’re also probably a bit stressed out- it does quite a number on your immune system. On top of that, there is “The Crud”. Not only the name of a local McMurdo band, but also the name of the dreaded illness that hits almost everyone upon arrival at McMurdo. We’re all living and working within such close quarters of everyone that it seems almost impossible to prevent. Everyone is even required to wash their hands before entering the galley and people are STILL falling like flies left and right… And I officially have “the crud”. It’s supposed to be a flu (I think) that lasts anywhere from 7-10 days. I’m not really one who gets sick very often, at least the kind of sick that knocks you on your back side and prevents you from getting to work or school. But, it’s hard to get out in the field and survive let alone THRIVE while working, when you have “the crud”.

“The crud,” is why I have been lying in my bed for the last 4 days. I toughed it out for two days of work while I had it and now I’ve had almost two fulls days off to rest, and we’re supposed to go out tomorrow, but I’m not sure if I’m gonna make it. My original strategy was to tough it out, that worked OK the first day, but Friday I kinda fell off the deep end. It’s hard to be of any help to your team when you’ve hit that point. For the first time skiidooing wasn’t fun, I couldn’t breathe out my nose so I breathed out my mouth and by the time I returned home I felt like someone had sanded down the inside of my esophagus with 40 grit sandpaper. Realization? Sometimes staying home really is better. We had two days off and I’ve taken an additional two off. It’s a really hard decision for me to make and it’s hard to stay back, but I don’t want to make myself more sick by spending a day in the field.

Interesting fact about McMurdo that I have learned this week:

Ratio of Men to Women: Women 27%, Men 73%

I knew there were more men here than women, but I wouldn’t have been able to tell you that the ratio was that unbalanced.

Which is probably why there are cute lines in local songs about how a girl can get any guy she wants…

I have just walked back into my office after spending approximately the last hour on Skype with a class from Oregon State University.  Itchung Chung is the Academic Program Coordinator at Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport (where I was working for four months before coming here) and he also teaches several classes at Hatfield as well as in Corvallis at OSU’s main campus, and he asked me to speak to one of his classes via Skype.

It was actually amazingly fun and a great compliment that students would actually be interested in hearing anything that I have to say, but after hearing their first question, “It’s been quite a while since your last blog post, what’s going on there?” I have been stabbed with an overwhelming dose of guilt at my failure to keep up with the blog and have found myself frantically writing to you now.

Realizations and Notifications:

• My goal of writing a blog post every day was completely unrealistic and I have failed miserably anyway, so I should change my goal.

• Somehow my responsibilities and job description has changed yet again since arriving at McMurdo (or Mactown as it’s also called) and I have found myself heading up an entire section of the project. Photogrammetry has somehow become my “baby” and is where almost all of my brain power and time has been dedicated to.

• I now officially have an idea for my undergraduate thesis. Hooray!

• In order to improve the frequency of my blogging, I have realized (well actually John from my team suggested) that I can add photographs later. Although it’s not what I would prefer and I know photos make a big difference when you’re reading a blog post, especially when it’s something cool like Antarctic terrain, but somethings gotta give. Therefore, I will try and see if I can post blog posts with only text first and go back later and add in photos. I’ll try and write updates of what posts have had photos added to them to help make that a bit more clear.

• I was sick with the McMurdo “crud” for about a week and am just now fully recovering from that “experience”. The “crud” is essentially an unidentified flu/cold that nearly everyone receives after coming to McMurdo. Living in such close quarters with the same 1,000-1,300 people that have come from all over the world, and getting reduced amounts of sleep from all of the work (or play) leaves you with the wonderful once in a life time opportunity to receive Antarctic crud. Great. I’m not someone who get’s sick easily and I don’t ever get sick enough that I have to stay home from work or school, but, with the crud I stayed back for 3 field days and that was AFTER we had received a rare two day weekend. Basically I was in bed for four and a half days and managed to work a couple hours in the office for part of the fourth day, before going back to bed. Being stuck in bed when you have Antarctica waiting for you outside your dorm room is a really frustrating thing. But, at the same time you have to be at 100% to manage working in the Antarctic environment, anything less and you’ll just get destroyed. Yet even that knowledge doesn’t seem to soothe the blow of being left behind from skidooing into the wild exhilarating world of ice.

• I have been in Antarctica for nearly four weeks, and it has been the FASTEST four weeks of my life. The days have passed feeling more like hours than days and the idea of leaving here in two weeks makes me feel like bursting into tears and chaining myself to a building all at the same time.

• Our b470 team party was last night. We hosted a party at the Coffee House, which is one of the three bars in town, and invited all of the friends that we have made during our time on the ice. It was by far the most fun I have ever had staying up dancing. Being in a group a people like that, where everyone there is guaranteed to be a pretty awesome person because firstly, they’re the kind of person that works in Antarctica and secondly because someone from your team wanted them there. It kind of makes it like an exclusive VIP party, where you feel completely comfortable hanging out, dancing, and getting to know everyone. It was fantastic, but somehow it has awoken me to what little time we have left here.

• I had written a rough blog post while I was lying in bed with the crud and it is much more detailed about the work we’re doing and the project itself. I think I am going to take up the new policy of “pictures later” and try and get that posted in the next couple days as well. Which means it will seem a little out of place considering the post was written about 2 weeks ago, but bare with me.

• Photogrammetry hasn’t gone anywhere near what I would describe as smoothly, but then again maybe that’s how research goes. In order to accurately build models in the program the cameras need to be individuality calibrated, which had been done before we came to Antarctica. Yet, somewhere along the way the cameras must have gotten beaten up and the lenses began giving us grief, which means that I have had to re-calibrate all of the cameras. I can’t build any models or even judge to see how well our procedure or setup for photogrammetry is until these calibrations are done. We have already tagged 11 animals, our goal is 15. Needless to say, I am feeling the pressure to get my stuff in line. I have a certain amount of leeway in that I have the opportunity to take photos again when we recapture the animal, which is usually about a week after deployment, to remove the telemetry gear. This opportunity is a wonderful gift from the science Gods that I can’t express my gratitude enough for.Here’s an example of some of the grief I’ve been dealing with.Markus realized after looking at my photogrammetry photos during our b470 presentation (Jo, Allyson, and Markus presented during one of the weekly McMurdo science lectures) that the camera angles were too narrow and that we couldn’t actually see the entire side of the seal in two photos. Basically four photos are taken at the same time from four corners perspective corners around the seal. Two people on either side of the head and two on either side of the tail. I need to be able to see points in at least two photos for Photomodeler to be able to reference the points into 3D. Therefore, we need to be able to see the seal from nose to tail in both photos from the right and both from the left. So we have changed our set up and now the camera angle seems to be more optimal, but there was still the issue of re-calibrating the cameras.This is an example of one of the first seals we worked with. You can see that the positions of the people holding the cameras is outside of the rulers and that you can’t really see past where the seal has swung out her body. I need to be able to see the entire side of her body and from this angle, a lot of her tail and back end of her body is hidden. Our angle was too narrow. The yellow alphabet cubes were an idea I had to help keep the photos separated. When you get home at the end of the day and have 3-7 photos taken of each animal (sometimes we do 2 or 3 animals in a day which would mean possibly 21 photos per animal) multiplied by four cameras, it’s a lot of photos to keep straight. The only photos I can use are the ones that are taken at the exact same time and when the seal isn’t moving. We rotate the cubes between A, B, and C in between each photo and that, plus the time stamps on the cameras help me group the photos into the correct sets.
  This is an example of a photo that we just took on Sunday. The position of the people holding the cameras has moved in towards the center, in line with front and back rulers and sometimes even more towards the center than that. I’ve also added marked flag poles on either side of the animal which adds a third plane for me to work with in Photomodeler. It’s kind of like math, with a ruler on the x axis (side rulers), y axis (front rulers), and z axis (flag poles). Another way to think about it is having a ruler or flag pole on all sides of box like when you’re trying to find volume and need height (flag poles), length (side rulers), and width (front and back rulers). Having that third plane helps Photomodeler solve the alignment of the points and keep all the points on the correct plane.

  I have been stressing out beyond all belief about calibrating these cameras. Basically I felt like I was holding up the entire project. I should know by now that stressing out to that degree isn’t really helpful, if anything it was probably just draining me of time and energy that I could have dedicated to moving forward and being productive. But, wisdom tends to come after the fact.I felt like I was doing everything I could, I was spending every spare second I had taking photos of a paper grid with the cameras and running the photos through the calibration process in Photomodeler, but none of the calibrations were coming out correctly. I was making adjustments accordingly and slowly fixing the problems, but it takes a lot of time that I just didn’t have. Markus mentioned that he wondered why the calibration process was SO difficult now when he never remembered it being an issue when it had been done by people in his lab in the past. It could have been the fact that the lenses were off and had obviously been jarred, but it seemed like more than that. After Markus left, I continuing to wallow in self pity and sorrow for several minutes until I remembered something…. I have an irrevocable tendency to be a bit hard on myself and be a bit of a perfectionist and I am well aware that many people have escaped this doomed fate. Perhaps whoever calibrated the cameras in the past is one of those people.

  So here’s some things I have realized about this calibration process in the last couple days,I already knew that essentially I could have used any of the dozens and dozens of photos I had taken thus far to calibrate the cameras, but that we wouldn’t want to because all of those calibrations had such a high degree of error associated with them.  Basically even though I knew this, every time I saw a calibration report that showed me what I considered to be a high degree of error, I considered the calibration process a fail. When I went to look at the old calibration photos and reports that had been done several years ago, the error was significantly higher than what I was receiving and I would have considered them un-calibratable. Which basically means I have been stressing out over these calibrations for days now, when my calibrations were already more accurate than the ones we had been using the in past. Definite “DUH” moment. However, that means our current position isn’t nearly the crisis situation it had  appeared to be and although I am still busy calibrating cameras at several different settings to make up for the several different scenarios we’ve used while taking photos in the field, suddenly a lot of the pressure is off, which is fantastic.

Welcome to my world. These cameras and photos feel as though they have made up my entire existence lately. The one exception, is being in the field. It’s hard to spend all morning working on cameras and photos and then being gone all day in the field only to return home to work on cameras and photos again. But, when I’m in the field I leave everything else behind. I am not stressed about whether photogrammetry is going to work or not or whether I have calibrated the cameras correctly. I am only focused on the experience of being out on the sea ice and working with Weddell seals.

I am going to attach an email I sent to my dad a couple days ago to finish the post on a lighter note, he mentioned that he thought it might make a good blog post.

I’m sorry for being so short on the phone last night. I am a little sensitive right now (maybe more than a little) and am just having a hard time remembering that regardless of how difficult my current situation may seem, I am in an amazing place and I have to remember that. We didn’t go out today because the weather is bad, which means thankfully I have time to work on my stuff… It was a good idea for me to revisit the idea of using RAW images, I’m going to look into that now.

 

When I’m out on the sea ice, I am in awe. It’s absolutely breathtaking. There is the seemingly endless sea ice, but then it’s stopped by the beautiful mountains surrounding us. The ice on the side of the island is beginning to melt and it leaves these gaping holes in a vertical sheet of ice. You can see stratified layers of ice covered in long melting streams of icicles, tens to hundreds of feet thick draping over the entire scene. The snow gets blown around every day by the wind and it makes it all the more scenic when you can literally see every which way the snow blows in, on, and around everything here. Driving to and from different sites is by far my favorite time of day and is when I really appreciate being here. I didn’t expect it to be so beautiful.

 

 

I’m finding it hard to not get caught up in work and stress, but I want to be more like you and keep an even composure. You have a way of not letting things bother you, no matter how difficult a situation is. I wish some of that would rub off on me.

 

 

I love you endlessly.

Mee-ya

Mt. Erebus

October 28, 2011 – October 29, 2011, Thursday – Friday

Happy Camper is a basic survival course that everyone has to take if they’re going to leave base. I was trying to keep my head held high, but I was definitely nervous. I didn’t have a clue what I was doing and didn’t really know the first thing about staying warm or surviving in this cold or extreme of an environment.

The class starts out with a couple hours in the classroom. We had three instructors and they took turns teaching us different aspects of working and living on the ice, things like learning risk management. We then got shipped out on a Delta which is basically yet another huge snow/ice vehicle where the driver is in one compartment up front and we’re all packed like sardines into a back section with no heat, but at least shelter from the wind. We had to use radios to communicate with the driver (radios are really important here at McMurdo) and clarify that we’re all secure. We drove over the hill onto the other side of the island, past Scott Base (which is the Kiwi station) and onto the sea ice. The Delta stopped at the main road and the instructors hopped onto ski-doos while we had to trek with our ECW gear to the location of the camp. Even though I started out cold by the time we got to camp I was hot and sweaty.

John, Rachel, and I driving to our camp site

On the trek.

Here’s a big thing I learned – don’t sweat. Whatever you do, do not get wet because it is beyond difficult to try and warm up when you’re wet.

Layers are your best friend, you take them off when you’re more active and put them back on when you’re just sitting around. I didn’t know these tricks before camp. Which is why by the time we reached camp and had sheltered up inside of what looked like a shipping container to learn the rest of our lessons for the day, I was freezing and couldn’t get warm. I had to learn to put on more layers and to adjust. One of the instructors kept saying – if you’re cold DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Eating and drinking keeps you warm, putting on more layers keeps you warm, moving around keeps you warm. You can’t afford to be lazy and hope that if you stay still it’ll get better, it won’t. That was really good advice. Oh, and CHOCOLATE IS YOUR BEST FRIEND. Chocolate = energy = warm. Yet another reason to love chocolate.

Eventually we left the container for the last time that day and continued our lessons outside. We learned how to start little finicky camping stoves, make ice blocks, build an ice wall, put up tents, and anchor them in the snow and ice, and how to boil snow (for future reference you can indeed burn snow…you have to have water in the pot to begin with). After helping us get started with all of those tasks, the instructors left on their ski-doos to head back to shelter. They told us this isn’t boot camp and that they were on the radio and could be here in a couple minutes if they were needed. If someone just couldn’t get warm despite following all of the advice given, we could call them and they would come get us. That was such a huge relief I can’t even tell you how much that information meant to me,  I thought we were going to be left on the ice with no where to turn and that everyone would be fine except me. I had a vision of me slowly turning blue until finally freezing into a Mee-ya shaped Popsicle.

I somehow took charge of the kitchen with one other guy named Kipp who is a dishwasher here and McMurdo and we boiled water all afternoon. We needed drinking water, we needed boiling water for our dehydrated meals, and we needed warm drinks. Mostly, we loved the warmth the heated water provided. Eventually Rachel, John, and I got bored and we decided to take a recreational “walk”, some people decided to build igloos or their own trench shelters for the night.

Me in front of Mt. Erebus

Our ice wall protecting our line of mountain tents

Me “cooking” dinner for my fellow happy campers!

Rachel and I waddling down the flagged path

Rachel was making snow angels, I was imitating a beached crab

John, Rachel, and I were all set up in a Scott’s tent, which is an amazing tent that easily survivse the extremities of Antarctica. Scott’s tents are commonly used in field camps and have been used in the Antarctic for decades. Scott’s tents are amazingly sturdy and can withstand the ridiculous winds of the Antarctic. The wind chill here changes how cold it is outside so drastically that it can make all the difference in how your day in the field goes. The tent is built for two people, but can fit up to four. It was freezing and we were only in Condition 3 weather.

In Antarctica there are three conditions of weather:

Condition 3: Weather is good and you can freely move about town without “checking out” with the station

Condition 2: Weather is a bit concerning, there is no recreational travel and anyone leaving base must check out.

Condition 1: No travel of any kind is authorized, including travel from building to building on station. Which means wherever you are when we go into Condition 1 is where you will stay until the status of the weather changes.

The conditions are based off of wind and visibility. It was beautiful and sunny with virtually no wind all night during our Happy Camper and I was still FROZEN. I could hardly believe it, but the last Happy Camper group before us was stuck in Condition 1 for the entire duration of their camping session! How could they survive in condition 1 while I was freezing my back side off in sunny windless weather? I realized after a couple hours that my sleeping bag would be significantly warmer if I cinched it up, but I slept like a caterpillar with both my fleece liner and the sleeping bag above my head. You wouldn’t have been able to find my face if you tried. I’ve never been someplace so cold that when you wake up in the morning your sleeping bag has a rim of ice/snow collected around the edge from the warmth and condensation you created throughout the night… Of course “night” is a relative term when the sun never goes down and you only slept 4 hours.

At this point it was a little hard for me to understand why people would do this for fun…. Winter camping? Seriously? Then again… by the time I had made it through the night and two days out on the ice… I felt pretty intense, Mee-ya the indestructible. Ok, not quite indestructible, but I felt unbelievably capable. No matter how bad the weather gets here in Antarctica and no matter what situation I’m in, I know that given the right tools I can survive. I wouldn’t be helpless. That is a HUGE realization and honestly even though we learned a lot of skills, I think that may have been the take home message of the course.

My three person bedroom for the night

Happy Camper Graduation picture!

Halloween McMurdo Style

October 29, 2011 Saturday

McMurdo runs on a schedule of 6 days on and 1 day off. Pretty much the entire station works Monday – Saturday and have Sundays off. Which means, that although Halloween wasn’t technically until Monday McMurdo was going to be partying it up on Saturday night and hung over all of Sunday. Halloween is a big deal here on station. The gym gets all decked out with decorations and everyone has been planning/creating their costumes for days if not weeks. You can buy drinks, dance to the music the wonderful DJ is cuing up, and participate, or at least watch, the costume contest! Jo had told us (more like warned us) that the party was going to be the same night as when we returned from Happy Camper, so I took a nap after we arrived back in town to make it through the night’s festivities. Rachel and I met in Jo and Allyson’s room at 7pm and began to get ready. We were going to be butterflies and the guys on the team were supposed to be butterfly catchers… The guys must not have been too psyched about the idea because they didn’t end up coming to the party. And although I was hesitant at first, I have to admit I thought we looked pretty cute when we were all together.

Halloween was awesome, we danced the night away and I met tens of people and would spend the next week trying to decipher who I met and what they actually looked like in “real life”. Let me tell you, being the new girl on base and meeting everyone at a gigantic Halloween party isn’t the best way to remember faces. Apparently Jo and Allyson have been re-introducing me to people by calling me “pink wings”. People work amazingly hard here and most people that work at McMurdo can’t leave base, so people work hard and play hard here. McMurdo is full of interesting people coming from all walks of life and it leaves you with a pretty epic opportunity to meet really cool people.

Station was pretty quite on Sunday and we took it easy as well. We had Sunday brunch and got to sleep in a bit. I finally got my computer set up for internet and could begin to check emails and start blogging. I had always heard horror stories about the food here. “Freshies” (fresh fruits and vegetables) were something you snuck into your pockets anytime you saw them (which was such a rarity). This year, however, I’ve heard rumors that the chef used to work at the Bellagio in Vegas and graduated from Le Cordon Bleu and that our freshies budget increased by 30 or 50%. Now, this is only what I’ve heard from word of mouth so who knows how much is true, but what I can say with absolute certainty is the the food is awesome. It’s probably the extreme cold, but I find myself thinking about my days via meal times. I am hungry nearly all of the time and I am the kind of person who is really easy to read when it comes to whether I’m hungry or not. If I’ve eaten I’m happy as a clam and when I’m hungry it is a quick exponential drop to doom, gloom, and being unproductive. I’ve found it’s a bit concerning when you walk into the galley (everyone eats in the galley, military, Raytheon employees, and grantees) and you see huge 200+ lb men walking around with heaping plates only to look down upon your own plate and realize it looks exactly the same as theirs…. I better be burning through all of these calories, or by the time I get home I’m going to look like a Weddell seal.

Me and my pink wings

The women of b470

Sea Ice Training

October 31, 2011

Sea ice training was pretty interesting, we learned about the different kind of cracks and how to be able to discern whether a crack is cross able. Being in Antarctica on the ice is like playing a constant game of cross – no cross, bridge – no bridge. Although it is normally very dry in Antarctica, technically it is a desert here, this season we’ve actually had quite a bit of snow. Which means, that when you a approach a new crack it might not even be visible underneath all of the snow. The procedure is to shovel out all of the snow and to drill at different intervals in the ice and measure the depth of the ice. Once you’ve found the safe “edges” of the crack (where the ice is thick enough to be deemed safe), you can measure the distance of the “crack”, or thinnest part of the ice, and know if it is a safe distance to cross or not. Depending what equipment you’re traveling in, you can cross different size cracks. The weather was actually quite bad, it was Condition 2 although many people thought it really looked more like Condition 1. We went out on the ice and drilled, measured, and checked a sea ice crack in the hurling wind and bone chilling cold. I was surprised by how well our ECW gear worked. There wasn’t that much of a difference in terms of how cold I felt in the Condition 2 weather as I did when we were at Happy Camper in Condition 1 with minimal wind and lots of sunshine. I found this realization uplifting. Knowing that your gear really works and really does keep you insulated from the elements is a fantastic thing. One thing you want to be able to depend on, other than your team, is your gear.

I’m checking the ice with the ice drill!

Skidoo Training

November 3, 2011 Thursday

The last couple of days have been a mad scramble. Jo and Allyson have been going out every day, weather permitting, in attempt to collect enough FLIR (Infrared) images. We need photos of at least five recently hauled out animals before we can start deploying instruments on the seals. The infrared images allow us to see the “cold spots” and “hot spots” on the seals and that tells us where the ideal location for the heat flux sensors would be. No one has really taken a wide range of FLIR images on Weddell seals before and we don’t know if the hot spots are a consistent factor that doesn’t change, or if hot spots and cold spots move/change over time. Roger and Markus are busy completing the finishing touches on the tags as well as working on “the onion”. The onion is the name of our tent that we will be using in the field. Having a tent in the field that we can put up around the seal while we are working helps us stay out of the elements and really focus on working on the animal. Plus it warms up a bit in the sun which is a really nice feature when dexterity is something you constantly have to fight for. The tent is really quite impressive, we can literally erect the tent in about 2 minutes, 5 minutes if you include the time it takes to screw in the ice screws. John has been helping everyone finish they’re tasks, as well as creating data logging sheets for the project. He is in charge of data management , amongst several other things, which means coming up with the most efficient and organized ways of storing and sorting our data. Data sheets are physical work sheets that we will fill out in the field; every time we touch a seal, we fill out a data sheet which will later help us remember exactly what we did while working on an animal. Rachel is preparing for field work, putting together all of the medical supplies that she will need including an emergency kit.

Jo on the Piston Bully (also known as a “PB”)

Jo taking FLIR (infrared images) of recently hauled out Weddell seals

A mother and her pup

I have been extremely busy trying to stay on top of all of my tasks. I have been frantically trying to get caught up on posts for Hailing Frozen Thoughts, I have quite a bit of updating that I need to do for publicity on the project (updating PEARL’s facebook page and notifying different departments, especially the Marine Mammal Institute on how the first week has gone), as well as prepare everything I need to do for photogrammetry. Although photogrammetry was NOT something that was originally written into the description of my internship position it is something that has kind of fallen into my lap as a great opportunity. Basically , photogrammetry has become my contribution to the team. It has become my “project”. As an undergraduate honors college student at OSU we need to complete an undergraduate thesis and I asked Markus earlier this summer if he’d be willing to be my mentor for a project. We’re going to sit down and finalize the objectives and details this week, but basically my thesis will be surrounded around photogrammetry and specifically with the data we will be collecting this season. The hope is that my thesis will be a scientific paper that I get published! It’s all theoretical at this point, but I’m pretty excited about the prospect. A huge reason as to why I loved the idea of working on this project, was because of how small the team is. On a team of only seven people, me being the only student, I knew I would have to be somewhat integral to the project – at least for the season anyway. Now, however, I feel like I am getting the opportunity to play an even larger role and take on a larger part of the project as my own. I will eventually be making 3D models for seals we work on and with the model I will be able to calculate body volume as well as surface area. Both volume and surface area will be integral when Allyson is creating the energetic models in year three (the final year) of the project.

Which means I have been busy putting the final settings on all the equipment and cameras to ensure that when we go out in the field (hopefully Saturday), the photogrammetry part of the deployment will run smoothly. We do have a little bit of wiggle room in that, I will be coming home every night and taking  a look at the photos we took that day and running them through the program in a very basic way just to ensure the photos are usable. If they aren’t, we can take photos of the seal again on recapture when we find the seals and remove the equipment we placed on them (roughly a week or so after deployment). John and Rachel have both been helping me a out quite a bit with my work load and I don’t know what state of mind I would be in right now if I hadn’t had they’re help yesterday.

Skidoo training was absolutely fantastic! It was by far the most interesting training we’ve had thus far and definitely the least painful. I couldn’t really start the skidoo, which was a small problem. I stood there for several minutes with Toby (the instructor and lead skidoo mechanic) trying to figure out how to pull the rope crank hard enough to start the engine. He was able to do it in a second, but I’m also not a big burly skidoo man. Eventually I did start the engine, but it had lost it’s allure at that point. After an hour of classroom, we were ready to go out on a skidoo obstacle course, and after I finally was able to pull start my skidoo I was riding it. It was SO much fun! Going around sharp turns on a skidoo is actually quite difficult, especially if you’re not in very good shape (ahem… ) and you’ve gone through this slalom type course about three times. In order to turn on a skidoo you also have to put your weight into the turn. You don’t lean into the turn like with a motorcyle, but rather shift your weight from the right or left side of the skiidoo to help with momentum. Basically on some turns I would probably have to hang off one side of the skiidoo in order to make it. Luckily, there aren’t a whole lot of turns, stops, trees, or obstacles in Antarctica. For the most part I am probably home free.

In front of the C-17 that took us to Antarctica.

October 27, 2011 Thursday

Team picture! Roger, Rachel, Markus, John, and I waiting on the plane for take off.

Through the windows of the C-17

John and I taking our first steps on the ice

“Ivan” the terra bus!

Behold McMurdo Station, Antarctica

October 26, 2011 Wednesday

Outside the USAP Passenger Terminal wearing my ECW issued ski pants and bunny boots!

October 26th was the scheduled date of our “ice flight”. Your ice flight is the flight that takes you down to Antarctica. We had to meet at the CDC which is next door to the U.S. Antarctic Program Passenger Terminal (which is where we check in for our flight), and the International Antarctic Center, which is an educational science center full of exhibits dedicated to Antarctica. You are required to wear your ECW gear while on your ice flight. Which means, the first thing we had to do after arriving at the CDC at 6:30 am is change into our gear. With your gear and all of your luggage, you then have to check into the U.S. Antarctic Program Passenger Terminal which appears to be run by the New Zealand military. While wearing all of your gear, you take your bags to the terminal and have all of your bags and gear weighed. You are included in this process and must also step up onto the scale with your orange CDC issued carry on bag and all of the ECW gear that you are required to wear.

You are issued two orange bags, one is a carry on bag that is mostly empty because you are wearing most of your gear, and the other bag is full of extra ECW gear that you didn’t decide to wear on the flight over. You can also request a third orange “boomerang” bag. A boomerang bag is needed in case you have a “boomerang” flight. A boomerang flight is when you make it onto the plane and begin the flight down, but due to weather in Antarctica the plane gets turned around and heads back to Christchurch before you land on the ice. Therefore, the only bag you get when you return from a boomerang is your carry on and one “boomerang bag” that is specifically packed at the top of the pallet (and labelled with a specific tag) on the plane so that it can be returned to you. All of your bags must be tagged with either a checked bag, carry on, boomerang, or New Zealand tag. The CDC also allows you to leave luggage at the CDC for the ease of the USAP participants and especially to help with the weight constraints of the plane. I am hoping to spend some time in New Zealand on my way back home, so I left a bag at the CDC.

We were then allowed to go across the street to the International Antarctic Center to get breakfast before meeting back at the terminal at precisely 7:20 am. At the terminal, we watched two training videos. One was based upon the Antarctic, it consisted of basic facts and things we should know about our soon to be new environment. We heard things like, make sure to stay hydrated (Antarctica is a VERY dry environment and staying hydrated helps to keep you warm), be cautious and careful, be sure to look around at your team mates and make it a priority to watch them for the first signs of hypothermia etc. Then, you go through the final point of security with your carry on bag and get onto a bus that is supposed to take you to your plane. We did all of these things, only to end up sitting on the bus for several minutes before being told that our flight has been delayed and we would probably be better off waiting back in the terminal.

This is me feeling excited BEFORE being told that our flight had been delayed.

The thing is, now that we had gone through security we could no longer leave the terminal. We were stuck in the terminal until we left for our flight. We were scheduled to go out on a LC-130, which is also known as a ‘Hercules’. If the name doesn’t give it away, let me give you a clue as to what Hercules looks and flies like… Hercules is a massive piece of equipment and takes significantly longer to fly and therefore takes significantly longer to arrive at McMurdo. Oh, and the LC-130s are also notoriously stocked with cramped uncomfortable seats. For perspective, a C-17 can fly from Christchurch to McMurdo in about 5-6 hours. The flight time on the Hercules is closer to 9 hours . We sat at the terminal and were delayed a total of three different times throughout the day. The people at the terminal were nice enough to bring us coffee from the coffee shop at the center across the street and eventually allowed us to leave the terminal altogether (which honestly wasn’t a very good sign, but I felt a bit like a trapped animal at that point and was excited at the thought of walking around and leaving the building).

Rachel and Roger passing the time as we waited for the plane. In between them is a securely locked Pelican case containing all of the anesthesia meds we will use this season. The drugs are controlled substances and therefore cannot leave Rachel’s side without being secured.

Eventually, we ended up taking a look around the International Antarctic Center and got to take a look at the different exhibits. They have the world’s smallest penguins and even have a room there that simulates the weather in Antarctica!

Rachel and I at the International Antarctic Center – Christchurch, NZ

John and I at the International Antarctic Center trying out the equipment

Our new check in time was around noon and by the time we got back to the terminal for check in, our flight had been rescheduled for the next day and people were pulling out trolleys to retrieve their bags from off the plane. The good news was that we were told that there was a chance that we would be switched to a different plane for the next day, which is why we were allowed to take our bags for the night. Typically your bags stay on the plane in the event of a boomerang or any other delay.

That night we had our second “last supper” and I have to be honest, at this point I was pretty antsy to get going. We were no longer in Christchurch enjoying the scenery, we were stuck in the hotel waiting to hear when our departure time for Thursday was and anxiously wondering if were going to finally reach the ice or not…. To ease our anxiety, or maybe just to prevent boredom, we went out to and had a Malaysian dinner and returned to the Rose and Thistle after dinner to share some laughs over drinks.

A quick note to those who may be interested, I have added a subscription feature to the blog. You can now sign up for email updates every day that a new post has been put up online. Look for the SUBSCRIBE button on the right side panel!

Also, keep a look out for blog posts throughout the season that will be coming to you from different members of the B470 team.  Get a different perspective of life on the ice from the most experienced of Antarctic veterans and also from fellow first timers on the team. These posts will also serve as a good source of insight into the details of some of the more scientific aspects of the project.

October 25, 2011 Tuesday

Tuesday was supposed to be the last day that we spent in New Zealand.  We finally made it to the vet in Rangoria and picked up all of the anesthesia meds that we will need for the season. Rachel, John, and I spent a couple hours labelling, cataloging, and packing the drugs for the flight down. With controlled substances like these they need to be kept securely locked up or with Rachel at all times. We felt a bit strange with hundreds of dollars of drugs laying out in the open on our hotel beds… scientist drug dealers.

The weather had changed overnight, the wind had picked up and the skies had become an endless blanket of grey. We went to the CDC (Clothing Distribution Center) in Christchurch and received our two orange bags full of our ECW (Extreme Cold Weather) gear and tried on every single item of clothing to make sure that everything fit well and all zippers worked properly.

Markus proposed that we go out to a nice final meal before heading for the ice, a “last supper”. Thus, we embarked later that night upon a journey to a local Thai restaurant that served us the most beautiful, delectable, and authentic Thai food. We were hearing reports that the weather at McMurdo had been very bad for the past two days, which wasn’t a good sign. Markus and Roger (both seasoned Antarctic explorers) kept referring to this supper as the first of what was to be perhaps several “last suppers”…

Current situation:

I am safely in Antarctica, but I am in the midst of back to back classes in order to get all the qualifications I need to get out on the ice to do field work on the seals. Today is the first day since arriving that I have had a chance to catch my breath, but I am sorely behind on posts. Therefore, even though I am already here in Antarctica I am going to review what has happened since 9:00 AM on October 24th (New Zealand time, which is also Antarctica time) day by day until I get caught back up to my current reality – McMurdo Station, Antarctica!

Painted Green Hills: Day 2 in Christ Church

October 24, 2011 Monday

Monday didn’t turn out quite the way we anticipated. Shortly after writing my last blog post, we (Markus, Roger, Rachel, John, and I) got into our rental car to drive to the city of Rangoria to meet a vet who would give Rachel (our vet) the anesthesia meds that we need for the Antarctic. However, after we got into car we remembered hearing that Monday was New Zealand’s Labor Day. We didn’t realize how seriously New  Zealand took their holidays until that day. We realized once getting into the car that no one had actually spoken to the vet since we had landed in Christ Church. After Markus tracked down the vet via several different phone conversations and referred phone numbers, we finally got ahold of the vet and was told that Tuesday would probably be more convenient for him. Which meant, that we ended up driving south to the Banks Peninsula and eventually landed in a beautiful little town, Akaroa. The drive was beautiful. New Zealand is full of rolling hills covered in lush green vegetation and speckled with hundreds of little fluffy sheep. We stopped at a farmers market on our way to Akaroa and had the most wonderful crepes! There were pony rides, jewelry, art, and food being sold. The sun was out and shinning brightly down until this colorful collage of quaint stands meshing into an unexpectedly brilliant moment in time.

Photos of the farmers market and Markus, John, and I eating our wonderful crepes!

We continued to drive through the rolling hills, often stopping to get out and take photos, until we found a little turn off where we went on short hike. The hike was through beautiful warm and yet wet moss covered forest, leading us to a beautiful mountain top overlooking the bay across the way from Akaroa and leading out to Akaroa Harbor and the dazzlingly blue ocean. We spent lunch time sitting outside in the sunshine under a big black umbrella eating fine cheeses, mussels, and drinking fine local New Zealand wine. For dessert everyone had coffee, except me. I skipped happily down the boardwalk with a freshly made strawberry, raspberry, and blueberry frozen yogurt cone.

One of our several stops on the road

John, Markus, Rachel and Roger at the peak of the hill that we hiked up

The beautiful view from the top of the peak.

Akaroa

A trip to a foreign country isn’t even worth it unless you get proposed to by a dashing young local

The following is an email that I sent to my parents, boyfriend, and aunts the morning after arriving in Christchurch, New Zealand. I don’t have a lot of time or access to the internet or computers here in Christchurch and this email actually seemed like a good update for Hailing Frozen Thoughts as well. I will upload pictures from New Zealand and more updates when I arrive at McMurdo.

October 24, 2011 9:00AM

Mom, Dad, Peter, Aunt Clare and Sue,

Quick message just to tell you all that I am safe. We landed in Christchurch yesterday afternoon (my time) after 29 hours of travel. Whew! I did sleep on the plane quite a bit so that really wasn’t too bad, but it was a lot of airports, connections, and waiting around.
Christchurch is a really cute town, I feel very comfortable and at home here. It reminds me of Korea of all things. It sounds weird, but the town is basically this combination of a quaint little cottage town and an up and coming urban scene. There are a dozen “ethnic¨ restaurants outside of our hotel, we had Malaysian last night (Mom I finally got my spicy squid that I’ve been shamelessly begging for you to make me – it was really yummy!).

The world cup of Rugby is taking place in New Zealand this year and the Kiwis are as enthusiastic about Rugby as the Koreans were about soccer when the World Cup was hosted in Korea.  Originally, the games were supposed to be hosted in Christchurch, but I’ve heard because of the earthquakes most have been based in Auckland. At first glance, it’s easy to miss the signs of damage that have hit the city from the earthquakes, but I see it now. There were two main earthquakes from my understanding, one in September and one in February. The February quake is what has left the city with the most damage, the hotel that the USAP (US Antarctic Program) normally hosts their people was called The Winsor and is currently an empty lot of rubble nearby. There are many empty lots like that strewn across the city, it appears that brick buildings got hit the worst. An old stone church down the street is now crumbling to pieces, barely being held together by several wooden braces surrounding the building. It’s not an uncommon scene it seems.
Even our hotel is only half functional. The restaurant, wine bar, and all entertainment is gone – destroyed from the earthquake. I’ve heard that the city has been slow to rebuild because hardly anyone had insurance and even those who did, the insurance companies went belly up  leaving the city with no means for repair. Plywood boards are tacked up on the fronts of many buildings around town (including part of my hotel), a sign that the buildings simply didn’t make it through the earthquake without shattering from the inside out.
It’s morning here, and the city is still in celebration, The New Zealand “All Blacks” won last night for what I believe is the second time in history, although from my understanding they are always a very highly ranked team. We went to a pub after dinner last night to watch the game, but it didn’t start until 9 and after 9:45 I had to call it quits and come back to the hotel. I woke up to the cheers of the country around midnight or so, but I slept pretty well overall. It’s nearly 9 am now, I’m meeting the rest of the team in half an hour. We are driving to a local vet office to pick up the anesthesia meds to take to the ice. I haven’t had any time to blog and don’t really have access to internet. The “complimentary  computer kiosk” is one computer located downstairs in the stairwell. I’m writing to you from my laptop in my room and then copying the document into an email to send over. I am writing in my journal like crazy though. I finally bought a new journal, it’s a moleskine journal (Peter gave me the idea). It’s compact and I bring it with me everywhere (for those of you who don’t know me as well, writing in my journal is one of the few things that keeps me sane). It’s become as important to me as my limbs. My anxiety about the trip melted away once our wheels left the runway at LAX and completely disappeared once I landed in Christchurch. It’s very pretty here. A city surrounded by miles of farmland. The sun shines ultra bright, but the wind can be chilly. The air feels clean and refreshing,  it feels a lot like the Pacific Northwest in that way.

I love you all very much!

Mee-ya

P.S. Markus thought it was really nice that my mom, dad, and aunts all showed up to see me off at the airport (* Note – my aunts live in Sequim, WA which is about 5 hours away from my parents house in Forest Grove, OR).

P.P.S.
Dad, I forgot to mention that I went on a stroll yesterday after we first got here and I got to take a shower (which by the way is the only thing that made me feel like a real person after that many hours of flying) and I took a few shots of the local area and, Peter you will like this, I talked to a local! He was staring at me, the weird foreigner who was taking a picture of an All Blacks flag standing outside a house with a lemon tree (2 things I don’t see at home), and we hit up a conversation. He is the one who told me to go the Rose and Thistle (the local pub) for the game. Yay look at me!