The C-17s are flying 80-100 people off the continent each day. The town population is now under 500 for the first time since I arrived. The skua bins outside of dorms are overflowing with discarded clothes, toiletries, and other items. I have been checking the skua bins and skua central multiple times per day, collecting half-empty vitamin D bottles, beat-up merino wool leggings, and other junk I think I’ll need over the winter.
I’ve probably found at least $500 worth of winter clothing in skua in the last week. Other treasures I’ve found include a North Face down jacket and a little travel-sized guitar that my friend Sparky left me.
Life in McMurdo in the last several weeks has been a crazy whirl of saying good-bye to friends, filling my dorm room with skua’d junk I’m gonna need for the winter (and maybe back home!), winding down from my summer Comms Operator contract, and getting training for my winter season broadcast engineer contract.
I had my first full solo day yesterday. It involved solving a dead air issue in the radio studio, switching out a DVD player, troubleshooting two web-machine interfacing issues, and scheduling one DJ training. I guess asking for a quiet first day would have been too much.
I have a good feeling about my job. The work structure and tasking are similar to what I did at WMUU for two years. But with radio AND TV. And in Antarctica. A lot of my daily tasking will involve scheduling and loading DVDs and updating slides for the movie channels, but there will be some projects like updating the CD and vinyl inventory, digitizing 8 mm tapes from the National Science Foundation, and maybe some filming. I have also been given permission to do a weekly radio show.
I’m gonna get paid to do a radio show in Antarctica!!!!!!!
There were two Adélie penguins (the most common penguin species in this area) about 40-50 feet onto the sea ice off Hut Point a few days ago, and I *finally* got some Adélie penguin photos.
I’d never been this close to penguins in the wild before.
If you aren’t Facebook friends with me or don’t spend much time on Facebook (good job!), you may not have heard my big news:
I have accepted a winter contract. This means that I will be here until early October, 2018. I will be living in Antarctica for an entire year.
This didn’t come 100 percent out of the blue, but it did come 99 percent out of the blue. Here’s how it went down:
Way back in late October I decided to apply for the position of Broadcast Engineer, which at McMurdo, means the person who handles the radio and TV infrastructure. The summer season position has been held by the same person for years, but the winter season position rotates through several folks. I spoke with the hiring manager from GHG, the contracting company that handles all IT and comms at McMurdo, and he suggested I apply.
I looked at the position description, submitted my application even though the job looked beyond my current abilities, and then promptly forgot about it, since I figured that would be the last I would ever hear about that job.
Then, at the end of December, I had an interview for the job and was offered what’s known as an “alternate” contract. Unlike a primary contract, which basically means “you have the job, here’s your plane ticket,” an alternate contract means you fill out a bunch of paperwork, go home and go about your life, but be on standby to deploy if the primary backs out, doesn’t physically qualify, or leaves the job mid-season for any number of reasons.
I was thrilled to be an alternate. I had the validation that I was good enough to do the job if the primary had to bail, but meant I could still leave Antarctica, eat a salad, see a kangaroo, get some things taken care of back home, yada yada yada.
Five days ago the IT and comms manager emailed me to say the primary had to back out, and asked me if I would like the primary position.
And that’s how it went down.
Now I’m entering a whole new level of “part of me.”
Part of me is thrilled that I GET PAID TO DO BROADCASTING IN ANTARCTICA AND LEARN NEW RADIO SKILLS AND LEARN HOW TO DO TV STUFF AND LEARN HOW DEFENSE MEDIA AND AFRTS WORK AND DO MORE BROADCAST MANAGEMENT AND MAYBE DO A FEW TASKS FOR THE NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION AND DID I MENTION THAT ASSUMING I DO A HALFWAY DECENT JOB THIS WILL ROCKET MY CAREER AS A BROADCASTER TO HEIGHTS I NEVER IMAGINED AND COULD POSSIBLY BE THE BEST CAREER MOVE OF MY ENTIRE LIFE.
Part of me is terrified. Feels horribly underprepared. Knows that if I could just have *one* month back home to recuperate and prepare myself, I would feel so much better about doing this. I could get a bunch of merino wool undies, eat a ton of fresh veggies, and buy a camera to take decent aurora pictures. My aurora pictures are gonna be really shitty.
Telling my mom the news was the hardest part. She sounded so happy when she answered the phone, and I felt like a monster for pulling the rug out from under her and telling her I would be away from home for a full year. I didn’t realize how much I missed my family until I told her I was gonna do it. I also went through a short grieving period for the next summer season, as I really had my heart set on coming back next summer and doing all the things again. But the Antarctic Support Contract lets you work in Antarctica for up to 14 months in a row, and then you are required to take a break for (I believe) 48 days before you can come back. So no summer contract for me next year.
As an antidote to feeling freaked out/wondering if I’m crazy/feeling like a horrible daughter/having to miss Icestock and all the other fun summer things next year, everyone I’ve talked with who’s done a winter here has raved about how awesome McMurdo is in the winter.
You have a population of about 150-200 people. You get your own room. You get wifi and faster Internet. The workload is lighter. There’s a UV light room and a hot tub you can use. You get to know people even better since there are so few of you. And you get to know the folks at Scott Base since there’s only about 12 of them that stay over the winter.
I am looking forward to having more access to the band room and maybe learning to play the banjo and saxophone. I’ll have the craft room, free DVD rental, and tons of books from the library. Three gyms so I can get in shape. More space to do fun, weird activities with my 150 other crazy Antarcticans. The editor of the Antarctic Sun recruited me to write monthly station updates. I’ll have my 54-hour-per-week job and and the learning curve that will come with it to keep me busy.
So assuming I survive this new job and life in a place where the average high in August is -10 before wind chill and there’s 24-hour darkness for four months, you all will see me sometime in October. By then I expect to be a feral, sun-starved maniac who has made a bunch more friends, gotten really buff in the gym, and learned how to play the sax. Maybe.
Also, I really will try to blog more, Skype, and generally stay in touch more than I have the summer.
I think “part of me” has unintentionally become my favorite phrase. I seem to say it a lot lately whenever friends ask me how I’m doing, how I feel about the season winding down, how I feel about leaving soon.
“Well, part of me feels sad about leaving my friends here, but I’m also looking forward to getting out and starting a new adventure, seeing friends back home, having a salad, training for some bike trips, seeing Australia…”
“Part of me really wants to leave, but part of me really wants to stay because I’ve gotten so used to living here and generally like the people here…..”
“Part of me knows that I can probably come back next season now that my foot is in the door, but I also know next season may not feel as magical as this one, since the novelty will have worn off….”
Point made. The first two months here, I was enthusiastic and dialed into the community. I went to every party, every rec trip, and any other fun event that I could. And by some miracle, even being on night shift for 2/5 of the season, I was able to attend the Halloween party, the helo hangar party, the waste barn party, the VMF christmas party, half of Icestock, the Softball tournament, and Carpstock. If my work schedule is different next season, I may have to miss some of those. But even if I had a 7-5 town schedule, I will never be able to exactly replicate some of the incredible moments and experiences this season. And I’m trying to accept that that’s okay. That’s life.
Riding in a helicopter for the first time to see the Black Island and RAID field camps. Visiting a fuel cache at Cape Reynolds. Helping with an ice dive and driving a pisten bully. Seeing penguins, seals, and minke whales. Writing for The Antarctic Sun. Dancing with Luke for two solid hours at the helo hangar party. Hosting a Christmas music show with McMurdo, South Pole, and field camps on HF radio. Playing at Icestock and making my awkward stage dive that my friends are still praising me for.
Since mid-January, I’ve felt more disconnected. Something in my mind and my heart unplugged itself and now I’m just going through the days on autopilot, watching the season wind down and feeling numb to experiences that were exciting and novel three months ago. And while I don’t think that’s entirely a bad thing, part of me (hahaha see!?) wants to get that excitement back, and mourns the loss of newness and wonder that I felt at the beginning of the season. I don’t know how to get that back. Perhaps that feeling just comes with living in the same place long enough.
I SAW AN EMPEROR PENGUIN AND HERE IS MY PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE!!!!
People are getting bored.
Atop Castle Rock, on the Castle Rock Trail, about four miles from McMurdo.
Castle Rock.
I can’t remember what creatures these are. I believe they are dogs. This was inside Robert Scott’s Discovery Hut.
Food from Scott’s Hut.
A mummified seal outside Scott’s Hut.
People lining up to go to the Waste Barn party.
First helo ride!
Black Island, where our HF receivers and Internet infrastructure are located.
Vessel season is the busiest time of year at McMurdo Station. For about two weeks from late January into early February, five enormous ships come to McMurdo Station to bring in cargo and fuel to last McMurdo Station, New Zealand’s Scott Base, South Pole, and field camps for the next twelve months, and also take away waste.
I don’t know how much waste they take away, but one of the vessel folks told me the cargo vessel Ocean Giant brings in three million pounds of cargo.
The process starts with the arrival of the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker, the Polar Star. The Polar Star sails from California to New Zealand and down to McMurdo Station and breaks up the sea ice around Ross Island. It then spends several days moving back and forth in the sea ice for a mile or so, breaking up more ice and creating a channel and a “turning basin” which will allow the other ships to arrive, dock at the pier for a few days, and perform offloading and unloading operations.
The Polar Star was docked at McMurdo for several days, and had several tours. It was really cool to see the inside of that ship.
Then the US Antarctica Program’s two research vessels, the Nathaniel B. Palmer and the Lawrence M. Gould came by for science operations, resupply, and picking up and dropping off a few passengers.
Then the mighty, hulking, biggest-ship-I’ve ever-seen-up-close Ocean Giant came in, and the cargo and supply departments at McMurdo commenced 24/7 offload of cargo and onload of waste to be shipped back to California. There were shipping containers (we call them “milvans” here) everywhere. Milvans for DAYS!
It’s the biggest “pack it in, pack it out” operation you will ever see.
The last vessel, the Maersk Perry fuel tanker, is currently here for another few days. Since the fuel department is the only work center that has to handle the Maersk Perry, life at McMurdo has quieted down a lot. The hundred or so folks from the Navy who have been here are also starting to leave. A week or so ago our population went above 900 for the first time this season, and the galley was just a little too crowded for my taste. The Internet was also the slowest it’s ever been.
Our first vessel: The Polar Star
Comms equipment inside the Polar Star
Comms area in the Polar Star
One of the research vessels, the Lawrence M. Gould
The Ocean Giant.
The Ocean Giant. There’s a lot more open water now that the Polar Star has broken up the ice.
Milvans. For. Days.
SPoT means South Pole Overland Traverse, meaning it’s cargo or waste being hauled between McMurdo and South Pole Station.
Elizabeth Delaquess 