Stand by to Stand by

26 Oct 2016

I was told to expect this phase of the journey to change frequently.  Yesterday, we went over tot he headquarters of USAP for our Extreme Cold Weather gear (ECW) issue.  We then went back to the hotel, expecting a 05:45 shuttle this morning that would take us to the plane for a 06:30 check-in.  However, that was all canceled with a 04:45 phone call, so I'm now sitting through a 24-hour weather delay.  We'll try again tomorrow morning around 6ish.  I expect this to happen a few more times, both here and in McMurdo.

Until then, here's some pictures:

Here's the entryway to USAP's terminal.  If you're ever in Christchurch, there's an Antarctic Experience tourist destination.  The USAP HQ is right behind that building.  We spent about 3 hours here yesterday having our computers' anti-virus settings verified, trying on our ECW, and getting some safety briefs about life on the Ice.

Here's a wall display of one set of ECW gear.  I was issued more or less all of this for my year on Ice.  Starting from the left, we have our parka (known as "Big Red", which is an awesome name for pretty much anything).  There are two models of bibs, we take the version we prefer, a lighter carhartt jacket for summer wear, and a fleece jacket and pants.  We also get a small fleece hat, a fleece balaclava, a fleece neck gaiter, gloves, mittens, bigger mittens, and boots (only one pair.  Here you see the three models that are available).  The red jacket on the right (known as "little red") is too light for pole.

All of that fits surprisingly well into two orange bags:

When we first arrive at CDC, everything is packed away much like you see here.  We then open it up and try everything on, exchanging anything that doesn't fit.  We then pack it all back up, and leave it like this to be loaded on a pallet whenever our flight goes.

As I am also a gawking tourist, the staff let me into the general distribution center to get some behind the scenes shots:

And there is the first answer to the question, "What do you pack for Antarctica?" 

Christchurch!

24 Oct 2016

Ah, it feels good to be back!  I didn't send much time in Christchurch when I was last in NZ, but just being back in the country at all feels very nostalgic for me.  This is great.  I'm constantly fighting the urge to run over to the airport, hire a car and hit the road to visit the places I did spend a lot of time.

Tomorrow at 9am I'll head to the local headquarters of the US Antarctic Program (USAP) and be issued my Extreme Cold Weather gear (ECW).  After that, we begin the weather waiting game.  I'm staying at a hotel that is frequently used by USAP.  When the clerk checked me in, he said, "I have you for two nights right now, ready to stretch it to 10..."  Everything depends on the highly variable weather at McMurdo.  Ideally, I'll get there on Wednesday or Thursday, but delays of a week or more are not unprecedented.  Once I get to McMurdo, the flight to pole itself is equally uncertain.

We have no cell service at pole, so I got rid of my cell phone, but I've moved my number to google voice.  I believe this means that once I get to pole, I'll be able to receive phone calls using the same number I've had for 16 years.  We have phones in our room, and I think I'll be able to set that as a forwarding number for my google voice account (our phone numbers all have Denver area codes, because computers).  Txt messages will definitely go to my email.

I hope you all had a good 23 Oct, I didn't get one.  I left Dallas on the 22nd, and the next thing I knew it was the 24th in Sydney.

Here we go

22 Oct 2016

T-minus 7 hours as I write this.  At 16:30 today I board a plane here in Denver, ultimately bound for Christchurch.  I'll skip the 23rd entirely and land on the 24th.  And then things get uncertain.  Depending on the weather in McMurdo, I'll be in Christchurch for somewhere between a day and a week or so.  Then, depending on the weather at Pole, I'll be in McMurdo for somewhere between a day and a week or so.  All through that period, internet access will be uncertain and haphazard.

The last two weeks have been really great.  I met about half of the winter over crew in Estes Park Colorado for a three day team-building experience.  We did some fun activities like building cardboard boats and a geo-cache type of scavenger hunt.  We talked about communication and team work, but ultimately about 70% of our team building was really done in the cafeteria and the lounge over a couple of beers.  This week we spent attending the Aurora, CO fire academy covering basic firefighting and rescue.  There are no professional emergency services within 800km of the pole, so we have to become the fire department.  The instructors at the fire academy were great, and the whole experience was a lot of fun.  Of course, my real hope is that this week of firefighting training was the most useless waste of time I've ever had.  When you live in an isolated station in temperatures that reach the negative triple digits, the best fires are the ones that don't happen, not the ones you put out.

First Post

8 Oct 2016

Welcome to my blog!  I'm not yet sure what this will be.  It will certainly be a place for me to in some sense document my 1-year stay at the south pole.  It will include mundane daily details, random stream-of-consciousness ramblings, pictures, and maybe other things.  Updates will be random, as internet access is limited down there.  If you're reading this, you probably know me personally, so I won't spend much time on introductions.  Please feel free to email me with things you'd like me talk about, complaints that I talk too much about other things, or any other thoughts/feedback/ideas/requests you have.  So what to talk about first?

It's Saturday night.  On Monday I move into a hotel, for what I consider in many respects to be the real beginning of my south pole journey.

The 2017 South Pole winter-over crew is meeting in Denver for the first time on Monday evening.  We'll actually start on Tuesday morning, when we head up to Estes Park, CO, entry to Rocky Mountain National Park, for three days of team building (I've been mentally calling it "trust falls and talking about the Meyers-Briggs" in a bit of well-meaning fun.  INTP, if you're curious.).  The following week, 17-21 October, will be spent in Denver doing firefighting/emergency medical training.  As there are only 50 of us spending the winter at the pole, we have to be our own emergency services.  About half of us have been assigned to the trauma medical team, and I've been assigned to the firefighting team.

In some sense, I've been headed toward the south pole for several months now, but Monday represents a real psychological threshold.  This is the day when there ceases to be a separation between "work" and "home".  For the last few months I've been living in Boulder, preparing for the pole, but there has still been an "office" I go to 9-5, and a "home " I go to out of that time.  As of Monday, that's not quite the case anymore.  We'll have training during the day, but at night we will return to the same hotel/YMCA lodging (Ha, even my pronouns have switched from the singular to the plural).  Things will be much more completely about the team, and less about my contribution to an organization.  I'll no longer have a street address, and will only travel in team-managed vans.  When we get to the pole, there will be absolutely no separation between work and home.  My world will be the ~2km circle of the Amundsen-Scott station.  Important note:  all statements about what my life *will* be like are subject to complete reversal once I get there and see how wrong I was when I wrote this right now.

Immediately after firefighting training, at 16:30 Mountain time, I'll board a plane bound for Christchurch, New Zealand.  If all goes well with the weather, I'll be there for 3 days or so to be issued my Extreme Cold Weather (ECW) gear, and then head to McMurdo, and then onto the pole itself.  That schedule is very weather dependent, and blogging will probably be very sporadic/unlikely as I make that transition.