Thursday, December 1, 2016

What would you say... ya do here?

1 Dec 2016


So what exactly does my job entail?  I am the station technician for NOAA's south pole climate observatory.  One of two NOAA staff members down here for the next year.  We have about 2 dozen instruments here devoted to monitoring the driving forces of earth's climate.  We monitor several atmospheric trace gases, some at sensitivities of parts per *trillion*.  We monitor the total radiation flux being delivered to the earth from the sun at multiple wavelengths, and quantify the amount of that radiation which is reflected back by the earth.  We measure the thickness of the ozone layer over the south pole daily, and we launch balloons to obtain spatially resolved ozone profiles from the ground up to altitudes of around 35 km.

That sounds very grandiose, but what do I actually do?  My office is in the Atmospheric Research Observatory (ARO, pronounced "arrow") about 500m from the station.  Seriously, check out that link.  Note that the floor plans are links to photos of the interior of ARO.  They're way out of date, but they'll serve.  We'll update them this year.  When things are going smoothly (which they do most of the time), I walk out to ARO every day and run through our daily checks.  We verify every instrument is running fine, that all the data has been transferred successfully the last time the satellites were up (overnight these days).  We have several large tanks of compressed gases, and we monitor them all daily to ensure the tanks are swapped out for full ones before they run out.

After the dailies are done, every day we need to do multiple measurements of the total column thickness of the ozone layer.  We use a Dobson differential spectrophotometer to do this.  The Dobson is a fascinating instrument, and will get its own post at some point.

On weekly and monthly periodicities, various instruments need to be recalibrated or have maintenance tasks performed.  Every two weeks, we collect literal samples of air in pressurized bottles.  These will be kept on station during the winter and mailed back to our collaborators in Australia, San Diego, and Boulder for further analysis.

Every 5 days, we launch a large balloon to an altitude of about 35km to obtain a spatially resolved profile of the ozone layer.  These measurements nicely complement the integrated column thickness measurements done using the Dobson from the ground.

All that is the normal, day to day stuff.  We're also on hand to repair anything that goes abnormally.  We're prepared to reconstruct data cables, reload the operating system on the computers, rebuild the plumbing connecting the gas cylinders, and hopefully save an experiment with a minimum of down time for any other issue.

In trivial news, a famous person came by the station today.  I had a brief opportunity to speak with him, but it was made very clear that he was not interested in a bunch of dirty nerds clamoring for photographic evidence of such a meeting.  The rumor is that video footage may appear on the BBC sometime in the next several months.

By the way, it should go without saying that this blog is completely my creation in my role as a private citizen.  It in no way is, or claims to be, a reflection of the opinions or views of any agency or department of the US government, the National Science Foundation, the US Antarctic Program, or the local Dairy Council.  All views and opinions stated herein are purely my own.  I hope that satisfies all the lawyers out there.

12 comments:

  1. Did you get Buzz sick? For shame! ;-)

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    1. Antarctica is a harsh and unforgiving place. Only the toughest (and least 86 year old) can handle the thin air embrace of our icy mistress.

      I didn't mention the medevac since it was a private health matter, but now he's tweeting photos of the ordeal. He came to the station, and was clearly struggling with the altitude the whole time. That's one of the main reasons I didn't get a picture. I wasn't going to be "that guy" who shoves a camera in the face of an elder gentleman when he's not at his best. All's well that ends well, however, and the station is very pleased that we did not kill an American hero yesterday.

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  2. I'm just assuming that Buzz couldn't keep up with a night of drinking wine with Dave. Oh dear... if you need to delete this comment for PR reasons I'll understand.

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    1. might've been a combination of the wine and sssssssserious conversation that did Buzz in. Dave man, you gotta have some respect for your elders, they can't keep up with you young whipper-snappers!

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    2. On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer your question under the protections afforded me by the 5th amendment to the US constitution.

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    3. Also, did you see him punch that dude in the face? I don't think Buzz would be the one struggling to keep up with *me*.

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  3. PS: By "local Dairy Council" I imagine you're referring to http://www.dairymoos.com/cows-in-antarctica/

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  4. glad your doing well Dave! I showed your picture in the drag suit to Mike and he said "is that the guy I met?" I think he thought you were crazy! I do believe that you've set the bar in that NO ONE can ever complain they are too cold in their suit.....ever!

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  5. What does "grid east-northeast" mean? I get that you have to have some directional convention at the South Pole, so I assume this terminology refers to that standard. But which hemisphere/continent is "north" and which "south"?

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  6. Yes, with the pole right there, using conventional directions would be madness. It turns out introducing a singularity into your coordinate system leads to all sorts of contradictions and difficulties.

    Our directions down here all use our own "grid" system. Grid north is aligned with Greenwich, England. Grid south is the International dateline.

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  7. It should make direction s easy, right? "Where's that thing I need?", Oh, right, it's north of me.

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