IceChaser: Chasing Snow in Antarctica

How do you dig out a 40-foot diameter fence buried six feet deep in snow on an ice shelf? It sounds like the beginning of a (really) bad joke. This question vexed a number of people besides ourselves, including National Science Foundation (NSF) representatives, McMurdo station managers, Fleet Operations personnel and others. As the weeks started to slide by, I was somewhat increasingly concerned that I was going to get to know my shovel very, VERY well when we suddenly got an email saying that there was "a plan" to free the shield and instrument and this plan would begin the Sunday following Thanksgiving. But before this plan could take place, we needed to dig out all the wiring that was running between the shield and the datalogger. So, we began the arduous task of trenching down to the cabling to free it from the snow. Looking down the beginning of the trench we dug to remove the cable Halfway along the trench. It took approximately 2 hours to dig the entire c...

One thing I got to mark off my Antarctic bucket list this year was a climb up Observation Hill (Ob Hill). Ob Hill rises about 750 feet above McMurdo and is the divider between McMurdo and Scott Base. It is also one of the many volcanoes that make up Ross Island. While this may seem small compared to Colorado standards, it's definitely one steep climb because the trail has very few switchbacks and essentially goes straight up. Ob Hill as viewed from McMurdo You will notice the flat area almost halfway up on the right side. That is where the old nuclear power plant used to reside. As part of the Antarctic Treaty, nuclear material is not allowed in Antarctica so McMurdo was converted to run off of diesel generators and the nuclear power plant was decommissioned and removed. The Kiwi's have also installed three wind turbines that are shared between them and McMurdo, which also helps power the station now. Mt Erebus can be seen with a steam plume coming from the summi...