Project S.C.I.N.I.: November 2007

Friday, November 30, 2007: SCIENCE!

One of the best parts about working in the Crary lab is meeting all the other grantees and seeing their projects unfold, and today i've got a sampling of groups i've met over the past two months around station. By next year, the NSF should have updates it's US Antarctic Program website with a list of active science groups, but for now i'm all you've got...

(continued...)

A nudibranch collected by a diver from Amy's group

Next door to us in the aquarium area is Amy Moran's marine ecology group, which this year is studying sea slugs. They are one of the rare other diving groups and we share holes and huts with them pretty regularly; check out their updates here.

Sea spider tank

A few of Amy's students are working on a sea spider maneuverability experiment to measure how fast the oversized cold water variants can "right" themselves after being flipped on their backs (one of the factors which might normally limit the maximum size the spideys can grow to). It's nerve racking watching the crawlers stretch and shimy right on the edge of balance over and over trying to get right side up again, but it's amazing to see them pull it off.

We also end up working a lot with the fish guys: Art DeVries and his students John, Eric, and Kevin. The fish guys put in lots of hours squatting around in huts with Scooby Doo fish poles pulling up bernachii for the aquarium and mawsoni for sampling. They are mostly interested in the special proteins the fish keep in their blood to prevent ice crystals from growing into deadly shards in the sub-freezing water. They have to maintain a careful balance of salinity, lipids, anti-freeze proteins, and fluid pressure to stay alive.

The ANDRILL site from our helo flight returning from New Harbor

ANDRILL is one of the largest projects operating out of McMurdo this year, and includes a number of collaborators from Germany, New Zealand, Italy, and the UK, which gives Phase Two a more sophisticated international air. Though their coffee unfortunately isn't any better, thy did pass their depth target of 1000 meters about a week ago and are wrapping up their geographical coring and starting to pack up this week. ANDRILL is a rock coring project based on the sea ice; first they drill a few meters though the ice, then down hundreds of meters to the sea floor, then start drilling cores through the rock. It's a large operation to do seismic scouting for future drill sites, process and split cores, and maintain a safe large sea ice camp.

The long duration balloon (LDB) project is one of my favorites down here because they do PHYSICS and have a balloon that goes up 35 kilometers, where it expands to 130 meters across. This year's payload includes CREAM (a muon energy detector), BESS (a giant 0.8 tesla magnite, like an MRI machine, used to detect anti-proton interactions), and ATIC (a project to measure the extreme high energy spectrum of low atomic number elements). We're really hoping to see a balloon launch in the next few weeks before we leave, it all depends on the weather...

There are two seal groups that we met way back at snow craft training; the smithsonian group with Crystal, Wendy, Warren, Lisa, Regina, and Roberto, and Marcus Horning's group with Sascha, Jen, Adam, and Derick. They've all been living out at field camps, tagging and weighing the giant Weddell seals that we run into from time to time at our dive huts. Birthing season ended a few weeks ago and we're just getting into mating season now, so they've been quite busy.

Weddells are pretty amazing; they can chew through sea ice to create new breathing holes, hold their breath and swim for more than 40 minutes, and somehow survive the extreme winters in this area. After birth the mothers pass on hundreds of pounds of body weight as extremely think and fatty milk to their pups, not eating themselves the whole time; we have some footage of seals underwater that i'll try to back post here if it's more feasible to upload.

In other news, it's hot here! I'm sweaty pretty regularly just walking around town in my bunnies (the only waterproof boots I have) and a long sleeve shirt. Pretty soon it'll be colder back home in Boston that it is here; i'm looking forward to more snowy winter and a second spring in a few months!

And...

OCTOPUS 8.0: RETURN OF OCTOPI

Full Post (posted by bnewbold @ 01:27) 1 Comments

Thursday, November 29, 2007: Because it's there...

What do you do when you come across an iceberg frozen in the sea ice? On our trip to Cape Evans Bryan and I had the opportunity to find out!

(continued...)

What do you do when you come across an iceberg frozen in the sea ice?

The Big Ice... its lure is irresistable.

Well, you walk up close and then you test the boundary between the sea ice and the berg with the best tools you can find. Being the wiley veteran, I sent Bryan out in front.

It was Peque's idea to let Bryan go first...

Once you know its safe to reach it, you lick it. It was an irresistable compulsion, like certain people have for chocolate. It overcame both Bryan and myself. Peque carefully watched to make sure we didn't take too much.

Yummy

Antarctica,
all you can eat!

Once you have licked it, taking the icy goodness of the frozen
continent into your own body, you just have to climb on it.
No one can resist...

It's mighty slippery to climb...

...but just fine to rest on for a spell.

Lastly, after the close relationship we had shared, I just had to hug
the big hunk of ice goodbye. I miss it even now.

Full Post (posted by BLee Williams @ 12:22) 0 Comments

Wednesday, November 28, 2007: Trip to Cape Evans

Blee mentioned that we had a day off on Monday and the highlights of the day for him were having seal snot blown in his face and licking an iceberg. Now I don’t want everyone thinking we all are as easy to please as Blee. Some of us prefer the more civilized side of vacationing in Antarctica.

(continued)

Evan’s Wall is a shear volcanic wall that rises about 200 feet above the sea ice. Glacier ice pours over the wall and extends well below the sea ice and down to the ocean floor.

Our first event of the day off was to dive this location. Beneath the water, large rocks create a steep slope heading deeper than we could venture. At our 130 foot depth limit we found a rich community of sponges and soft corals and in the shallower depths were ice waterfalls extending to the bottom. It was a very pretty dive.

After our dive, Stacy unpacked a gourmet lunch and Blee complimented the spread with a nice bottle of wine.

I don’t think Blee ate or drank any wine because he was scared it might wipe off some of his precious seal snot. After lunch we took a walk along the ice wall and ended up at the iceberg locked in the sea ice. While the boys were licking and climbing I walked around looking at all the sculptured ice. I took picture after picture until the batteries in my camera froze and ended the photo session.

We then drove farther north to Cape Evans where Scott’s hut still stands. On the way we came across a small group of Adelie Penguins walking and sliding across the ice. It is a mystery as to where they were headed but they were definitely on some kind of a mission.

Scott’s Hut was a staging point for Scott’s ill fated attempt at reaching the South Pole. The 96 year old hut is in remarkable condition and is still provisioned with the gear and food from their occupation. The deep cold has kept this time capsule intact and it is a humbling and awe inspiring step back in time.

Brian was kind enough to pilot the Mattrak on the long drive home while the rest of the crew nodded off. It was our day off! So that is my view of a great vacation day in Antarctica. There is however always seal snot and iceberg licking if that better suits your tastes.

Full Post (posted by Rusty @ 01:37) 0 Comments

Tuesday, November 27, 2007: Turtle Rock scuba dive, Video Ray mission and octopi

Well today was an eventful one. As the title implies the schedule called for a scuba dive and a Video Ray mission held at Turtle Rock which is north of McMurdo. Stacy and Rusty were the divers who collected our normal suite of experiments while BLee and myself focused on carry out the Video Ray mission. We were joined by the dive tender William Tinus who works as the local machinist at the Vehicle Facility Maintains. William has be very helpful in the SCINI Project as we have asked him to machine a few pieces for the robot and he has provided us with excellent parts.

This picture was taken by William while I took a second to take in Mount Erebus. It felt like I could almost touch it.

(continued...)

Stacy, Rusty and BLee left ahead of William and myself in their speedy Piston Bully while we trudge behind slowly in the might TUCKER! The Tucker is a beast and isn’t really built for speed but for it’s raw power. I heard the Tucker took on a glacier head on and busted it to pieces, this vehicle demands respect.

The Tucker!

While in route to Turtle Rock I learned all about how William became a machinist and it all started back in the Navy. William scored one of the top two highest scores in his class and the Navy told him he had the opportunity to choose where he would like to go to school. Well like any right minded person would do he asked to be an electronics technician on a nuclear submarine. Apparently there were plenty of young seamen who were looking to do the same job so decided to go with his second choice, machinist mate. Something about the title had a ring to it and sounded very appealing to William. After he finished with his classes he was deployed in the Pacific and toured all around the Pacific Ring. After the Navy he did some machining in Long Beach and Colorado where he used to own a machine shop. But now I find this gifted machinist at the bottom of the world sitting next to me telling me how the beginnings of a machinist were created. William is from a time when you learned a trade and mastered. He even went so far to bring a pair of calipers, high accurate measuring device, just in case he needed to take some measurements on the rov. What a guy!

After some entertaining stories we arrived at Turtle Rock. We checked in with the divers as they were busy suiting up and go an okay to take a walk around to check out the pressure ridges. We were told to take some bamboo poles because to probe the ground with because there are unseen cracks that will gobble you up! Well not really but you can get pretty wet and be uncomfortable the rest of the day. Not only are there magnificent pressure ridges but there is also a colony of Waddell seals surrounding Turtle Rock. William and I wove our way throughout the colony but were mindful to keep a respectful distance. It is currently the season when female seal give birth and introduce their pups to the underwater world. Many of the pups were still feeing from the females but seemed to be growing rapidly. After snapping some photos we returned to the dive hut and helped with getting the divers out of the water. Both Rusty and Stacy said this dive site was an amazing place and the crack really helped to illuminate the world below the ice. With the divers out of the water and all packed up, BLee and I began to focus on the Video Ray mission.

Our goal was to locate some raised platforms that were at 20, 40 and 60 meters along the Turtle Rock slop. After some strategic navigation planning, hole drilling and set up time, we were ready to drop Video Ray into the water. Now this was a new experience for Video Ray because we normal deploy it though a hole but today it was deployed through a naturally formed crack. I was a bit skeptical but the crack was plenty big enough. With the rov in the crack I piloted to the sloping face of Turtle Rock. Between BLee and myself we did various search patters in depths of water from 40 to 60 meters which took us to the end of our tether but we were unable to find any of the platforms that we were looking for. We all agreed that we may have misjudge our deployment location and we were going to be unable to locate any platforms with our current tether length. At this point we ended the mission, recovered the rov and broke down all of our gear. To many people this may seem like an unsuccessful mission but I left Turtle Rock satisfied for a couple of reasons. Throughout the whole deployment we didn’t have any mistakes, we didn’t forget to bring important pieces of equipment and the dive went as smooth as it could have. From a piloting standpoint everything went as well as we could have planned for and next we have to expand our search more inland. We could expand our search by increasing our tether length or deploying the rov closer to Turtle Rock. Either way it may be a goal we shoot for next season as our time is running short here and it feels like there is still so much to do.

Ma and pup nose to nose

I asked this seal nicely to pose for the picture.

A fraction of the Turtle Rock Waddell seal colony.

Not only are there seals but Turtle Rock is surrounded by these pressure ridges. They are formed when sea ice is uplifted against the land.

Now for the octopi part of my update. The Fish Guys, as they are know to us, lay out fish traps to catch various types of fish to study how a certain type of molecule acts as an antifreeze agent that prevents the blood in the fish from freezing. One type of fish they are trapping is a Mossinite which is a very big fish that can weight over 100 pounds and lives at depths around 500 feet. Sometimes instead of Mossinite they catch other organisms, like an octopus. This was the second one they brought back with them and I have to admit they are very interesting creatures to look at. Just look at him, with a head that big you know it has to be a smart organism. I bet it could solve a rubix cube if you gave it one.

The day after this picture was taken the octopi went missing. Apparently it crawled out of the tank and someone found him in the middle of the night laying on the floor and put him back in a different tank.

Full Post (posted by Nicholas @ 10:46) 1 Comments

Monday, November 26, 2007: A day in the sunshine

Today we are working on access to two sites that are several kms away from McMurdo, Turtle Rock and Cinder Cones. We have been laying the groundwork by helping the Field Safety folks survey the area to be sure there is a safe way around the cracks for the large vehicles to travel, and flagging those routes. Today we accompanied Tom the driller out to put in the holes, and put a hut, kindly shared by another researcher, Amy Moran of the ANUDE project, on one of them.

Some of the beautiful pressure ridges, areas where
the ice has been pushed up against the shore,
at Turtle Rock.

(continued...)

We’ve talked before about the drilling operation, so I’ll skip another description of the shoveling exercise. Because of the sea ice cracks at Turtle Rock, we could not get to one of the sites we wanted to drill. So we carefully surveyed the naturally occurring openings in the cracks for one that the ROV would fit through. Fortunately, this location is extensively utilized by Weddell seals as a pupping area, and they have contributed to easy access to the ocean. We found a hole that was large enough, and had solid ice nearby where we could park the Tucker, our control center.

Setting up for drilling at Turtle Rock.

Today was one of the few clear days we have had so far this season, with blue sky and an awesome view of Mt. Erebus and even glimpses of Mt. Terror. We enjoyed the sunshine, and the calling and whinging of the new pups as they searched for mom and more milk. It is hard to imagine that the seals are comfortable laying on the cold ice, but they give a convincing demonstration of absolute contentment, flopped about bonelessly and only occasionally worming their way into a more comfortable position. They took almost no notice of us, our shovels, or even the tractor and drilling rig.

Mother and pup pairs of Weddell seals decorate the icescape at Turtle Rock.

At Cinder Cones the drilling went even more smoothly, and we are eager to dive here because the ice is clear of snow – so there should be lots of light underwater. We finished our two holes in short order, paid our respects to the gorgeous views of the Royal Society Range, Mt. Erebus, and Castle Rock, and returned home in time to make it to dinner with the Kiwis.

The slopes at the base of Mt. Erebus are beautifully fissured and crevassed.

We had a kind invitation from fish researcher Victoria Metcalf to come to dinner at Scott Base, New Zealand’s research station which is only a few km from McMurdo. Scott Base is smaller than McMurdo, and thus has better food and a more personalized atmosphere, if slightly less sophisticated lab facilities. We thoroughly enjoyed excellent John Dory fish, and pumpkin phyllo wraps, as well as conversation on fish behavior and physiology and a tour of the aquarium, and of course a wonderful view of the pressure ridges in front of the base. A brilliant end to a beautiful day!

Clear water ice melting in the warm Antarctic sun.

Full Post (posted by stacy @ 01:21) 2 Comments

Sunday, November 25, 2007: Werner Herzog Review

Sunday night at the end of Thanksgiving weekend McMurdo station got a screening of Werner Herzog's new documentary Encounters at the End of the World, which he shot last year in Antarctica as part of the NSF's writers and artists program. Many of the individuals interview in the film were present, and it was interesting to get an outsider's (warped?) perspective on life on the ice.

(continued...)

The first thing to say about any Herzog movie is of course that many of his victims/subjects have been somewhat misrepresented and represent caricatures from the director's unique world view. Given that the real world characters need little embellishment or spin, and that Herzog's technique is to draw out the excitement and passion in people only to trip them up with awkward pauses, a few scenes were painful and frustrating. I have seen a few other Herzog documentaries and knew what to expect but the effect is a little different when you know the person squirming under his strange celluloid stare.

Excusing a few half baked interviews, I think the film did a great job portraying the side of McMurdo that attracts many of us: incredible people, fantastic and surreal locations, fresh research, and a constant energy for exploration and discovery. The portion about the vulcanologist on Mount Erebus at the end made me wish I could get such an introduction to every research group; I had no idea just how active our island is nor had heard of the natural steam tunnels underneath the ice up there.

The portion on benthic ecology diving at New Harbor was a surprise to me, it's hard to belive we were just there at the beginning of the month. Much nostalgia over the drilling, dive tending, and a movie on the last night before flying out; we missed the rooftop concert and blasting.

The production could have been a bit higher quality, especially the video from under the sea ice, but I do appreciate what I assume was a more frugal use of resources than some film makers on the continent. This isn't the place for even a 4 person film crew when every individual is a mouth to feed, a body to clothe, a bed to reserve, a helicopter spot, and gallons of fuel and water to be transported and purified. I'd much prefer 5 Encounters at the End of the World than a single larger budget, more resource intensive production.

In other news, earlier in the day I took a walk out on the Cape Armitage loop, which goes around Observation Hill to the New Zealand Scott Base. It was so warm I could lie in the snow barechested and feel my skin fry in the high-UV light. I've never felt so strongly that I'm exposing myself to the raw radiation from a thermonuclear reaction millions of times more massive than the entire planet as I have down here... psychosomatic or otherwise, the light feels completely unfiltered.

Full Post (posted by bnewbold @ 18:51) 2 Comments

Saturday, November 24, 2007: Steady as we go...

We have been making steady progress at improving our operation.

Of course, there are still better things to do...

(continued...)

Congratulations are in order for the whole team as we have accomplished the goal for this season here in Antarctica: We can navigate under the ice. We have used Project Scini's nav equipment on the Video Ray and succesfully made maps of in-place science equipment on the seafloor. We have made good use of the sonar Video Ray lent to us to find the old experiments.

Sonar image of three cages that have been on the ocean floor for up to 40 years.

Peque is proud to lend a flipper. Note the Nav Ducer now stands upright (the better to hear) after sonar installation. Extra blocks of foam have been added high on the vehicle to compensate for the added mass of the sonar. A well-deserved rest is in order.

Video Ray gets a freshwater soak in the sink after a busy day of swimming in the salty ocean.

Meanwhile, back at the lab...SCINI has been undergoing a testing program seeking to tune the power system in order to run the propulsion thrusters more smoothly. Bryan has had the lead on this and had worked long and hard, and has made great progress. Most of the week SCINI's inside were outside as we tested, measured and tweaked.

Doctor Bryan operates...

There is still work to do, but we have the brains to do it. Nick will need to build up the thruster motors so we have spares. Bob and Bryan will test various fixes we have impleneted as they put the vehicle back together. And finally we will be operating SCINI in a seawater tank in Crary Lab to ensure we have a reliable build. Then back we go under the ice. To help make sure we are prepared for that harsh environment we have enlisted the aid of Peque, the worlds most technically astute penguin, to oversee the entire operation.

Peque stands ready to help with the assembly of SCINI

Full Post (posted by BLee Williams @ 11:59) 2 Comments

Friday, November 23, 2007: Critters and SCINI

For those of you waiting for news on the latest progress with SCINI, you'll have to be patient because this update will discuss the other major component of the project. Dr’ Kim’s past research in Antarctica has focused on benthic community changes (critters living in and on the seafloor) resulting from human activities in the Antarctic. Detecting benthic community change requires years of patient and focused sampling so long term data sets can be compiled and analyzed. Read on for a taste of what the marine biologists do when sampling for community change in the Antarctic.

(continued...)

This project is sampling the sea floor around McMurdo Station where human impacts are expected and reference locations far from McMurdo where human impacts are expected to be minimal. So what kind of impacts are we talking about? Any time people occupy a location for an extended period of time, wastes are generated. This includes things like trash, used fuel and lubricants, human wastes and a wide variety of construction materials. McMurdo’s long history of activity dates back to 1901, and over the years and phases of development at the station, waste disposal policies were not always as environmentally responsible as they are today. This was primarily due to the extreme logistical difficulty and cost of transporting waste back out of Antarctica. Ocean disposal was common in the past and today we still find extensive evidence of waste products on the ocean bottom. Because the environment is so cold here, waste products degrade very slowly, forcing biological communities to contend with these conditions for many years. Some species are tolerant and can adapt to contaminated conditions while others are very sensitive and unable to adapt. This often leads to an increase of the tolerant species and a decline in the sensitive species. Increases and decreases of even a few species can lead to major changes in the entire community due to the interdependency of species in this harsh environment. Detecting changes in community structure and tracking those changes over time allows us to assess the magnitude of the human impacts around McMurdo and the rate at which communities are recovering now that effective waste management has been implemented. Dr. Kim and her colleagues began monitoring benthic communities around McMurdo in 1988 so those data sets are now invaluable when assessing human impacts and long term change around McMurdo. The current project will add three years of benthic community assessment to the existing data and will serve to further expand our understanding of long term change in Polar regions.

Benthic community sampling under the ice is extremely difficult because of the effort and cost of drilling multiple holes through the ice. Small ROVs like SCINI can’t perform all the needed sampling and large ROVs with manipulator arms capable of collecting all the samples are typically too large to fit through ice holes. That means divers are still the most effective sediment sampling tool in this environment. It leads to some pretty cold fingers, toes and lips but each trip under the ice amazes us in some new way. Getting to see and study these communities is a marine biologist’s dream so I for one hope that we are never able to completely automate sampling with ROVs.

We collect three types of samples at each study location: infaunal cores, digital photographs and video transects.

Six infaunal cores about the size of a coffee can are pressed into the sediment and then capped (not easy with big gloves on) so they can be transported to the surface.

In the lab, sieving the sediment through a fine screen separates the critters from the sediment and allows for easier preservation and handling.

A microscope is then used to do the taxonomic identification and counting of the various species in the sample. Infaunal core sampling is used primarily for identifying small species such as polychaete worms, crustaceans and bryozoans that can be found living in or on the sediment in relatively high numbers.

Next, ten underwater digital photos are taken at each location in such a way that the image captures 1 square meter of seafloor. These images are then analyzed to do area counts of larger species like nemertean worms, urchins and anemones that the cores don’t effectively capture.

A final sampling effort involves taking underwater digital video along three ten meter long by one meter wide transects of sea floor. These video images are then analyzed to identify and count larger and more mobile species such as sponges, pycnogonids (sea spiders), large isopods and nudibranchs along the transect.

Each of these sampling efforts yields a list of species and their average abundances within the sample area. By combining the species counts from each of the three sampling techniques we can develop a basic community structure for the location we are interested in. In short we simply are trying to determine what animals live at a location and the relative density of those animals. Tracking that information over multiple years at many locations helps us understand whether the communities are changing and whether the communities are healthy or impacted. That in turn allows us to associate human activities with community changes so that we can better mange the unique resources in Antarctica.

So what ties SCINI and benthic community assessments together in this project? Divers in the Antarctic are restricted to shallow water (<130 feet) by physiological limitations and U.S. policy. We also need a three to four foot hole to dive through. That combination prohibits the exploration of vast areas of the sea floor deeper than 130 feet. SCINI however requires a small ice hole so it can be deployed with much less effort and costs and eventually should be able to reach depths of several thousand feet. Its high resolution video allows us to observe and quantify at least a portion of the community at much greater depths than previously possible and its navigation capabilities allow us to build more accurate maps of each sampling location. This gives us complimentary sampling techniques that actually broaden the information we can collect and expands the depth range over which we can sample. It’s a great combination of old and new technologies that will give us better insights to marine life under the ice.

Full Post (posted by Rusty @ 00:32) 2 Comments

Thursday, November 22, 2007: Happy Turkeylurky Day and don't forget to ask me who turned 50!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!
So Thanksgiving crept up on me this year and for some reason I thought it was on the 25th. In the light of this holiday I thought I would write a little about what I am thankful for this year. I would have to say I am thankful for all of my family and friends that miss me so during my time here in Antarctica. I really enjoy Thanksgiving and Christmas because it is a time when much of my family, some who I haven’t seen all year, comes together. I am also missing the first Thanksgiving that is going to be held at my brother’s house and I wish I could be there to celebrate it with them. A Happy Thanksgiving to all loved ones from the SCINI team. On with the update!

Go ahead, ask me who turned 50 today!

(continued...)

Today was an interesting day in the world of our ROV Video Ray. We planned on traveling down to Dayton’s Wall to do some science. Our goal was to map some old experiments that Dr. Paul Dayton had placed underwater several years ago. In order to map the area we needed to drill some holes for our navigation system. So after a morning of prep, Stacy, Rusty and I went out to drill three holes in the ice. I can’t believe how easy it was to drill these holes, I’m used to the hard ice that we were drilling through at New Harbor. After an hour we drilled and GPS each of our holes without a problems. We returned for lunch and gathered up all of our equipment for the Video Ray dive.The deployment team consisted of BLee, Bob, Stacy and myself. Before deployment Bob made some extensions for our navigation cables so we could extend our range and allow us to navigate more efficiently. Well when we got to the dive hole we found our navigation cables weren’t long enough and we were about 10 to 20 meters off. I think someone forgot to carry a zero! To solve this problem we rearranged some cables and pulled one of our cables higher in the water column. After this little mishap we were on to some science.

This is what a typical rov mission looks like. Lots of wires and lots of computers.

We ran into some unexpected navigation problems and after about an hour of attempting to solve the problem we decided to cancel the science portion of the mission. With the mission canceled this was a perfect opportunity for Bob to do some test piloting. So I handed the piloting controls over and took a break from driving. Bob was doing a great job of piloting and as another navigation test we decided he should try to find our navigation transducers that were hanging in the water column. He flew Video Ray over to transducer one without any problems. Well while we were nice in warm in the dive hut the weather outside had started to get ugly. The weather around here can change in a moments notice and by the look outside a storm was blowing in quickly. Even though we were only about a mile away from McMurdo Station there was still the possibility of getting stranded in the dive hut. Stacy didn’t hesitate to call the rest of our testing and decided that we need to pack up the necessary gear and head back to town.

While BLee and Bob recovered Video Ray, Stacy and I went outside to collect our cables. For some reason we couldn’t pull transducer cable number one through the hole and Video Ray couldn’t get away from transducer number one. And then it hit us, Video Ray tether was caught on the first transducer! BLee took over the piloting controls and attempted to untangle the tether but was unable to. So now we were faced with a tough decision. We could keep trying pilot Video Ray to untangle the tether or we could unplug the navigation cable at the surface and hope that Video Ray would be recovered with a navigation cable hanging from it. We decided to go with the latter and Stacy and I unplugged the navigation cable and watched it sink under the ice. We rushed back into the dive hut to help recover Video Ray and see if our plan worked. Unfortunately, Video Ray was recovered without the transducer and cable. By this time the wind was howling outside and we loaded up our vehicle to head right back to town. We weren’t too worried about the cable because we knew it was in between the dive hole and transducer number one which was about 20 meters away. And with the visibility here we should be able to find it while scuba diving in no time. So we made it back to town and the clouds that looked mean and vicious turned out to be nothing more then strong wind.

This is an example of how tether and transducer were tangled up.

Now that we returned to McMurdo it was time for dinner followed by our “engineering meeting” at the dive locker. We weren’t really having a meeting but that’s what we told Rusty to get him to the dive locker. Today is Rusty’s 50 birthday and we were trying to have a surprise party for him. Too bad I showed up late to the surprise part! Anyways we had a grand ol time and we all laughed and giggled late into the evening. We were even joined by some of our Kiwi friends from Scott Base, oh how I love their accents. Rusty received several gifts to remind him that he just turned 50 but some how I ended up wearing half of his gifts.

These are just some of the gag gifts Rusty received for his birthday. Notice the bleeding lip, I guess when you turn 50 your parts just start falling to pieces. Happy birthday to you Rusty.

I don't know what to say, just hand me another beer.

Full Post (posted by Nicholas @ 19:20) 3 Comments

Wednesday, November 21, 2007: The SOS and FALA experiment

After 2 days of surface supply diving, I was very happy to have a little less physically strenuous day in the lab. I worked with the experiments that Charmaine Ryan’s SOS class in Watsonville, CA and Mindy Bell’s biology and chemistry classes in Flagstaff, AZ built for the ROV to perform down here. So even though the students can’t be here, a bit of each of their spirits, captured in film, is here in Antarctica, and even underwater!

Nick positions VideoRay to take images
of the experiments built by high school
classes in California and Arizona.

(continued...)

One of the big performance tests for an ROV to be used for science is visual acuity. As an ecologist, I need to be able to identify animals that the ROV captures in its cameras. The classes were helping us by building an experiment to test the visual acuity of the ROV, and assess the maximum distance, and minimum light level, that is needed for correct identification.

Some of the many species of sponges, anemones, corals
and other animals that ecologists need to identify.

We sent engineering drawing to the classes, and it was up to them to figure out how to interpret the 2 dimensional representation and build the system. There was room for suggestions and improvement – as there always is. We brought with us the frame they built, and images for identification – but instead of identifying Antarctic sponges and seastars, the students were to identify themselves and their class mates. Each student sent a laminated self portrait that could be laced into the frame.

Here is the specification sheet for the experiment, ready to be turned in to reality by the students.

With the experimental systems assembled, we headed down to Winter Quarters Bay and lowered them and the ROV into the water. Nick showed a steady hand as chief pilot, with Rusty as assistant. They flew around and took images near and far away, at high and low light levels. Which do you predict would provide the easiest combination for good identification?

Nick and Bryan next to the assembled frame and pictures.

My job today was to convert the hours of video into shorter relevant data that can be sent over the very small internet pipe from McMurdo to California and Arizona. The SOS and FALA students will then interpret the image data, and get beck to us with a report on how close we have to get, and how powerful our lights have to be, for us to identify not only McMurdo animals, but also high school students!

The SOS class underwater in Antarctica!

Full Post (posted by stacy @ 17:59) 5 Comments

Tuesday, November 20, 2007: Electromechanic Wonderland Miscellany

This week will be a lot of bench time for me as I debug some thruster power issues, recalibrate sensors, clean up our controls software, and add some inertial measurement features. So while everybody else is out breaking their backs in beautiful high twenties weather I'm getting fat eating cookies, electrocuting myself, and putting the Mr. Coffee through a stress test.

(continued...)

Being a physics dork, I'm pretty excited about our inertial sensors. These micro-electro mechanical systems (MEMS) devices are tiny enough to fit on a standard microchip board and give us feedback on how SCINI is oriented ("Which way is down?") and how fast we're turning ("Wait, are we moving?"). Our acoustic navigation system gives us positions in space over time, so we can figure out exactly where we are and sometimes roughly how fast we're moving, but it's accuracy and speed (updates every couple seconds) make it difficult to tell what's going on right now, and gives us no information at all about SCINI's orientation with respect to the ground. In good conditions we can look around for a dive rope or even back at the hole to figure out where we are, but sometimes the ground is sloped or we are flying in pitch black and have no reference.

The accelerometers measure the force being applied on SCINI; sometimes this is due to our thrusting about or handling on the surface, but mostly it's due to gravity (or more precisely the buoyant forces keeping us from free falling at the acceleration of gravity). By comparing our acceleration along three different axes (forwards/backwards, up/down, left/right), we can calculate the gravitational force vector in SCINI's frame of reference (aka, which way is straight down relative to which way the ROV is looking); because on human scales this direction is pretty constant, we then invert this vector to give the pilot SCINI's orientation vector in their frame of reference (aka, which way the ROV is pointing relative to the ground). Because we don't have a compass (the magnetic fields are crazy around here; magnetic south is actually north of us) and gravity is symmetrical around a vertical axis (you can't "feel" which way is north or west like you can up and down), we don't know which direction we are pointed on the ground plane (for navigation), but we know our pitch and roll tilt, which are more important for maneuvering.

The tiny circuit board sticking out perpendicular from the main microcontroller board contains all of our inertial sensors

The accelerometers are pretty simple conceptually: there is a tiny lever with a weight on the end which gets flexed when a force is applied on it; the sensor measures how far the level is flexed to determine the force. Our gyroscopes, which measure the rate of rotation, are a little trickier. A classic gyroscope is a spinning weight suspended so that it can twist freely; the weight wants to keep spinning the same way (think of the bicycle tire trick), so you measure the orientation of the weight to determine how far you have rotated relative to it. It's pretty tricky to suspend a large enough weight and keep it spun up in a cheap way, however, so instead we use sensor based around a tiny vibrating mass: when twisted the coriolis effect perturb the path of the mass to one side or the other, and this is measured to determine the speed of rotation (aka angular velocity). If you're interested in all that, check out these HOT HOT links: white paper, wikipedia, manufacturer description.

And now... filler photos! Leave a comment if you are curious about any of these; I realized we had anonymous comments disabled, the process should be easier now.

Icefish skull

Quiet Crary lab hallway

Nudibranch hanging out in the Crary aquarium

In case nobody else has mentioned it, Antarctica is a harsh continent, and also doesn't care. These truths tragically hold true for invertebrates as well as us boney types, even wise beasts like this octopus that got caught in a fish trap over the weekend. The effects of decompression coming up from more than 140 meters (400+ feet) were too much for the poor fellah and he didn't make it through the night, but for a while he ruled the fish tank benevolently, putting feisty bernacchii in their place with a smack from his mighty tentacle and cycling through skin colors faster than a cabernet singer. He will be missed.

Full Post (posted by bnewbold @ 13:41) 0 Comments

Monday, November 19, 2007: Some Lessons Learned

I have been in Antartica for coming on 18 days, and we have had VideoRay in the water 10 of them. Including the last 6 days in a row. I call that reliable.

(continued...)
I have been in Antartica for coming on 18 days, and we have had VideoRay in the water 10 of them. Including the last 6 days in a row. I call that reliable. Since as ussual I am behind on my blog, I thought it would be a good idea to send Marcus a Operations Report and post it as a blog. I figure Video Ray will like this since they sent out a press release quoting my last blog. If I make this one long enough maybe they will make a feature film... (By the way fellas, should I send you an address to send my royalty checks to?)

The sonar is the black cylinder at the front of the floatation block.

The TriTech sonar has been invaluable. Mounting it was a little tricky... I ended up adding a half wrap of electrical tape to the OD of the base and press fitting it into the hole provided in the foam. It is wonderfully secure. Marcus Commented that this was the way he ussually mounts the sonar, too!

It can be difficult to identify small targets as the slider system for setting contrast and sensitivity requires considerable tweaking, and on the fly the pilot doesn't have that time. It is very, very useful as a way of determining heading. Most work is done on a slope, and the direction of "up-hill" is known. Setting the sonar on polar (360 degree scan) and "High Speed" to keep track of which direction it gets shallow in has been critical to efficiently driving the VideoRay.
The sonar has been useful in making small scale maps showing how groups of objects relate to one another. Below is a map/photo of several sample cages we discovered with Video Ray while looking for Stacy's experiments at Cinder Cones.

The corrals are too close together for seperate nav positions of each one to be very useful, but the sonar image allows the scientist to easily see their spatial relationship.

After adding both the sonar to the Nav Ducer above the center of gravity of Video Ray, I was concerned about stability. I added some flotation up high as well, and extra wieght down low to compensate.

Peque, the World's Most Technically Astute Penguin, proudly displays the new Nav Transducer mount with added flotation.

I have noticed that VideoRay tends to roll a bit in turns even with the attempt to increase the metacentric height. I lack the time, inclination, or information to compute Stabilty for the vehicle, and it occurs to me that most 'casual' operators would rather just have the answer instead of the problem. It might be a good idea to include a stabilty adjustment with any piece of semi-standard add-on equipment.

I have been operating positively bouyant and using the vertical thruster to hold the vehicle steady on the bottom. It has gotten a lot of run time. I think this has contributed to a low oil level in the shaft seal. The aft thruster's seals do not have low levels. I'll be topping off the level in the Vert's Shaft Seal tomorrow. We get a day off from diving! Hooray for maintenance!

Marcus commented that VideoRay recommends replacing rather than refilling the seal cartridge. After I had it apart I found the oil level was not low after all. I reinstalled and dove it to 30 meters with no problems. I have dove three different VideoRays for three different scientists and I have yet to see a real problem with these seals. In my experience, they are the best idea for sealing a prop shaft I have seen, easy to check, dependable, easy to change. Lovely.

The integrated laser package Marcus sent us has performed flawlessly. We only notice them when we need to measure something. Perfecto.

The single biggest improvement that could be made to the ROV opertion is a dependable heading indication. We can use the sonar to keep track of up-hill, and watch the nav to see which way we end up travelling, but real time heading information would make the job significantly easier and intuitive. VideoRay has heading indication provided by a magnetic compass, but it suffers from the geographical location of our dives (we are south of the south magnetic pole) as well as nearby thruster magnetic fields. Operating in Antarctica doesn't help but in my experience with other VideoRay operations, far from the Poles, I have seen the same rapid compass swings. It is an agile little vehicle and can swing very quickly for real. I long for a laser ring gyro to provide a steady heading... It would only perhaps quadruple the cost of the VideoRay. Maybe if I'm good I'll get one for Yule.

Full Post (posted by BLee Williams @ 13:59) 0 Comments

Sunday, November 18, 2007: Traveling on snow and ice

Safely and efficiently traveling around McMurdo requires functionality and reliability of equipment that is suited for extreme cold conditions. This update takes a quick look at the strange names and configurations of vehicles used to meet the various needs of the community. Think of it as a car show- McMurdo style.

(continued...)

After stepping off the airplane, new arrivals are hurried to the Terra Bus, a behemoth designed for moving large groups of people and gear across the ice and snow between the runway and town. The tires on this beast are about 5 1/2 feet tall and 4 feet wide so stairs are needed to climb in. From this elevated perch one gets their first view of McMurdo and the ride to town for orientation.

The next size down in mass transportation is the Delta. This is another vehicle that you don't want to change a flat tire on. It seats about twenty if you squeeze in tight, like we did when going to snow school. As we found out though, if you are cold, being packed in really tight doesn’t seem quite so bad. It can even be an asset because experienced McMurdoites know to pick someone cute to sit next to.

The Mercedes Benz of the McMurdo fleet is the Hagglund. Manufactured for the Swedish military, it is expensive, fast and particularly valuable on sea ice because it floats if it breaks through the ice (tests are not recommended however). These vehicles are used primarily by the FSTP folks that survey cracks in the sea ice and by Search and Rescue teams.

The next few vehicles are issued to the various research groups based on their particular personnel and equipment needs. Each vehicle requires some training to understand their function, limitations and quirks.

Our group uses a Tucker Snow Cat that pulls a tracked trailer loaded with our equipment. The tucker boasts a powerful diesel that drives four independent tracks. The chassis articulates in the center giving a pivot point in the center of the vehicle rather than near the front. Backing it with the trailer is “interesting”. We also use this to tow our dive huts from dive hole to dive hole. With its long tracks it can travel almost anywhere but its “not so” top speed is sure to make you late for dinner anywhere you go.

Other groups requiring less people or equipment typically use the Piston Bulley. It’s another diesel powered tracked vehicle that distinguishes itself by being faster than the Tucker but having no suspension to soften the ride. It will rattle your teeth so have your fillings checked and come prepared if you wear dentures. If not, you may get to dinner on time but you’ll only be able to eat the soup.

For smaller teams or smaller loads you may elect to use a MatTrack. This is a pickup with its drive system converted to use tracks rather than wheels. It is a great idea but all the moving parts require vigilance with regard to maintenance.

It also has a reputation for overheating the transmission when driven too fast and catching the vehicle on fire. You are warned about this in the training but occasionally people forget when late for dinner.

Around town, standard four wheel drive pickups and vans are used but interestingly the four wheel drive shift level is removed and you have no option of shifting them into two wheel drive. I guess there’s simply no reason to even try two wheel drive around here.

If you need to move equipment around on pallets you get to use a “Pickle”. They certainly won't win any beauty awards so it’s no wonder the Navy wanted to give away these so aptly named work horses.

For fast traveling for one or two people there are plenty of snowmobiles to pick from the pool. The Skidoo seems to be most common of several types. These are used for both work and recreational travel but any time they leave town, travel must be in groups of two or more snowmobiles. Redundancy of machines that aren't large enough to provide survival shelter is mandatory when traveling away from the station.

If your driving record back home proves you can’t be trusted to drive any of the vehicles around station, you get assigned skis and/or a snowboard. Only Nick has earned that notable distinction in our group.

So no matter what your needs are in McMurdo, there is a snow and ice vehicle that will fit the job.

Full Post (posted by Rusty @ 19:58) 0 Comments

Saturday, November 17, 2007: Life Under Water

Today’s update comes to you from underwater. Well not really but it involved some underwater activities. I have to say that every time I suit up to get into the water there is a feeling of excitement that runs through my body. I have made seven or eight dives under the ice and each dive has been a new experience. Today we were suppose to dive a site called Arrival Heights and this was going to be newly formed team member Rusty’s first dive. The plan, Rusty and Dive God Rob Robbins were to complete their dive first and Bob, Stacy and myself were going to splash in next.

Mama Stacy makes sure Rusty’s mask is tucked in and ready to go for his first Antarctic dive.

(continued...)

Dive God Rob Robbins had briefed us on the 119 foot dive site where a huge volcano sponge sat at the bottom. From the bottom of the down line the ground sloped upwards As we waited for Rusty and Dive God I thought about my first dive and how I felt prior do jumping in.

After about 30 minutes we saw some air bubbles come up from the dive hole and we all prepared for Rusty and Dive God’s return. Rusty was the first one to come up and his first words out of his mouth were, “That was horrible!” Of course he had a joking grin on his face. We all helped strip Rusty’s gear off and next up came Dive God as smooth as can be. Rusty’s first experience under the ice was a great one and he saw some amazing new things. In a post dive interview Rusty said he really enjoyed the anchor ice that has formed on the bottom of the ocean.

Okay, on with what you people want, more pictures!!!

This is what a Rusty looks like before an ice dive.

Rusty poses so well underwater.

And this is what a Rusty looks like after a dive. What an accomplishment!

Here is some of the anchor ice covered with ribbion worms. Hey, isn't ice suppose to float??

I mean this little fishy was way too cute for Stacy to not take a picture of!

And no dive would be complete without some goofy pictures of Bob and I posing.

This has nothing to do with the post but I went snowboarding on a trial called Castle Rock the other day. Snowboard and ski in Antarctica, check!

Full Post (posted by Nicholas @ 00:40) 0 Comments

Friday, November 16, 2007: Getting rearranged

Rusty and BLee are almost through the training process and ready to start. Having new ideas and fresh energy added to the team will be great. The down side is that today Marcus and Mindy left. We will miss them! They contributed a lot to the team with their hard work, great attitudes, and individual skills. And their departure reminded us that we do not have that much time left before we too will be going home.

Marcus and Mindy are ready to leave Antarctica.

(continued...)

Rusty is a marine chemist, who runs a large and busy lab in California, the Marine Pollution Studies Lab. His interest in environmental issues has led him into projects that include monitoring, contaminant surveys, and introduced species studies. His diving and shoveling skills will be utilized intensely within the SCINI project. Rusty is also an avid hunter and outdoorsman, but I do not think the former will be very useful here!

Rusty doing some sampling back in California.

BLee comes from a background with the Alvin manned submersible at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Aside from piloting the sub, he was also an expert power systems engineer, which developed from his Navy work on nuclear submarines. His experience with the operational side of a very busy research sub will be very important to us to streamline our operations as we deploy our ROV more often.

The Alvin submersible ready for launch.

Mindy is on her way back to Flagstaff, Arizona, where many eager students – and her husband and daughter - await her return. Her PolarTREC online journal and the 4 webinar outreach events we conducted from McMurdo have helped connect the SCINI project with interested students and others back in the “real world.” I will miss her wonderful willingness to attempt things even when she doubted her ability (and she was always able to do them), and having another woman on the team.

Mindy ready to head out for another day of work on the ice.

Marcus is returning to his wife and 4 kids in Pennsylvania, and his real job with VideoRay. We have been very fortunate to have use of one of his commercial ROVs, and more importantly, to use of his brain and hands to help us develop and improve SCINI. I was very impressed with the scientific capabilities of the VideoRay, and I already miss all of Marcus’ great ideas, and his ability to wear stupid hats with style.

Marcus trying to recover some drill flights by climbing into a 6 ft deep hole in the ice.

The team has a new flavor with the changing members as well as our experience and increasing familiarity with each other and with SCINI. Thank you to Mindy for early mornings, camaraderie, teaching us how to teach, and helping us connect with learners of all ages. Thank you to Marcus for being willing to join us, work with us, stress with us, and succeed with us! We’re very glad that you’re both part of the SCINI team!

(
Get the Flash Player to see this player!)

Here's a short video summarizing our mid-season accomplishments.
(medium)

Full Post (posted by stacy @ 00:37) 0 Comments

Thursday, November 15, 2007: Where we stand

Today is Mindy and Marcus's sad last full day, and one of the first we've had Rusty and BLee along, so we were a bit crowded in a a dive tomato for our video ray deployment.

Nick collected data on the sewage outfall pile for his capstone project, and the rest of us got practice deploying and driving the video ray so we'll know what we're doing after Marcus leaves.

I thought the middle of our time here would be a good time to give an update on SCINI's technical progress and the issues still facing us, so the rest of this post will be a some-what technical run through; You'll either find it RIVITING or BORING.

(continued...)

So far our major successes with SCINI have been:

"Medium" (high definition grade, good enough to pull photos out of) video capture
Reasonable motor and positioning control and excellent tether dragging/current fighting power
No bottle leaks or floods down to ~150ft (50 meters)
A full (time saving!) deployment through a 10in diameter hole drilled at New Harbor.
A successful dive with SCINI and the video ray in the water

We currently operate with two similar ROVs (SCINI I and SCINI II aka SCINII aka SCINEEEEEEEE). The electrical distribution systems have been running smoothly so far, though we haven't really tested them (they haven't caught on fire or stopped working).

Most of the science video collection and exploration we did with the video
ray at new harbor, both because of manuverability reliability (SCINI had
broken motors and an unexperienced pilot, and it's design doesn't make for
as smooth manuvering yet). video ray is great, very easy to get everything
rolling, but needs a larger hole melted out (long time) and it's video isn't
going to get any better than it is now.

Mechanically, we've had a number of motors fail. We tried filling our
casings with mineral oil, but 50% of those have failed as well. We've been
able to swap out entire thruster couplings (the white tubes in between
bottles) easily so far; probably the worst part of a motor failure is how
long it takes for the pilot to realize they're driving poorly because of
mechanical failure, not just carbon monoxide poisoning.

The tethers haven't been a show stopper, but a few connectors have broken or
leaked, and we're also having some network troubles streaming video over the
longest lengths; maybe the elphel camera could be tweaked to work better in
these conditions? That would be treating the symptoms, not the cause.
Bouyancy in general has been slightly positive, but that's
good because it keeps SCINI slightly nose down which gives us a better
view without leaning on the thrusters.

For controls, we've been sticking with the simple python software I wrote a
while back and the 6 degree of freedom controller. I'd like to complete the
MOOS software system instead of hacking on more features (like dual
joysticks) to the simple program.

The camera situation is one of the top priorities right now. In general it's
not super smooth to playback because it's so much data, i'd like to tweak the
laptops so it plays better. It's also been hard to get it to display super
high resolution video reasonably (fit to screen, almost crashes computer); I
think I can improve this with a couple hours fiddling about.

Only SCINI (not SCINII) has inertial and depth sensors set up right now, and
i'm not really doing anything with that data... it would be really good to
at least get visual feed back of tilt and rotation speed for the pilot, but
that will take some calibration and software writing.

Our collected video has been getting backed up and i'm working right now on
transcoding it to a more workable file format. Some better solution for
anotations and screen grabs would be great, MBARI has software that i'd love
to get running and integrated. We also haven't done any editing and few
clips, I'd like to streamline that process so we can publicize our results
and more importantly start doing science with SCINI.

A growing pain with the camera is that the LED lights are thermally
connected to the sensor board, and after about 5 minutes the sensor gets up
to 55 celsius and the images get noise, errors, artifacts, and eventually
get corrupted. Either cooling or thermal isolation are required (no fan in
that bottle right now).

The LED reflection cone I built is working pretty well, you can see the difference in these two stills, both with lights turned up high:

Without light baffle

With Light Baffle

As is it is a pain to switch camera modes, take snapshots
at a different resolution, change exposure settings (I usually turn off auto exposure because it varies the frame rate at the long exposures we use, and I haven't figured out a way of compensating for this). If I have time I would love to write a MOOS client for the elphel to manage these settings from the controls interface, and log information about the video at the same time (eg, frames with navigation data).

Full Post (posted by bnewbold @ 18:15) 2 Comments

Wednesday, November 14, 2007: Better Things to do...

When it comes to posting a blog, as far as I know I am the furthest behind of any member of our team. This post was suppose to be up on the 16th and it is now the 21st. Makes me kinda proud, actually. I have no excuse, but I might have an explanation...

(continued...)

I'm in Antarctica. "When I grow up I'm gonna..." We all had a list. Visiting this continent was the only thing remaining on my childhood list that I had not done. I did not come here to sit at a computer and write a blog. But it is an amazing place and deserves a chronicle.
Right now I am upstairs in the Crary Lab Library, looking out across the Ross Sea at some islands that are about 50 miles away. That is about the equivalent of sitting on the steps of the White House in Washington DC and seeing Baltimore. The air is incredibly clean, and you really can see forever.
And the view will stop you dead in your tracks. Mount Discovery and the Royal Society Range rise right up off the flat white McMurdo Ice Shelf and poke right through the clouds. Mount Discovery looks like a big pile of vanilla ice cream with chocolate syrup running all over it.
My favorite is the gleamingly metallic Royal Society Range. All shiny and cold looking, they could be "The Saw of the Gods" if they were not named by some scientist desperate for funding and/or recognition.
The mountains are almost always wreathed in clouds but when the weather clears behind them the blue backdrop makes them leap out at you and completely fill the horizon. I came expecting to be awed by Mount Erebus (and I was), but I've fallen in love with the shy mountains across the sea. I look for them maybe 30 times a day, and my main photographic goal for the rest of the trip is to remember my camera and get a picture when they next burst out into the sun.
Right now Discovery is hidden in clouds, with just her feet showing. The Royals have clouds atop them but the valleys are seeing sunshine through some gaps in the cloud cover. The Blue Glacier rolls down out of the mountains and is yellow-orange in the sunlight, shining like a wet road where it meets the sea ice. Higher up the light glints unevenly off the scattered ice surfaces. 50 miles away and it looks like you could walk across the ice in a couple hours.

The southwestern Royal Society Range as seen from the Library. The shining Blue Glacier can be seen at right below the boiling clouds.

PS... I am a passionate Newcastle United fan, and follow the team however I can and from where ever I have to. The best site for all things Toon is nufc. They have been compiling a list of countries from which Magpie fans access their site, and were up to 171 until I weighed in from McMurdo. They have recognized Antarctica as a full-fledged country, listing it between Anguilla and Antigua y Barbuda.
Passport information for the newly recognized nation to follow as soon as someone can be found to take on the job of King, Queen, President, Prime Minister, or Chief Headhunter.

Full Post (posted by BLee Williams @ 01:07) 0 Comments

Tuesday, November 13, 2007: Reinforcements Arrive

We’ve had a mid-season changing of the guard on the SCINI project with the previous Sunday’s arrival of Rusty and Blee and today’s (Friday) departure of Marcus and Mindy on a northbound C-17. That leaves some big shoes to fill for myself (Rusty) and Blee. We have been going through the week long basic survival and logistic trainings (sea ice, snow school, vehicles, small engines and radio communications) and completed all just in time for us to take over some of our roles tomorrow.

(continued...)

Last on my list of trainings is a check out dive so that I can take over Marcus’s diving responsibilities on the project. There are 19 divers on the continent this year so it’s a pretty exclusive group of scientist to rub shoulders with and a rare opportunity to see things few divers have ever seen. For me it has also been a long held goal to experience a dive under the cover of ice so I’m getting really excited as that time nears.

Fortunately we had some time between classes yesterday for a Video Ray ROV dive just outside McMurdo, at the wastewater outfall, so that Blee and I could learn the basics and begin to better understand our project roles. Planning a research ROV dive, setting up the system through the ice, testing it prior to a dive and establishing effective navigation, all precede the fun of actually piloting the ROV on a science mission. The highlight of yet another day of firsts for me was piloting the ROV at the end of the science mission and getting a feel for the various propulsion and video controls. It’s like playing a video game where crashes at a minimum will cost you a day of wearing a really silly looking hat. Damaging the ROV obviously has more serious consequences because FedEx doesn’t deliver here.

Before our narrow focus on science blurs my first vision of Antarctica, I’d like to pass on some glimpses of life at McMurdo station. First impressions start with walking off a C-17
that has just landed on 12 feet of frozen ocean, and standing on flat whitish-blue sea ice with a surrounding view of black volcanic island and mainland peaks in every direction.

In the cold clear air and 24 hour sun the perceived distances deceive the eye and peaks 40 miles distant beckon as if they were only an afternoon hike away. From the airstrip which is a mile away on the flat sea ice of McMurdo Sound, McMurdo Station has the appearance of a mining camp perched on the side of a volcanic cone called Observation Hill (a small mountain to some). A bustling city of 1100 people (150 over-winter) occupy a spacious cluster of buildings representing various eras of architecture. Most won’t win any awards for architectural genius- typically square with metal exteriors, with few if any windows, painted in earthy tones of brown, green and tan. A few of the newer structures are inter-connected by large insulated conduits containing various pipes for heating, freshwater and wastewater. Only the rectangular two and three story dormitories sport windows and most windows are covered to block the assault of the midnight sun and its impact on northerners’ ability to sleep. Dormitories are spartan and take one back to early college life. Little time is spent there however so they adequately fill a need.

The newest and most elegant structure on station is the Crary Science Lab, a multi-level modern facility that we scientist occupy. Around 150 scientists are on station during the summer while the remaining 80% of the population serve the needed support roles to make the science projects possible. This includes pilots, mountaineers, administration, postal services, plumbers, electricians, carpenters, mechanics, cooks, and virtually any other trade (including a couple bartenders) one can think of as mandatory to survival and science in this harsh environment. All these folks walk bundled from the cold on ground that is a contrasting mix of black volcanic rubble, ice and drift snow. At this time of year the low mid day sun warms the station to just above freezing, melting the snow to create a black volcanic slush. These summer days see morning and evening temperatures drop to near zero, re-freezing the slush in a recurring cycle. Strange tracked vehicles bearing names like Mat-track, Piston Bullie and Tucker course these frozen black roads between buildings at all hours, but as in all small cities the bustle slows in the wee hours of the bright night.

The view from our laboratory window is across the frozen McMurdo Sound and on to the Ross Sea. The 10PM sun courses high above the southern horizon illuminating endless miles of glistening ice. To the south lies the Ross Ice Shelf where Black Island and White Island emerge and rise over 3000 feet from the sea ice. Between the two islands lies the 800 mile path to the South Pole. To the north is Ross Island crowned by 10,698 foot Mount Terror and the active volcano 12,447 foot Mount Erubus. To the west are countless glaciers with names like Koettlitz, Blue and Ferrar and the Taylor dry valleys where a polar desert boast environments seen nowhere else on earth. The stark contrasts of white and black, ice and volcano, day without night and people where none should exist gives McMurdo Station its own unique character that can only be inadequately described. It must be experienced to give each visitor that sense of awe and the same inability to describe its wonders. I am very fortunate to be here.

Full Post (posted by Rusty @ 23:54) 0 Comments

Sunday, November 11, 2007: What is warm and bright and humid in Antarctica?

"He is happiest who hath to gather power and wisdom from a flower." is the quote I found inside of the McMurdo Greenhouse on my visit today.
NOTE: For folks reading both journals - there is a SURPRISE at the end of this one!

(continued...)

When I walked in I found John Williams and Farah McDill just enjoying the warmth, humidity and oxygen from the hundreds of photosynthesizing plants in the greenhouse. Sunday is their one day off from work and they spent some of it recharging their personal batteries in the greenhouse.

John and Farah enjoying the atmosphere and ambience of the greenhouse

The McMurdo Greenhouse was first built during the 1988-1989 summer from mostly scavenged materials. You can learn ALOT more about the greenhouse at this website.

The greenhouse tech is Karen Harvey. She and her fiance Tighe Urelius had just harvested lettuce for tonight's salad. She reminded me to go to dinner early if I wanted to eat any, as green salads at McMurdo go very fast!

Lettuce beds at the hydroponic greenhouse

One of the grow lights in the middle of this bed isn't working well and you can see that the lettuce in the middle of the bed is much smaller than the lettuce on this close end. Karen said if she ordered a new lamp today, she would get it in February of 2009! It is too late for this year's ship, so the next ship it would come in on is 16 months away!

Karen explains the nutrients for the different plant types and stages

The McMurdo Greenhouse is 100% hydroponic. The plants are grown in water that is enriched with nutrient solutions. There is no soil. The water gets changed once each month. This doesn't sound so hard, until you realize the water has to be changed by hand as there is no running water in the greenhouse. All the water is brought into a tank in the greenhouse and then has to be spread to all the plants by pipes and by hand. The