Saturday
12th January
From
John Storey.....
 Today
was not a good day. It began at 6 when I rose for breakfast
and had my first cup of so-called coffee, and learned that
last night's flight to the South Pole had turned back because
of bad weather. Apparently the wind is bad at the Pole, picking
up the snow and reducing visibility below the minimum acceptable
level for the Hercules pilots. They can approach the South
Pole skyway with radar, using the reflection from the fuselage
of a crashed Hercules (now conveniently dragged to the end
of the skyway) as a target. Then "...ya gotta be able
to see at least 3 flags." If not, the plane resumes cruising
altitude and circles for up to four hours before returning
to McMurdo.
Anyway,
it seemed worth a try. Fourteen of us dressed up in ECW gear
and clambered into the back of the vehicle that would take
us out to the McMurdo airstrip (otherwise known as Williams
Field). Unfortunately Ivan the Terrabus was not available,
so we were put in a "Delta". A Delta is a very large
truck with a sort of a box added to the back like an afterthought
- much in the manner of a child's drawing. Steering is by
hydraulic rams that bend the whole truck in the middle. With
tyres that are nearly 2 metres in diameter and a metre wide,
the whole thing looks totally ridiculous. It reminds me of
those gadgets that often win prizes on "Inventors"
shows on TV - gadgets that clearly captured the judges' rather
limited imaginations but which never should have been allowed
past the engineering drawing stage.
The
Delta has an appallingly rough ride, and the passengers are
incarcerated in the "afterthought" box. In the event
of injury the surviving passengers can communicate with the
driver using a walkie-talkie. This is exactly what happened
3 years ago when a particularly rough bump resulted in one
passenger suffering a broken arm. We arrived in McMurdo the
day after this incident and were treated to a helicopter ride
from Williams Field to McMurdo, the Deltas having been taken
out of service while someone thought up a good story for the
OH&S people. So, from that point of view I don't consider
the Deltas to be all bad. But I digress.
Ably
driven by a personable young lass called Casey, the Delta
delivered us all to Willy Field unscathed. At that point we
had to transfer from the Delta with really knobbly tyres that
can go over slushy snow to the Delta with rather smooth tyres
that doesn't chew up the runway. (A suggestion that we all
stay where we are and simply get someone to change the tyres
over was, surprisingly, rejected.) Then we wandered about,
admired the Twin Otters, watched the Hercules refuel, wandered
about some more, before being told there was "essentially
no chance" of our plane landing at South Pole. The weather
was expected to remain poor for at least another day. Furthermore,
all our equipment had been offloaded to
make way for more fuel (so the Hercules could circle for longer
at South Pole), so there's not a lot we could do if we got
there anyway.
After
a lot of discussion we took the advice of the crew and abandoned
the flight. The plane will fly on and attempt the landing
with just 4 of our number still aboard, they having decided
that they may as well sit and read on the Herc for 10 hours
as sit and read in McMurdo. At least the coffee couldn't be
any worse.
Returning
to McMurdo we were reassigned to our rooms (though I'll have
to make my own bed this time) so sit out the rest of the day.
Just
before dinner we received the depressing news that the flight
did in fact manage to land at South Pole. There are no flights
tomorrow (Sunday), so we're stuck here for a while. That's
perhaps not too bad. It's still sunny here; 10 C and warm
enough to wear a T-shirt. Perhaps that's why it is so cloudy
at South Pole, and why Paolo is reporting rotten weather (warm
and humid) at Dome C. Meanwhile, the novelty of seeing the
sun blazing away, high in the sky at midnight has still not
worn off - I suspect it never will.
From
the Crary Lab (the science lab with the library and computers,
among other things) one can look out across McMurdo Sound
and even spy on things with a small telescope. This afternoon
three large seals are lolling about on the ice. In wildlife
documentaries these things are always fighting or mating or
both and there is never a dull moment. However these three
haven't moved more than a metre all day and look like lazy,
oversized slugs. Don't they realise that the planet is warming
up and they should be hard at work evolving into something
else?
 As
luck would have it, tomorrow is the annual Scott's Hut race.
This is a 7.5 km running race, and is the major sporting event
on the McMurdo calendar. Two years ago I completed the course
in a finite if not particularly competitive time, and have
a t-shirt to prove it. Tomorrow I will try to better my previous
time, score another t-shirt, and at least show those seals
a thing or two. I think I've also persuaded Duane to have
a go, although my attempt to persuade him that everyone has
to wear ECW gear and bunny boots appears to have failed, so
now he'll beat me hollow.
After
dinner I was invited by Wilfred to a quick tour of the Polar
Sea icebreaker. This is an extraordinarily powerful US Coast
Guard ship with 3 propellors, enormous diesel engines, electric
drive motors, and then 3 gas turbine engines for when the
going gets really tough. It can punch through 3 metre thick
ice at a steady pace and looks indestructible. On the other
hand it has a really big dent in the left-hand side, so somewhere
out there must be something even bigger and tougher. This
is profoundly disturbing - I hope it's on our side.
John
 
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