Thursday
17th January
From
John Storey.....
The
day got off to a bit of a bad start when I arrived at breakfast
to find the music had taken a turn for the worse. As far as
I could tell it was Bruce Springsteen massacaring Waltzing
Matilda, but I chose not to enquire. I hope this phase will
pass rapidly.
Fortunately,
that was about the only bad thing that happened today. Well,
that's not quite true: today we discovered that something
good that should've happened didn't, which is really the same
as something bad happening. Basically, our cannister of calcium
hydride, which was sent from Sydney before Christmas, has
not arrived and in fact is still in Sydney.
Calcium
hydride is a very aggressive drying agent, and we use it in
all our optical instruments to keep out water vapour. We use
it because it is really, really good at absorbing water. The
problem is that it is so good, it's dangerous. If it accidentally
comes into contact with something wet (water, for example)
all hell breaks use. Not only that, but even when it is quietly
going about its job of chewing up water vapour, it's doing
it by turning it into hydrogen - which is very explosive.
For this reason it is classed as "hazardous" by
airfreight companies (Well, I'm assuming this. They may have
other reasons of their own, but these two sound pretty convincing).
The net result of this "hazardous" classification
is not only big boxes with lots of kitty-litter, but also
an uncertain delievery schedule.
Last
week in McMurdo we realised that, for various complicated
reasons, Paolo was not going to get *his* calcium hydride
at Dome C, so we sent him off some magnesium perchlorate.
This stuff comes in third in the list of things-that-are-really-good-at-sucking-up-water,
the silver medal being taken by phosphorous pentoxide. Now,
despite the fact that it is, in its own way, a rather exciting
substance (it can be used to make bombs, for example), it
is not classed as "hazardous". This should greatly
improve our chances of getting hold of some - in fact I know
there's heaps of it already in McMurdo.
So,
apart from that, we're looking good. I set myself up in the
Jamesway and spent the day wiring up the Stirling engine control
panel. Duane finished fixing the heaters in place and did
lots of other construction jobs - mostly with the help of
lethal-looking power tools. Tony borrowed a replacement "Supervisor"
computer from the IT people here, and is loading our software
onto it. He also got us another ethernet hub, so hopefully
we can keep both web cameras running at the same time (though
webcam devotees should note that the satellite link is only
up from about midnight to 8 am (Eastern Australian Summer
Time). Unfortunately the hub has a fan in it that makes a
noise like an airconditioning plant, so it may end up out
in the snow.
Today
is the 90th anniversary of Robert Falcon Scott's arrival at
South Pole. The occasion was marked by a small ceremony around
the Pole at noon; there will be a second ceremony at midnight
tonight. It's sobering to imagine what it would be like to
be just arriving today, knowing you had to walk all the way
back to McMurdo before it got too cold and dark.
A
British Antarctic Survey Twin Otter also arrived this morning.
Over the next couple of days it will ferry some automated
equipment out to remote locations, where the equipment will
operate for the next 12 months. The instruments were designed
and built by Mike Rose, who spent a sabbatical at UNSW working
on our instrumentation. Mike arrived here yesterday - it's
great to see him again.
Just
before dinner Mike Whitehead arrived out at the AASTO towing
a sled behind a Skidoo. We loaded SUMMIT (our submillimetre
instrument) onto it and took it across to the Jamesway, where
we'll have plenty of room to work on it. We also took the
Stirling engine from the Jamesway across to the AASTO and
uncrated it ready for installation, so now things are really
getting serious.
 
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