Some aerial landscape photos from the Helo

Just wanted to share a couple of my favorite aerial photos I was able to take from the Helo during our Wright Valley trip to Lake Vanda and Bull Pass.

I still can't get over the scale down here.  Also, this is one
of the few areas I've encountered that isn't only blue and white.

A view of glacial water and sea ice.

A trip out to Lake Vanda and Bull Pass

On Saturday, October 20th, we took a day trip out to the Dry Valleys, specifically to Wright Valley to visit Lake Vanda and Bull Pass. It was the first time that we stepped foot on Continental Antarctica! Many people who work here at McMurdo never get to see the Dry Valleys - it's too bad, because this area is otherworldly and incredibly beautiful. We were accompanied by Loomi, a FSTP (Field Safety Training Program) team member and we all had a great time.

The Dry Valleys are appropriately named because there is almost no snowfall there at any time of year and the mountains are so high that the Ross Seawater can't make it inward. The valleys are typically very windy, which makes it really hard to get to and land at, but we had really incredible weather and were able to get out there and land with ease (special thanks to our Helo Pilot Barry).

Our first stop was to Lake Vanda. It's a hypersaline lake - meaning it has 10 time more saline than seawater! And the maximum depth is 225 feet! The lake is covered by a transparent freshwater ice sheet that is 11-13 feet in depth year round. When we arrived, I was so shocked to see it's beauty! Wow, truly incredible! We each went on our own little adventures finding so much beauty on the lake ice. It feels so weird to stand on top of clear ice, but we were definitely on very thick ice, so there was no concern of breaking through. We quickly got comfortable and were nearly ice skating in our bunny boots gliding all around the lake - it was so awesome!

After spending 3 hours at Lake Vanda photographing everything possible, we packed up and got back in the Helo with our Pilot Barry and made our way to Bull Pass between Wright Valley and McKelvey Valley. Here, we spent 2 hours photographing ventifacts - which are granite boulders that have been severely weathered by wind and blown sand that they look polished or sculpted. There were some huge ventifacts and some tiny ones, but each was unique and allowed one's imagination to wander to find shapes, animals, and figures... kind of like finding cloud formations.

We returned to McMurdo base mid-afternoon and spent a couple of hours downloading photos, then got ready for a night out on the town! I have to say, it's a weird feeling heading home at 3 am in broad daylight after a night of fun (think : walk of shame)!!!

Snow drift formations near Lake Vanda.

Lake Vanda.

The cracks and ribbons were amazing!

At some point a storm must have blown in and some snow
and sand got trapped just below the surface ice.

Bull Pass.

Ventifacts.

Tracks near McMurdo

I just love the vehicle tracks from above.

Those little buildings are dive huts.

Cape Crozier!

Wow - this was an incredible trip!  On the 19th, we took a Helo out to Cape Crozier, which is the most easterly point of Ross Island in Antarctica. We went along with Dr. Paul Ponganis, who has nearly 20 years of experience studying the Emperor Penguins in Antarctica. We went out to Cape Crozier with him so that he could get some photos for a population sensus and to count how many eggs and chicks didn't make it over the winter while we shot lots of photos, video, and recorded some audio.

After an hour long helicopter flight, we finally made it to Crozier, and landed on a rocky area quite a ways away from the penguins. We were so far up the hill, we could only see general dark areas on the ice where the penguins were huddled, and couldn't even define any individual penguins at all - we were way up there! It took us an hour to hike down the hill, where we had to be very careful not to disturb the protected rookeries (nests) of the male Adelie Penguins. The Adelie males had just arrived to the Crozier area where they were beginning to set up their nests in anticipation of the females arrival to court them.

Once we got down the mountain to the sea ice, we had to find a path to cross the ice to get closer to the Emperors - and it wasn't easy! We tried three different routes only to be blocked by large ice cracks that were impassible. It was fun to use my recent Sea Ice training to determine whether we could or could not safely cross on foot. Finally we found a route that was acceptable to cross over, but did involve some rather large steps over some areas. Along our way, we ran into a few Weddell Seals, one of which had a brand new pup. Seals are so strange! The Weddell's are friendly compared to their cousins the Leopard Seals. The Weddell's we ran into were sunbathing on the ice and napping. When they would hear us walk by (crunch, crunch, crunch on the ice), they would just look at us so curiously. These Weddells most remind me of a cat-slug combo. It was a treat to see them, though!

Finally, after about 2 hours of hiking and ice traversing, we made it to the Emperor Penguin colony! It was incredible! The Emperors were the penguins featured in March of the Penguins. At first, a group of around 10 Emperors came right up to us, just a few feet away, and were so curious about what we were and what we were doing. They never displayed any hesitation or fear at all, just really interested in us, and after around 10 minutes we moved on to a bigger group. I shot some video, some photos, and we recorded some audio too. They were so interesting to watch! The new chicks were a fluffy grey color and copied whatever their parent was doing - it was so cute! At this time of year, one of the parents would be out in the sea getting food, while the other kept an eye on their chick. We spent and hour or so out with the Penguins, then started our hike back up to the Helo. It took another hour and a half to get back up the mountain, and I'm still sore from the intense climb with all of our gear on my back!

Here are some photos from that trip :

Dr. Paul Ponganis (left) and our Pilot Barry (right) mid-flight.

Diane, Dr. Paul Ponganis, Diane, and our
Field Safety Support Member, Jen.

View from the bottom of the first hill / top of the second hill.
The Emperors are straight ahead!

My ice axe - complete with a little heart! So perfect!

The second hill down to the sea ice.

We made it to the colony!

A few Emperors and a look at the Antarctica landscape.

Audio recording.

So many Emperors.

On the way out, we found an abandoned egg... and lots of guano.

The egg was huge and there was guano everywhere. Also,
we had to use stabilizers on our boots to keep traction.

Weddell Seals out sunbathing. This is a good example of
the sea ice we had to traverse to get out to the colony.

Huge ice cracks in the sea ice from tidal variations,
taken from the Helo.

Ice cracks, I love this pattern so much!

In the Helo to Marble Point today!

Today was a big step forward for us! We've completed all of our training sessions and were finally able to get out in the field today!

We took an hour long helicopter ride out to Marble Point to drop off our science partners, Lars and Tom. Once we touched down, we let them load out and then took off for a scenic route across McMurdo Sound to photograph on our way back to McMurdo. The Sound is the area that connects the Ross Sea to the Ice Shelf and it's currently mostly covered with ice, but there was an area that had not frozen over. We saw several seals, complete with afterbirth remains from recent pup births, a penguin colony - we think they were Emperors, and lots of gorgeous views.

Here are some photos from today's outing :

Ready for take-off.

Photographing out of the window.

Marble Point touchdown area.

Sea breakthrough with Mt. Erebus in the background.

Some beautiful cloud coverage over the ice shelf.

Crevasses in the ice shelf.

Touchdown!  Back at McMurdo.

Photos from Sea Ice & Snowmobile Training

The view from the Hagglund people-mover called Moonraker.

Moonraker!

Drilling down to the sea water.

Measuring the sea ice depth.

View from our ride back to McMurdo.  Distance and scale down here are very confusing,
especially with the sunlight and angles.

Warming up the snowmobiles!

Sea Ice Training

Because we will be out on the sea ice (frozen ocean water on the outskirts of the continental ice shelf) fairly frequently on day trips, we had to attend a sea ice awareness course. It was awesome! We learned about the geography of the continental shelf and the sea ice around McMurdo base and went out to profile a large crack out on the ice to measure it's growth or depletion, and to determine which vehicles can cross the crack.

Right now, the water is just over a meter and a half deep, at minimum, on most of the sea ice surrounding McMurdo. But due to tidal variations, pressure points from icebergs and glaciers, and other natural variances, ice cracks form. We drove over an hour to an ice crack out near Tent Island and used a power drill to drill down to reach the sea water point and measured the depth, found that the crack's thinnest point was just under 10 inches deep, then checked the maximum effective width of our vehicle and based on all that info we determined that the ice is still thick enough for us to drive over the crack. We took our data and turned it in to the SSC (Science Support Center) to keep track of the crack to determine if it's growing or shrinking over time. Right now, the ice should be growing a bit more, but come two weeks from now the ice will begin to melt and by January, the sea will become visible again. Crazy to think that we can drive vehicles and land places (huge ones at that) on the ice! But it was an awareness course to make sure that we profile all cracks we come across in vehicles to avoid falling into the sea!

While we were out on the sea ice, we did see around 10 seals in various locations. When seals are nearby, that means they've broken through the ice somewhere in close proximity... which also means that a nearby crack may be fairly thin. Though the seals are super cool to look at, it's a warning that the ice nearby may be fragile.

I'll post some ice drilling photos soon enough!

Snow Cave

Here are some photos of my snow cave at Happy Camper School.  I slept in the little nook on the left side, and I built those stairs to get in!  Brrrrr!!!

I Survived Happy Camper!

Wow - this was by far the hardest thing I've ever done in my entire life! But it was AWESOME!

I returned just yesterday evening from my overnight Happy Camper training. Not sure if any of you checked the forecast at McMurdo for Friday night's weather but it was crazy! I'm a VERY tired camper.

I survived Happy Camper school thought it should have been called "real life extreme winter weather survival"! We had just about 3 hours of in-classroom lessons before heading out 5 miles off of base for in-field training and camping. We were shuttled out in this huge people-mover that carried all 19 of us to the field. When we got out to the camp field it was -50F windchill with some major gusty winds! We set up tents, built snow walls, snow trenches, set up a huge kitchen and ate a lot! We all had tons of clothes, I wore two silk or wool thermals, a fleece layer, then my "big red" ECW gear, plus neck warmers, hats, goggles, gloves, and of course "bunny boots". It was a lot of clothes! All in all it was probably an extra 10 lbs of layers that made doing even the simplest task a challenge. The wind picked up more and our record out there was -63F!!! No joke. It's cold enough that a full nalgene bottle will freeze solid if outside in a matter of an hour or so. We were so well dressed and had so much food and fluids. 

Finally, the wind did die down for a while for us to enjoy our camping experience. After our initial outdoor training was over, the instructors left us to it to finish our camp set ups, make dinner, and get some rest on our own. I partnered up to make a huge snow cave sleep shelter, and that was fun but all that shoveling and digging was hard work. Sleeping on ice is far from comfortable and I spent most of the night trying to find a reasonably comfortable position and worrying about what time it was. The sun is up all the time, and only looks like dusk for a few hours only then back to full sun. This has really thrown me off in the middle of the night, I tend to think that I've overslept. But we did see an awesome pink sunset on Mt. Erebus before going to sleep at 11 out there!!!

When we got up in the morning the wind head picked up again. It did not make packing up fun at all. I hardly slept a wink and was sore form shoveling and my sleeping position, but still had to break down our camp, and return our gear to the shelter before our 8:30 pickup for more classroom time. We were all so happy to be back in the classroom! There were 19 of us in total, out of which there were only 4 females. We all worked well as a team and pitched in as much as possible. After more in-shelter school, we returned to McMurdo to go over helicopter safety and finally wrapped up our Snow School training. We left with only one injury - one of the guys did get second stage frostbite on one of his thumbs after his liner glove got wet while packing up. I felt so bad for him! His tissue should be OK, it'll just take a while to regain full sensation.

After Snow School was over, and after the most-deserved and enjoyed hot shower I've ever taken, and after a wonderful Italian galley meal, I met up with some new friends and went to the local bar (Gallagher's Pub) for some live music and dancing! It was so much fun to get "out on the town" and hang out after so much training. It also helped me get a good night of 12 hours of sleep! So well deserved!

Today, it's Sunday and I've just been catching up on some personal things, and will prep our photo gear and get ready for Sea Ice training tomorrow.

Glad to catch up! I'll check in again sometime soon.

My view from the front of the people mover.  The sign reads "Happy Camper". 

Our camp site : 2 Scott tents, 7 mountain tents, 1 6'x6' stadium seating kitchen.

Hauling ice blocks via sled to build various buildings.

Snow drift pattern caused from the wind.

Cold happy camper!

My 6' deep snow trench. If you look closely there's a shelf on the left side, that was my sleeping nook. By the way this photo was taken around 10 PM.

Back inside on the 2nd day for the bucket head white-out simulation.