Leave Taking

The South Pole Traverse, from here on out referred to officially as, SPoT- departed the local area on Friday morning at 1100 hours. The team consists of nine members: Terry Billings- leader, Steve Zellerhoff-equipment operator, Kristy Carnie-equipment operator, Dave weimer-equipment operator, Rob - equipment operator, Wayne Lundeberg-mechanic, Tom- mechanic, Jason-mechanic and Gallen-mountaineer and Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) operator. As Steve commented later in his email, they left to, "absolutely no fan fare". In fact, most of the community of a little over one thousand people are still not sure whether or not the traverse has left or turned around or is surprised to hear that they had not yet made it back. Suffice to say, although we are living in a technological age of instant messaging, here on the ground- the big chiefs of this remote science station felt it wasn't all that necessary mentioning their departure. Nine people driving tractors to the south pole; what of it? Its been done before. I should mention then that they are pulling sleds equipped with yacht like living quarters, a machine shop, a generator module with a snow melter and almost 90,000 gallons of diesel fuel stored in bladders of 3000 gallons each all the way to the South Pole! Picture this: in front of the whole convoy tracks s a bright red Pisten Bulley (a ski area groomer). It is equipped with a boom extending out in front of it- much like a bow sprit- on which is affixed the ground penetrating radar. As Gallen drives across the ice shelf he is also reading the radar screen imaging looking for anything suggestive of a crevasse. The most heavily cravassed area, respectfully known as the Shear Zone-was crossed safely yesterday. The Shear Zone is worked for weeks in preparation of the traverse by first locating crevasses large enough to swallow tractors, blasting them with dynamite and then back filling them with snow pushed by D8-Caterpillar bulldozers. Crevasses occur here because the unyielding continental bedrock is resisting the hummocking roll of force created by the pressure of the constantly moving ice shelf. From the other side of the Shear Zone the route follows the path of least cravassed territory proven by satellite imagery, the GPR imaging and ground proofing of the six past traverses. The rules of glaciology and the known lay of the terrain being crossed have proven this to be the safest route to follow. Steve reported last night that they made camp in a white place surrounded by white and was surprised to learn that this was surprising to him. He called his revelation, "interesting". It was his turn to heat up diner. Diner is the only meal they eat that has been prepared for them and served hot. These meals were cooked ahead of time by a catering firm in Christchurch and come as large frozen entrees. I imagine family sized lasagnas. Last nights meal was pub cod, mashed potatoes and cauliflower- "white food". For breakfast Steve indulges himself with packets of instant oatmeal which he enjoys with the soy milk he brought along from the store in McMurdo. Lunches are cold cuts, PB&J or tuna on, what I hear- is lovely bread- baked in New Zealand. They do have the ability to use the Internet, though as you can imagine-as it would be at sea, the service is slow and quiet limited. There is one computer for nine people. I went out to see Steve off on Friday and got a tour. I saw his tractor which he has rigged up with various anchors for an isometric rubber band (the kind a Physical therapist would give you) which he plans to use to quell boredom and keep in shape. I saw his bunk which is in the main living module which shares the kitchen, the computer space, and some more bunks on the opposite end. In Steve's quarters, which he has labeled, "us" are four bunks. In the foreword berthing which he labeled, "Them" are more bunks. An additional bunk house unit separate from these quarters also exists and is labeled H2. I don't know what that means.

Meanwhile in McMurdo I have been informed that I will be getting a roommate. Her name is Jill and she is a scientist. She claims to be tidy, smoke free and incapable of snoring. She should be leaving about the time Steve returns...sometime in January. A blizzard came through last night. We have all been anticipating our first holiday in three months: a 2 day weekend in celebration of Turkey day (which I think should be re-named Pumpkin pie day). However the man in charge of calling the shots out on the ice runway- which will soon need to be moved out onto the ice shelf before the annual sea ice break up- has announced for us all to stand by to stand by which means, in his parlance: "y'all might have to work over the Holiday weekend". Though this has us all in a dismal mood we have been promised that we would get our 2 days of freedom the following weekend and, would still be served thanksgiving day meal someday near thanksgiving.

My guess is that in less than three weeks, if these strong southerlies keep up, the salt water will be tossing waves ashore here and we might even get to see some of the world's most coveted wildlife: penguins!

If anyone has questions for Steve, post them in the comments. I will try my darnedest to get them relayed out to him and reply to you through this blog which I now have time for and am happy to be writing again.

The cheese here (flown in from Christchurch)is fantastic and money is going into our bank account. Malcolm reports that Jamie and Marcus are better "house-guests" then Steve and I and has yet to shed a tear in our absence. Maybe we should get a dog.