Antarctica Report, October 4, 1997 McMurdo Station Current Weather: Condition 2, visibility less than 1/4 mile, -26 deg C, 30 knt winds, gusting to 45.. Chilly!

Back in wonderful McMurdo. The trip to New Zealand went without incident, but unfortunately our flight out of Christchurch to McMurdo was delayed by a day due to mechanical problems. Last time I did this we flew over in a LC-130 (Hercules) in a very uncomfortable 8 hour flight. This time we few in a LC-141 (Starlifter) jet transport in a very uncomfortable 5 hour flight. This was the first main flight in for the 'summer' season and it was packed with cargo and almost 100 people. There were no comfy seats, no in-flight movie and next to no leg room. We sat jammed side to side and back to back in webbing jump seats wearing earplugs due to the interior noise. Not much to do. We took turns stretching our legs and most people either tried to fall asleep or read a book.

We arrived without a problem and unfortunately I promptly became very ill. There is viral flu here known as the 'McMurdo Crud' which, as I found out, can be pretty nasty. A high fever, vomiting, diarrhea, sore throat and sinus inflammation kept me pretty much confined to my room until today. I was even in the infirmary yesterday being hydrated intravenously. Antarctica is an extremely dry environment and your body dehydrates very quickly, so, flu symptoms become very serious. Intravenous fluid addition is the only way to put fluid back in the body when your intestinal tract is all messed up. Not much fun. However, I am feeling much better today.

We have a fair amount of training to go through before we head out alone on the ice and start our diving program. This coming Monday will be spent in Sea Ice training (learning to navigate on the ice etc.) and Tuesday will be spent learning to use our assigned radios, GPS units, tracked vehicles (called Sprytes) and waste management. We hope to be doing our first dives starting on Wednesday.

Antarctica Report, Oct. 9, 1997 current weather: Condition 3. clear, -30 deg. C, 35 knt winds, gusting to 40 knt. Cold!

I am almost over the flu. It has taken almost a week. However, most of our group has been sick as well. As a consequence, not much diving has been going on (none in fact). The flu has been running rampant at the base -- lots of people are under the weather. This happens from time to time; not too surprising when you think about the circumstances..... it is cold and stressful and lots of people are sharing close quarters with one another. It is easy for the germs to get around. So far, the flu has apparently been viral, which you just have to let run its course.

Some information about weather etc. that Steve's class has asked.

Time: Time here at McMurdo (and elsewhere on the US bases) is running on New Zealand time. (4 hours behind California, but one full day ahead since we are on the other side of the international dateline. I'll try to make posts with a 24hr clock so things don't get confusing, however I will leave it up to you to convert things to whatever time local time scheme.

Weather Condition. A 3 condition weather plan is used here and temperature doesn't usually factor into it.

• Condition 3 = 'normal' clear conditions. Visibility on the ground greater than 1/4 mile. You are allowed to travel by foot or in an open vehicle (i.e. snowmobile).
• Condition 2 = visibility on the ground less than 1/4 mile. Usually accompanied by high winds. Travel is allowed only by covered vehicle, i.e. in snow cat . On clear days, Condition 3 may become Condition 2 if there is excessive wind chill
• Condition 1= visibility less than a few hundred feet (to almost none at all). Travel is not allowed (and often impossible).

What have we been doing besides trying to get well? We have managed to take a bunch of various training courses to allow field operation down here. These have included field safety (digging snow caves, setting up tents and radios in storms etc.), classes in radio and GPS use, waste management classes, vehicle use and a dive orientation.

We'll be taking additional classes in helicopter loading etc. when we start operations farther in the field.

We did manage to spend most of the day yesterday out in the field. We went to a location just a few km north of the McMurdo Base known as the cinder cones. These are a series of extinct volcanic cinder cones located on Ross Island where we will be doing some of our diving. We went out with a drill rig in the morning to drill the 4 foot diameter dive holes in through 2-3 meters of ice. We drilled 7 holes, covered them with large insulated wooden covers (to keep them from freezing solid too quickly) and then used a tractor to tow a large dive hut from McMurdo for placement above the main hole. These huts can hold about 6 people and have a hole in the floor above the dive hole and are equipped with several big heaters. Most dive operations are done from within the hut so they can continue regardless of the weather conditions outside. Then we spent several hours 'flagging' our route on the ice with bamboo poles and flags so the travel route across the ice can be followed even when visibility drops. We are starting to get anxious to get into the water!

The base is slowly starting to get busy. There are science groups arriving from all over now. There is a large party working at Cape Roberts. A large drill rig has been erected to drill through the ice, through several hundred meters of water, then for hundreds of meters into the sea floor. The team is composed of scientists primarily from 4 nations (USA, Germany, New Zealand, Italy), with the New Zealand group organizing most of the effort. There is about 30 scientists all together in their group. They will collect all their samples at the drill rig and then do the processing in the Crary Lab here at McMurdo (lots of geology and micropaleontology).

The support staff here is busy trying to gear up for the season. And there are crews out in the field setting up the radio communications repeater stations for field camps, preparing helicopter fuel caches and the like. South Pole Station won't be operating until late in the month.

A bit of excitement. A group of scientists were out at Cape Royds when a storm settled in the day before yesterday. They had to brace the helicopter down with over 1000 lbs of hand carried boulders (there were 75 knt winds) and then seek shelter in a little emergency hut built out on the cape. Unfortunately a winter storm had completely destroyed it -- the doors were gone and the shelter was full of snow. They managed to get their survival bags and spent the night inside Shackleton's hut. A famous landmark that the polar explorer used on one of his many Antarctic journeys. They made it back the next day.

I don't have too much more to report. If our sinuses have cleared up enough, tomorrow we might try to head out for a dive.

Antarctica Report, Oct 11., 19:50 hrs Weather, Condition 2, -20 deg C, 45 knt winds Getting very stormy! lots of blowing snow.

Despite our teams' (and other dive groups) illness, we had to go for a dive yesterday. The Scientific Diving Coordinator must be present when you make your first dives so he can be sure that you know what you are doing (dive groups will have practiced techniques and equipment before coming down) and to give some last minute instruction on various aspects of Antarctic diving. Unfortunately the Scientific Diving Coordinator here (a great guy, Rob Robbins) was also starting to come down with the flu, so he wanted to get everyone checked out before he wound up in bed. We dove.

The location was the Intake Jetty, located right in front of McMurdo Station. We had dove out of a dive/fish hut about 5 minutes from the dive lockers ( a small heated building near the shore). The hole was in 80 feet of water. To be honest, I would have been more excited if I hadn't be dreading having to dive with a congested head (it plays havoc with trying to clear your ears etc.). Suiting up takes about 20 minutes, with all the multiple layers of undergarments, dry suit and then dive equipment. A surface tender who doesn't dive helps you suit up since it gets impossible to move around with all the heavy gear and thick gloves etc.. Once you get in the water you sink feet first down a vertical tunnel in the ice, 4 feet in diameter -- the ice here was about 6-8 feet thick. Then you hit the incredibly blue, open water beneath. Very stunning....

Light comes in through the ice, and is brighter under the larger cracks. And yes, the water is very clear; although the Intake Jetty (where the main sea water intake pipes are for the laboratory facility) isn't the best I hear. It was only so-so, which in this case was about 400-500 feet. Other locations we will be diving have visibility in the 600 foot range. It really feels like you are hovering in air, and it is very difficult to estimate distances at first. What looks like it is just beneath you can be in well over 100 feet of water. If you sit on the bottom under the dive hut, it looks like the dive hole is just a few feet away -- instead it is 80 feet above you. We dove for 30 minutes testing our equipment. Yes, I got cold, but not until the last few minutes of the dive. Now the bad part...diving with a congested head. I had managed to equalize my ears and sinuses on the way down, but on the return to the surface they blocked and I had a terrible reverse squeeze. Ouch. It feels like someone is driving a spike into your head. Oh well, it eased up after a few hours topside.

Today, I wisely decided not to dive to give my head a day to recover and instead worked as a dive tender for the other divers.

One of Steve's students asked what the difference was in diving here as compared to where I normally dive, i.e. in California:

The actual diving isn't that different once you get in the water. Some of the gear we are using is specially modified to work in very cold water (-1.8 deg. C). The regulators have special adapters to keep them from freezing closed. We use 2 completely separate regulator systems for total redundancy. A large steel 95 cu inch (volume) tank. We are using special weight harnesses since we are using a minimum of 40 lbs of weight each. Under our drysuits we are wearing capiline long underwear, a Polartec® jumpsuit, and a thick Thinsulate® jumpsuit. The drysuits have attached hoods for extra warmth and we are wearing a "full face" hood or "gorilla mask" under that has only a thin slot for your regulator to fit in. Gloves have warm liners and flexible rubber outer shells that seal against special flanges built into the wrists of our suits. I'll be diving with an additional small tank full of argon on my later dives. This will be used to inflate my suit with denser (=warmer) argon rather than air. A few extra techniques are used while diving. You try not to breathe through your regulator until totally submerged to prevent icing up, when injecting air into your drysuit you do it in only tiny burst to prevent the input valve from freezing open.. After diving we have to be very careful rinsing all the gear to prevent any fresh water from collecting anywhere that might freeze on the next dive.

Tomorrow our plan is to go diving at a place called Cape Evans, about 90 minutes drive by Spryte (the 2 tracked vehicles we are using to drive on the ice) north of McMurdo base on the sea ice. It is the location of Captain Scott's last hut -- where he left from on his fateful trip to the pole. However this will only happen if the weather calms down. In the time it has taken me to type this, the weather has turned to Condition 1. The winds are well over 50 knts and I can only see about 20 feet out of the library window. The windows are shaking and you can hear the wind shrieking between the buildings. Hopefully it won't last long.....

Antarctica Report, Oct. 15, 16:30 hrs Weather: Condition 3. -10 deg C, 10 knt winds quite nice but overcast

Well, the storm absolutely raged for 2 straight days. The winds was blowing 60 + knts for over 8 hrs straight at one point. Very spectacular. The clean-up afterwards was equally spectacular. There were (and still is) huge snow drifts all over the place. The road below the dive locker was erased by huge drifts and they just got it dug out today. Our Spryte tracked vehicles were buried in the snow and the cabins full of snow (which seems to be able to blow in any tiny crack or hole).

We did have a few hour lull in the weather so we managed to zoom out and do a couple of dives in a nearby dive hut. Very nice (although I am still having some lingering effects from my recent flu -- a little trouble clearing my ears.). A large Weddell seal was hanging around during the dive and even managed to pop its head up our dive hole in-between dives. Even after being submerged for 40 minutes I didn't feel too cold; at least on the first dive...the second dive felt like ice! I guess you lose a lot of calories in between dives, even in a heated dive hut. The visibility still seems amazing. After swimming around a rocky outcrop, one section of the bay opens up into a bowl shape and you can see for hundreds of feet in all directions, lit with a very spooky blue light that makes it in through the occasional crack (in this case the large cracks that form parallel to the shoreline because the tide (about 1 meter max.) flexes the sea ice up and down and forms cracks along the shore). Very nifty.

Then the storm returned for about 12 hours. There isn't much to do outside when the weather conditions deteriorate, however indoor work, lab work etc. continues as usual. For those groups that rely on outdoor travel stormy conditions mean a chance to catch up on sleep, relax a bit and get caught up with other jobs.

Yesterday we took the 2 hour Spryte journey to Cape Evans (we had been stormed out previously). I was actually surprised that travel on the sea ice was so easy and there were so few drifts -- most of the snow just blew away from the flagged 'road'. At the Cape Evans hut, we found out where some of the blowing snow wound up -- piled up against the dive hut. It took 30 min. to dig our way through drifts to the door, and a further half hour to dig out some of the snow that had somehow filled the hut (there was a huge snow bank in the center of the hut covering most of the dive hole). After that the safety hole had to be located under the drifting snow and then uncovered and chipped free of ice to allow emergency surfacing (more digging!). Then, finally, our dive team went into the water. I declined to dive in order to let my ear recover and instead worked as a tender for the other divers. Working as a tender entails lots of lifting tanks, weightbelts etc. and then helping the divers dress since they have difficulty maneuvering with all the bulky garments and gear. Once the divers enter the hole (one at a time) the tender hands in all the equipment (cameras etc.) that is needed for the dive. While the divers are under the ice the tender keeps the dive hole free of floating ice, and looks menacing to any seals that might take residence in the hole and prevent the divers from surfacing. When the divers have returned to the hole, the tenders recover the equipment and then help the divers remove all their gear in the water (very cold on the hands!) since they can't come out of the hole with their gear in place... I spent most of my time in the Cape Evans hut trying to keep the stove lit inside the hut to keep it warm and made pots of hot soup for between-dive feasts. The diving itself was disappointing because, due to the large amount of drifting snow, hardly any light was able to penetrate beneath the ice -- it was in essence night diving. We were unable to visit Scott's Hut on this trip to Cape Evans since the wind was still pretty high and the snow was still blowing around. Making the 15 minute hike across the cape wouldn't have been wise (better safe than sorry). We shall return.

After the diving was done we drove the Spryte to the Mt. Erebus ice tongue. This is a branch of a large glacier on Mt. Erebus that extends far out into the sea ice. We had wanted to check out some of the ice caves but the entrance had been drifted in by the storm. We lacked the motivation for more digging, so we'll have to wait for another group to reopen the entrance for exploration. We made it back to McMurdo for a mad dash to the galley before dinner was over...we had spent 11 hours out on the ice.

Today we did a few dives at Arrival Heights, located approximately 1 km north of McMurdo. It is nestled up against the shore, near Danger Slopes so named because one of Scott's party slid in his smooth sole seal-skin boots and was unable to stop himself before hurtling over a cliff into the sea (the ice had blown out late in the season). Fortunately it wasn't too drifted in with snow. Again, I stayed out of the water to tend and heal my ear and 'showed the ropes' to another would-be-tender who plans to help us in the future. I'll be diving there tomorrow so I will be able to give a better idea of what the bottom terrain is like.

Antarctica Report, Oct 17. 2000 hrs Weather -- condition 3. -15 deg C, wind 10 knts, overcast.

Well there is good news from down on the ice... a lot of us, myself included are starting to feel a lot better. In fact I consider myself about 95% healed -- diving today caused no problems. The bad news is that a new flu bug is starting to float around apparently, and new batch of people are getting hit... I am hoping that I have enough antibodies left from the last one to escape the new illness.

Today we did some spectacular diving underneath a grounded iceberg. Stunning. The iceberg apparently broke free of the Ross Ice shelf late last season and was pushed towards the shore and stuck fast on the bottom before the sea ice formed up again. It is now located about 0.5 km south of Cape Evans (where we were a few days ago). The iceberg itself is fairly small (but still huge) -- "only" about 40 feet is showing above the ice level and it is about 200 feet long and 100 feet high. Underwater it is much larger of course (most of an icebergs mass is below sea level). The dive hole is located right beside it and looking through the hole at the correct angle, you can just make it out under the water. Once you are diving, the berg forms a solid wall of ice all the way to the bottom (about 90 feet deep below the hole), and slopes deeper down away from the hole. You can just make out the large trench the berg cut into the bottom when it drifted towards shore -- it looks about 120 feet deep near the trench, probably much deeper (something to be checked on a later dive). The berg is also cut by a large tunnel that disappears back around a corner as a vertical slot. Tomorrow I shall be going back with high powered lights to check to see how far the tunnel under the berg goes.

There is a shelf of ice that sticks out at about the 20 foot level that is covered in ice algae and loaded with bright red amphipods that are grazing for food. These amphipods in turn have attracted a large number of ice fish that are feeding upon them. We managed to find one icefish that was protecting an egg mass within a hole in the iceberg and a large crack that shimmered with a large school of the icefish. Very impressive. The bottom around the iceberg is a fine mud that is easily disturbed, but covered in clumps of bright yellow sponges and white starfish. It is hard to describe how the entire scene looks when you are diving around it. You can see for hundreds of feet in all directions, until it gets too dark. The iceberg is channeling a lot of light within itself by internal reflection and refraction so it glows a ghostly blue colour under the water -- like a big fluorescent wall, and looking up, you can see the bright patches where the there is less snow on the ice, and dark patches under deeper drifts. Most amazing is looking out and seeing dozens of large jelly fish that look like they are just hanging in the air. Some of them are large, 1 m long, and the water is so clear they look like tiny toys when far away. All I can say is 'Wow'.

We did two dives and it took most of the day since it was a long slow trip in our Spryte (which we have nicknamed 'Pokey'). We left at 0800 this morning and just made it back in time for last meal at 1900 hrs. Tomorrow we plan on returning. With us will be a NASA scientist who will help as a dive tender and who will also be doing some ozone measurements with some special machinery. It should be an interesting day.

Antarctica Report, Oct. 19, 1400 hrs. Weather: Condition 3, -10 deg C, wind 10 knts (overcast but pleasant...all things considering)

Yesterday we made 2 exciting dives at the iceberg location. And, once again the dives were stunning. I managed to take some time to explore the long tunnel that extends through the iceberg...it was a long spooky swim, but the tunnel opened up on the other side of the berg (between 2 fragments of the berg). The snow had been blown off the ice at the far end of the tunnel so a shaft of blue light penetrated the light, and looking out, the water is the same colour of blue that you see in fussy people's toilets.... Most interesting, at the far end of the tunnel, there were some large brine channels, some 2 - 3 meters long, hanging from the bottom of the sea ice. These look very similar to cave stalactites and form from super cold brine that seeps from within the surface sea ice, finds its way down little cracks and channels and emerges all in one spot. It is much colder than the sea water so the sea water freezes in a tube around the outflowing brine and continues to build up forming a hollow icicle or 'brinecicle'. Nifty. I wanted to explore more, but it was a long swim, and the far side of the tunnel is a long distance from our dive and safety holes. Not the type of place you want to have any problems. We found another exciting place on the main berg -- there is a large shelf at about 20 -30 feet in depth that is coated in algae and is making a home for lots of baby fish, amphipods and other creatures...following this shelf back into the iceberg we came to a short tunnel that extended back and then parallel to the iceberg exterior. The entire tunnel is coated in huge ice crystals and is like swimming inside a giant snowball. The photographer in our group was busy taking pictures and every time his flash went off, the entire tunnel would sparkle with light.

One of our dive tenders was Dr. Steve Schearer. He is a NASA volcanologist who is based at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. He had brought along his portable ozone and UV measuring equipment and made a series of measurements between dives. Even though he is trained as a geologist he uses satellites to monitor the emission of gases from various volcanoes around the world. And since Mt. Erebus is located right behind McMurdo Station and it is an active volcano, he can 'ground truth' the satellite measurements with those he can make on his own on the ground. He also spent some time collecting special rock samples along the shore near the dive hut.

We had taken a different Spryte to our dive location (our Spryte, #666 'the antiSpryte' was in the shop) that was much faster than old Pokey so we managed to get there in a record 95 minutes.

Some topside exploration late in the day indicate that the large iceberg has actually fragmented into 3 pieces on the opposite side to the dive hut, so we have many other pieces to explore underwater there. Unfortunately, the light outside was very flat and it was difficult to see fine structures in the snow and ice, so it became dangerous walking around the sea ice -- we couldn't see the subtle (and not so subtle) changes in snow texture that can indicate cracks in the ice. We returned to our hut before exploring the entire area around the iceberg.

Today (Oct. 19), Spryte #666 lived up to its name. We were set to dive at Little Razorback island this morning at 0800 -- we lost our tachometer on the way to the fuel pump (a harbinger of things to come), and then lost oil pressure once we crossed the transition from the land to the sea ice. Rather that risk a break down far from the base, we drove a short distance to the intake jetty hut and did a dive there. We planned a deep dive to 120 feet, down to a bed of sponge spicules that I am interested in. After surveying that area, we returned to a large rockfall near the jetty shore at a depth of 60 feet, hunted for 'dragon fish' to photograph and slowly worked our way up to the shallow anchor ice to provide a little decompression (needed after the deep dive as a safety stop).

I swam over to the observation tube ( a large steel pipe sunk through the ice for people to climb down to a small window covered chamber at about 20 foot depth; it allows those who can't dive a chance to see what is going on under the sea ice). The windows had become encrusted with platelet ice and I smashed those loose to allow those entering the chamber a chance to see -- I was greeted by a happy face waving a video camera on the inside.... A glance to the north showed an enormous swarm of pteropods and small jellyfish coming towards us. Pteropods are similar to small swimming snails -- the largest about 4 cm in length -- they look almost like little transparent angels with their flapping, wing-like muscles and mantle. The swarm also contained thousands of thumb sized jellyfish and ctenophores (comb jellies). By the time we were ready to exit the dive hole we had been in the water for almost 1 hour -- much longer than normal and ice crystals had started growing on our fins and dive equipment. I came out of the water looking and feeling like "the human popsicle".

Spryte 666 wasn't through with us yet -- about 30 meters from its parking spot at the base dive locker, it threw its left track off leaving us stranded. Sigh. We had to hand carry all the equipment across the snow to the dive locker. Oh well.

Tomorrow 666 goes back to the shop and we will try once again (with a different one) to get to Little Razorback Island.

Antarctica Report, Oct 21 -- 1915 hrs Weather: Condition 2 (on the sea ice), Condition 1 in McMurdo base temperature, -25 deg C, overcast, wind 30 knts, blowing snow

It is very amazing how quickly the weather changes here. Today, as you can see from the header, was rather blustery and cold. Yesterday was entirely different. It was only -15 C (fairly warm), there wasn't a breath of wind and not a cloud in the sky. You could see for miles and miles in every direction.

We drove (in a faster Spryte this time #242 "peppy") out to the iceberg again for what would probably be some of our last dives there. The iceberg is actually grounded near shore at the base of what look like some formidable icefalls on the glaciers surrounding Mount Erebus -- it just took a clear day to really see them. In fact it was so clear there weren't even any clouds around the summit of Erebus and we could see the steam rising out of the summit caldera very clearly. We did 2 very long dives on the iceberg. The first for 55 minutes and the second for 71 minutes... The phrase for the day became, "71 minutes is too long." Yes -- we were quite cold by the time we were finished the dives and we were thankful that our tenders kept us filled with hot soup after surfacing.

Norbert Wu managed to finish up all the photography he wanted to do in this area and I spent some time taking a few final photographs of him working with all his equipment underwater. He had brought his 16mm underwater movie camera along as well (nicknamed "the widow-maker" because the housing alone is 1 m long and weighs over 75 lbs) and he took some footage around the iceberg as well. Once all the filming was over, we swam off towards the other end of the iceberg where we still hadn't been. A large shelf continued at 30 foot depth, covered in algae similar to the area we had already been diving but without the spectacular ice caves towards the interior. At the far end of the berg, the shelf was about as wide as a tennis court. I continued swimming past the end of the berg towards the 3rd fragment that we had identified on our earlier topside exploration. After a few minutes a ghostly white bulk appeared in view, still hundreds of feet away. Unfortunately snow cover was very thick in this area and very little light was penetrating the ice sheet so the water was extremely dark; and deep. The berg disappeared far past the limit of my lights into depths well over 200 feet. By this point we were a long way from our entrance and safety holes, so, spooked by the whole situation we returned to our dive hole, light, and the warm interior of the dive hut.

One of our tenders was again the volcanologist Steve from NASA who wanted to collect a few more rock samples and get out of the lab for some fresh air. The other tender was one of the firemen from McMurdo base, Reno. It was his day off and he wanted to come help so he would get the chance to get away from McMurdo for a while. During our long second dive, a helicopter landed outside the dive hut and unloaded a group of Reno's friends who work on the search and rescue team (who make sure the scientists working in the field down here don't kill themselves). We surfaced to find the hut full of tenders, the rescue team and the helicopter pilots all sitting around telling stories in the sauna like heat of our hut. An impromptu party of sorts then developed....

On our drive back to McMurdo we stopped in at Little Razorback island to make sure the heater in the hut was working and make sure there was food and water for our next days dives there. Steve was also able to make a few rock samples from the shores of the island (part of an eroded volcanic plug).

Every now and then a whole series of tiny events, seemingly unrelated, all come together to produce a very unique and special moment. Our short stop at Little Razorback Island yesterday became just that, a very special experience that made all the hardships and difficulties so far, the cold weather, the hard work, equipment problems and being away from home and loved ones, seem worthwhile. As we were walking around the pressure ridges of ice, thrust up around the sides of the island, we turned a corner and there on a slab of snow, surrounded by spires of blue ice and with the blue sky and Mt. Erebus in the background was a mother Weddell seal and her pup. She had just given birth a few minutes before since the afterbirth and small pools of blood on the ice had not yet frozen. The mother and pub lay side by side in the sun, content and peaceful. We stood on a ridge of ice completely speechless -- there was nothing we could say. We all glowed for a while and returned to the Spryte. Steve turned to me and said, "this is why I had to come to Antarctica." I couldn't have agreed more. Steve had left his wife and 10 month old baby to come here to spend a few weeks making ozone measurements and collect a few rock samples. He flies back to Washington tomorrow.

Today we just returned from two dives at Little Razorback. The weather was cold and blowing strong. The mother seal and her pup were still lying close to where we had seen them last. However, now they were covered in blown snow and bits of ice. They still looked content and happy though.

The diving was interesting. The terrain beneath the hole was very steep and rocky. You were afraid to put anything on the bottom for fear of it sliding away forever. The deeper walls are sprinkled with anemones and hundreds of thousands of purple sea stars. There were lots of nemertine worms, pycnogonids (sea spiders), large 10 cm long isopods and lots of sea urchins. Most interesting was the shallow rocky shelf surrounding the island. In water about 9 feet deep the sea ice hangs like a low convoluted roof. In some areas the brine tubes and clusters of platelet ice hand down from the ice ceiling. The bottom is covered in isolated clumps of anchor ice and sprinkled with small cobbles and sea stars. It was possible to swim in along this shelf with it extending as far as you could see into the distance. In areas (beneath the topside pressure ridges), large cracks extend up through the sea ice forming high ceilinged rooms with almost enough room to stand upright. In the tops of some of these domes were the breathing holes that the seals keep open by chewing with their teeth. The entire scene really emphasized how truly special these animals are. Throughout the year, even in the long, dark winter night, these seals dive beneath the ice, through the low tunnels we had just careful picked our way through, and keep their breathing holes chewed open or else they will suffocate. We didn't see any seals beneath the water on these dives today. We could hear them faintly in the background occasionally. I brought along a special hydrophone and after the dives we lowered it through the ice hole and we could hear a whole symphony of seals far off in the distance. Very cool.

Antarctica Report Oct 23, 1750 hrs. Weather, Condition 1 -- wind 60+ knts, -47 deg C.

We are officially confined to the indoors. In my case, I am confined to the lab facility (along with a bunch of other scientists). This is the second day of this storm and it is amazing that the weather deteriorated so fast. A few days ago it was bright and sunny. Then yesterday the main front moved into our area, Condition 2 on base, but condition 1 on the sea ice, so we were unable to go diving. This morning the storm intensified even more and after lunch today, it became condition 1 on base with no travel allowed. We will probably not be able to make it to the galley for dinner (but there is lots of emergency food around just in case) and if continues for much longer the search and rescue team will begin to string safety ropes between the buildings to allow some limited movement around the base.

It is hard to describe the intensity of these storms. The buildings are shaking under the wind and it sounds like a locomotive is constantly passing overhead. Visibility is only a few tens of meters out the window and only a few feet when you are out in it. I was knocked over by the wind en route to lunch this afternoon.... It didn't seem too cold outside because we are so bundled up, however it is very difficult to move around when visibility is so restricted by blowing snow. The forecast is for the storm to continue into tomorrow -- we are hoping it will let up enough for us to make a dive later tomorrow if the weather cooperates.

Some questions from Steve Bartram's class in San Diego...

oh -- our latitude and longitude here is: 77 deg 50.769min S, 166deg 39.891min E.

All the times I am posting are in New Zealand time -- Zulu time is actually the same but 12 hours displaced.

Period 1 Question: Is the ice at different positions made differently? How is the berg "grounded" as compared to the floating part?

There are different types of ice here.... The sea ice is made from the freezing of sea water so it does contain small pockets of salt water (brine) that makes it taste salty if you put some in your mouth. The icebergs are freshwater ice that break (calve) off the many glaciers that come off the surrounding mountains and reach into the sea. There is also the ice of the Ross Ice Shelf and Antarctic Ice cap -- huge glaciers that cover thousands of square miles.. The glacier ice is made primarily of compressed and compacted snow that over the years is packed into solid ice... There is so much ice and snow (thousands of feet thick) in the glaciers and ice caps that the weight makes the edges of the icecap slowly ooze outwards towards the sea. On mountains, gravity also helps the glaciers flow downslope like a giant river.

The iceberg became grounded because wind blowing on it pushed it through the sea into shallow enough water for it to get stuck on the bottom. An iceberg is very heavy, so once it starts moving it is very difficult to stop. As the berg was pushed to shore, it dug a deep trench into the soft bottom before it came to a stop.

Period 1 Question: Is it difficult to estimate distances? How do you compensate for vision problems. What was the cause of the steam from Erebus?

Yes it is difficult to estimate distances at first. The only way to get around this is through experience on the ice and a knowledge of the surrounding geography. Vision problems...when it is sunny on the ice, it is very easy to burn your eyes and go snow blind. We wear goggles and special sunglasses when traveling out on the ice.

The steam on Mt. Erebus is coming from the active volcanic vent at the summit of the mountain. Mt. Erebus actually has an active lava lake in its summit crater but it is hardly seen due to all the steam. The high temperature gases warm the air around the summit of Erebus which makes what little moisture in the air condense into fog which adds to the 'steam' from the vent.

What is your normal oxygen consumption in a standard tank. What are your reserves and emergency procedures in case of closure of the icehole?

We can usually dive for approximately 60 minutes on our tanks, but since it is related to our diving depth, we can stay down much longer if we are working in the shallows. The normal limiting factor is staying warm. We try to keep a good reserve of air in our tanks even at the end of the dive in case there is a problem with the dive hut hole. The most common problem is for a seal to take up residence in the hole and try to defend it (they can become territorial during the breeding season). To avoid a bite, we would then surface through a safety hole that is kept open nearby (but not inside the hut -- brrrrrrr.). We spend a lot of time before diving chipping and clearing ice from the holes to prevent them from freezing over while diving.

How can someone get to be part of the crew. (dive tenders)

We normally have no shortage of people willing to tend for us. There are lots of service people around who can help on their days off. They take a short instructional course from the diving safety officer and we give them additional instruction when they come with us for the first time. Many are already divers or paramedics so they don't need too much help, except learning a few special ice diving tricks. They like to come since it gets them away from the base for a while.

What is the type of helo used, capacity for both cargo and passenger. Special equipment (de-ice - blade warmers, etc) Where are the pilots recruited from, are they volunteers or paid.

I'll ask a helo pilot about these ones...

Antarctica Report, Oct 30, 2130 hrs Weather Conditions: Condition 3, -15 deg C, wind 10 knts

Sorry I have not posted for a little while.... Things have been very hectic since the storm.

Since my last message-- the storm got progressively worse and absolutely pounded the base for 3 straight days. Needless to say, no diving. In fact, not much of anything since we were confined to those few buildings connected by lifelines. The maximum wind speeds were over 91 knts, hurricane force. The storm was one of the worst they have had in the last 5 years and the worst 'summer' storm in recent history. In retrospect it was very exciting and gave me a real feel for all that Antarctica is. It also gave me an even heightened respect for the earlier Antarctic explorers who didn't have internal plumbing, Goretex® and heated tractors... I have never experience weather of such intensity for such a long period of time; not ever at sea, in the mountains or in Northern Ontario. The wind blasted and howled between the buildings, the power cables shrieked and I was blown to the ground twice on one trip to the galley.

The not so exciting part came after the storm -- cleaning up and digging out. There were enormous snow drifts in places and it took a long time for the tractors to clear them out. It took 2 days to plow and repair the ice runway for planes to land. Our less-than-faithful Spryte was filled right to the very top with snow. Amazing. It took 2 hours to shovel out the interior and the rest of the morning to slowly poke the snow out of the engine compartment (which was also filled solid). The other Sprytes were in similar shape. Several of the dive/fish huts were so drifted with snow (one also had the interior filled to the top) that the weight of all the snow pushed the huts below sea level by flexing the ice beneath. The huts then promptly filled with 6 inches of water (which all had to be chipped out and the huts then moved). People worked round the clock and after a few days the base was back to normal, although now staffed by exhausted people.

The Cape Roberts drilling program (to retrieve sediment cores beneath the sea ice) took a beating and the drill rig and adjacent buildings had to be abandoned mid storm (it was quite as intense there, so the workers and scientists there were evacuated to the other side of the Sound). The high winds and huge seas near the ice edge started to break up the sea ice and they were afraid of having the entire complex drift to sea. Then huge swells started causing the sea ice beneath the drill rig to move up and down up to 35 cm... The rig has been moved closer to the coast onto safer ice and they are now looking for an alternative site to work the rest of the season.

When we finally managed to get back on our diving schedule (despite several set-backs with cantankerous Sprytes) we returned for a last day of diving at the Iceberg before the hut was moved (which we did today). The safety hole was starting to shrink to the point of uselessness and the ice around the hut was starting to sag...The hut is now moved to Turtle rock, and hopefully we will dive there tomorrow.

Traveling back and forth from the far dive sites we have been encountering small groups of Emperor Penguins.for 3 days in a row. Very amazing animals. The slowly march across the ice and seem to home in on anything they consider to be out of the ordinary....like humans. We would see them a few hundred meters away and get out of the Spryte, and within 15 minutes or so they would have all walked or "tobogganed" over and be standing all around us as if to say, "What the heck are these red coated things?" They are absolutely fearless and very inquisitive.

We then put our efforts into diving for a few days at Little Razorback Island. The site of the seal pupping. The mother and pup we had seen there previously are still there and now they have been joined by another half dozen pairs. We have been doing a lot of diving along the shallow shelf under the low ice ceiling. Truly stunning. We have been working farther and farther back through a series of tunnels and small rooms and have found some beautiful sights (tunnels and rooms bright blue and covered with ice crystals) and some pretty cool animals (pure white octopus). We often have to 'share' the tunnels with the seals (that seem the size of automobiles underwater) that have made breathing holes in some places in the roofs. We get out of the seals way -- although they seem inquisitive not aggressive. We were at first a little apprehensive at working (photographing, carrying equipment), so far down these tunnels, away from the dive hole, but once we assured ourselves that we could get our heads out the same holes the seals use if there was a problem, it wasn't quite as creepy. We dove there again today, this time with a large movie camera. We have been staying down a long, long, long time on these shallow dives. We came up today quite cold after a 95 minute second dive.

We also had another small weather adventure the day before yesterday at Little Razorback. When we came up from the second dive a blizzard had socked us in. Condition 1. Extreme winds, cold and visibility was about 10 meters. There was no way we could see the flags to get on the road out. We radioed back to base outlining our situation and found out that other groups were stranded all over the place by the sudden storm. We fortunately had the shelter of the dive hut, lots of hot soup and cookies so it wasn't too bad. Until the hut heater ran out of fuel..... The Sprytes are equipped with survival bags full of tents, emergency rations, a small stove, and sleeping bags. We dragged these into the hut and made ourselves comfortable for 6 hours until the weather cleared.

Yesterday we took snowmobiles out to the ice edge under the guidance of a sea ice expert. It was a 90 minute ride out past Cape Royds. The ice edge was blown in with pack ice, so we couldn't see any open water, but we did see lots of Adelie Penguins and a few more Emperors. We then checked out a possible location for our ice edge camp (where we will be working from in a couple of weeks) in "Back Door Bay" near Shackleton's Hut (very cool) and a large Adelie Penguin rookery (also really nifty -- but also noisy and pretty smelly; 3000 nesting pairs of penguins!).

Tomorrow we will do a few more dives, hopefully at Turtle rock....

Antarctica Report, Nov. 3, 1910 hrs Weather: Condition 3, clear skies, -10 deg C, wind 10 knts.

Today we had a rest day. Not much of a rest actually -- we spent most of our time running around preparing equipment and schedules for some upcoming work farther afield. So no diving. I did spend a few hours late in the afternoon helping to relocate a new dive hole and hut at Cape Armitage. There was an enormous amount of snow on the ice which had again pushed the ice surface below sea level. When the hole was drilled, sea water gushed out and flooded the area. It turned out to be impossible to bulldoze enough of the snow away for the area to drain. So, instead, the area was piled with more snow and the hut positioned high above the dive hole. Now that the hut was dry, the interior hut hole was unfortunately about 4 feet above the ice hole to dive through. To allow diving, we constructed a small interior platform just below the hut opening to allow divers to climb in and out.

We have been diving the last few days at Turtle Rock. An area populated by a large seal colony. Underwater most of the ice was very dark (the ice is about 2.5 m thick there, covered with drifting snow), but in certain areas large cracks are visible that have been formed by pressure ridges. The seals have enlarged a series of breathing holes along the ridge and cruise back and forth along the crack systems and disappear into the darkness under the shallow shelves close to the island shore. Very cool. The large number of seals in the area means that there is a large amount of 'seal poop' under the cracks as well (it looks like they have been eating mustard!). This seal poop feeds a rich benthic community and the sediment below the cracks swarms with starfish, worms, and clams all eating what falls down from above.

One of the most remarkable sights occurred on our last dive yesterday -- hundreds of large, say basketball sized, jellyfish went floating by. Amongst them was a single enormous jelly of a different species. Its bell was approximately 1 m across, and its oral feeding arms 1.5 m long, and its stinging tentacles looked like they could extend at least 10 m. Huge! It slowly pulsed its bell along, at times almost turning inside out and looking remarkably like a tulip. Tomorrow we are planning to go back.

One member of our team, Dr. Leighton Taylor is now returning to the USA. Actually, he tried to leave today, but the C141 that landed this morning had somewhat of a crash landing on the runway. Large chunks of snow came off the runway as it touched down, they bent some of the landing gear, tore off landing gear doors and packed the gear bays with snow. The last I heard they were attempting to get the plane back into the air so it could attempt a gear down flight back to New Zealand, without cargo or passengers aboard. The next flight will be in 2 days so Leighton is stranded. Also, 2 C-130 flights left for the South Pole station today and had to turn back due to bad weather conditions over the pole... With all the people now stuck at McMurdo, housing is becoming a bit tight. No new scientists or staff will be flying in for a while until they can move people out to the Pole and other field stations.

The latest member of our team, Peter Brueggeman, from Scripps, has now completed his survival training etc. and after his check-out dive tomorrow, will be ready to start diving with us in the field. Hopefully we will all get out to Turtle Rock tomorrow.

Questions:

Early on, Steve Bartram and class had asked about helicopters...

After a chat with 'Beeze', a remarkable helo pilot who has flown down here for a number of years (first as a Navy Pilot, now with Petroleum Helicopters the contractor doing the helicopter work now that the Navy Helicopters have left). Here is the scuttlebutt

They are flying Bell 212's (weight 11200 lbs) with a payload of approx. 2500 lbs, or max. 12 passengers. And Aerospecial AS350-B2's with a max. payload of 1500 lbs. The Kiwis are still flying a few Bell 205's.

They don't do too many special things to keep the helicopters flying here. They have few problems with icing since the air is so cold and dry, so they don't have to de-ice the rotors and blades. They do use a lighter weight oil in the engines and transmissions for the cold weather.

During storms they tie the helo's down to whatever they can, and fix the blades in place with lines and support poles to keep them from vibrating apart.

Some of the pilots are like Beeze, Navy pilots who flew for years down here and then moved into the private sector when the helo operations were contracted out. The other contract pilots picked from those candidates that have minimum number of hours flying in the mountains, and have enormous total flight times. Many are pilots who work the Alaskan oil fields and other areas during the summer

months. They are top notch pilots. Questions from Bruce et al.

Power failures and their danger (i.e.. then you lose heat). Yes, power failures would be a big big problem. However, I have never experienced or heard of one happening here at McMurdo. Keeping the generating plant running is the number one priority for the base. They have lots of redundant systems and a bunch of engineers running it around the clock.

Redundant diving systems. We dive with two complete regulators; first and second stages each on their own valve (a slingshot valve). All suit inflators, gauges etc. are placed on the back up regulator. In the event of a primary regulator failure, we can move to the secondary, switch off the primary at the valve and still have the gauges working. The dive is then canceled. Yes, pulling off the facemask is not possible. So, you try not to knock it loose....

Antarctica Report Nov. 5. 2010 hrs Weather: Condition 1-2 in town, Condition 1 on the sea ice. temp -15d deg C, wind gusts +45 knts. another storm has hammered us.

Once again, what started out as a beautiful day yesterday turned to storm by late in the afternoon. This will be the 4th significant storm since we have arrived. Today we were unable to dive or travel onto the sea ice. So far it hasn't turned to Condition 1 in town, so we are still able to move around the base. The temperature has remained fairly warm, but, high winds and blowing snow has reduced visibility making travel anywhere but in town next to impossible.

We were still incredibly busy today without the dives. We took a snowmobile mechanics course in the morning (to learn how to troubleshoot and repair snowmobiles in the field) and a helicopter safety and cargo loading course just after lunch. After all that we spent most of our time building cargo manifests and weighing each individual item of gear that will have to be helo'd across the Sound to our upcoming camps at Granite Harbor and New Harbor and then to the Kiwis Camp at Cape Bird. Lots of work still to do -- we have to plan all our meals and pack up the food and water for helo sling loads (dangling cargo beneath the helicopters).

The dive we did yesterday morning was incredible. We drove out to Turtle Rock (also known as Sparkle Rock, because the rocks that make it up are loaded with olivine crystals that catch the light) early in the morning and planned to make one quick dive. Instead we spent 90 minutes underwater. I was trying a new Argon rig on this dive (for dry suit inflation and extra warmth) that turned out to be more of a hassle than it was worth. There was all sorts of extra gear to schlep around for a nominal difference in warmth (at least in the sort of diving we were doing). I will probably be going back to what we are calling "the toe heater sandwich" for extra warmth. -- We stick dry chemical heat packs (normally used for warming fingers and toes) on both sides of our feet before putting on our suits and I am contemplating just sticking them all over my entire body (just kidding). It is quite amazing what a little additional heat down on the feet can do to make a long dive more comfortable.

While we were photographing under a large crack that runs towards shore over the shallow island shelf a mother seal entered the water with her pup and started to teach it how to swim. Amazing. We managed to get quite close and the mother and pup didn't mind our presence at all. At times the pup would dive down, quite spastically actually, and swim right up to its reflection in the dome port of the video camera I was using. The mother would then just cruise by and inch the pup back towards the breathing hole. There was a solitary seal cruising the area that seemed much more aggressive and whenever it came close both the mother and the intruder would posture and make all sorts of noises and then the mother would chase the intruder away. I am guessing that the intruder was a juvenile male seal and the mother didn't want any trouble with her pup on its first swim. It was incredible to watch the pup being introduced to its new environment; it looked so eager and unskilled and tiny, and its mother so graceful and huge.

The newest member of our team, Peter, made his check out dive with us and unfortunately had to contend with what can be a very serious problem. He had both his drysuit wrist/glove seals flood (due to incorrectly installed cuffs) and the small tubes we place in the seal to equalize pressure allowed his suit to flood to his elbows. Despite being soaked he managed to stay in the water for 14 minutes. Back at the surface his hands were very cold and stiff, not to mention painful.

As we were leaving Turtle Rock the weather started to change. It became windy and snow was falling. Visibility progressively worsened en route to McMurdo.

After dinner we managed to sneak in another dive at a nearby location (Cape Armitage) in what looked like to be a break in the weather. The hut had been scheduled to move that evening and we wanted to get in a dive before it left. (this is the same hut that we had to install the additional platform in). The dive itself went very well. Peter had a great dive and his reinstalled glove seals worked perfectly. It was an interesting location although not as exciting as some of the other areas. There was so much snow on the ice above it was similar to a night dive. There were just 2 shafts of light penetrating the ice, one from the hut hole and one from the safety hole. All else was black. Directly under the hole was a shallow valley at a depth of about 60 feet, sloping gradually deeper. The bottom was mainly sponge spicule mat, sprinkled with brachiopods, sponges and the occasional small rock outcropping. I used this dive to take a core sample of the sponge spicule mat to send to some researchers in Canada (the core was a partial success -- but that is another story). The most amazing thing I can remember from the dive was looking up the slope from my sampling site (at about 120 feet) and seeing Peter and Norbert, back-lit by their powerful dive lights as they swam along the bottom far up the slope taking photographs. As they passed under the safety hole there was enough light to illuminate their bubbles as they floated towards the surface. Very nifty. It is amazing diving in such clear water.

Once the dive was over we hastily packed the Spryte and I drove us back to the base in progressively worsening weather. What should have been a 5 minute ride to the transition took almost 20 as our tender had to help me find the flags that marked the path back to the base. We had to squint our way from flag to flag. Once we were off the sea ice it wasn't nearly as bad since there wasn't as much blowing snow. The weather continued to degrade all night and into today.

Hopefully the weather will improve and we will make it back to Turtle Rock tomorrow.

Antarctic Report Nov. 9, 1900 hrs Weather: Condition 2, -10 deg C, 40 knt winds. Condition 1 on sea ice.

Another blustery day to say the least. It was very bad again this morning so we were unable to travel onto the sea ice. To make the most of our time we continued preparations for our future field work. It is amazing how long it takes to organize and pack all the food and equipment necessary for work far away from base. In addition to preparing the air compressor and diving gear there are all the 'little' things that are needed and which take most of the time to organize. Packing meals, water (60 gallons), fuel (both diesel and gasoline), camping supplies, a 'polypack' (for use as a field toilet), personal items, radios, generators, solar panels, etc. etc. and then weighing and tagging each item takes a long time.

I have lost count of the number of storms we have had this season. Apparently this is now the worst they have had on record. The forecast is for decreasing winds tomorrow, so we will try to get out (back to Turtle Rock to film the seals again) again. It didn't hit condition 1 on base today, but the sea ice was getting blasted (often with what is called a 'ground blizzard' = a blast of driven snow that is only about 12 feet thick that hugs the ground and is forced by very high wind speeds. Impossible to navigate in.). A group of scientists with a camp out on the sea ice radioed in last night with wind speeds greater than 85 knts that was threatening to destroy their main jamesway tent ( a large, half-domed shape military tent).

We did head out yesterday but were lucky not to be caught by the changing weather. We made a quick dive in the morning at Arrival Heights. I spent my time photographing the pelagic animals (mainly tiny jellies, salps and pteropods) that had drifted into the area in a very large front. There were millions of them and by diving below and then looking up towards lighter spots under the ice, I could just see their faint outlines and swim closer to take pictures. I quickly finished a roll of film and surfaced to change the film in my camera. Descending again my regulator second stage started to freeze up (probably due to my surfacing, partially warming the regulator in the warm dive hut and then descending again into the freezing water). The regulator alternately free-flowed and then leaked (well, flooded actually) water but it never stopped functioning and I managed to breathe it for the rest of the dive until the final ascent when I had to switch to my back-up regulator. I hope the pictures turn out.

After the dive, we loaded up what felt like a zillion pounds of camera equipment and headed out to Cape Royds again with the Sea Ice Wizard, 'Buck' and some of his SAR friends: us to take pictures of penguins and hopefully make it to the ice edge; Buck et al. to check on ice conditions farther afield and get away from the base for a bit of a break. The drive in our wonderful Spryte (now loaded with an additional 20 gallons of fuel) took over 2.5 hours, but it was worth every second. The afternoon was sunny, the wind not too strong and the scenery along the coast stunning. When we got to the Cape the wind had picked up slightly but it certainly wasn't threatening. We took photographs of the Adelie Penguin rookery and then of the groups of penguins (both Emperors and Adelie's) walking between the rookery and the ice edge about 1 km distant. The Adelie penguins are hilarious. They really are like little cartoon characters; always hurrying and scurrying about with great purpose and commotion. They appear to be reincarnated New Yorker's if you believe in that sort of thing. The Emperor penguins appear just like their name. Emperial. Majestic. They are slow and methodical and move with a sense of purpose.

After a brief snack our plan was to cross over a spit of land to reach the sea ice edge beyond -- a hike of about 30 minutes. However, the wind had really started to gust by this point and the distant Mt. Discovery started to disappear into threatening cloud, and the closer Mt. Erebus was half-capped in spectacular lenticular clouds and blowing snow. It was time to go. Unfortunately one of our less than trusty Sprytes was overheating on the way out so we had to creep back slowly to prevent losing it entirely. We crept back to base at 0230 this morning just as wall of blowing snow rolled down the sound towards the base. Less than 30 minutes after we had unpacked the base was again being hammered by a storm (which has continued off and on all day today).

Another dive group wasn't so lucky. Returning from Cape Evans after a late-night dive they were still a few kilometers from McMurdo when the storm hit. They managed to get back at 0500 this morning in spectacular fashion. They would inch their first vehicle along the flag road in the direction of the next flag until their other vehicle was just starting to lose sight of it. Then, some lucky person (a marine biologist from F.I.T.) would venture from the Spryte with a rope tied around his waist and then sweep around for the next flag. Then, the rear vehicle would be contacted and drive up behind the forward vehicle which would then follow the rope to the flag... Then the long, slow and cold process would repeat. At times they were able to climb up the top of the Spryte and look above the ground blizzard for landmarks to make sure they were going the correct direction.

As all this was going on, I was already fast asleep in my room on base.....

Antarctica Report, Nov. 12, 2000 hrs current weather: Condition 3. temp -5 deg C, winds 5 knts just beautiful outside.

Well, we have been having an incredibly busy few days. Some of the bad weather has cleared up (but there is rumors of another storm on its way) and the last 2 days have been glorious. Clear skies, warm temperatures, and low winds. We are hoping that it continues...

2 days ago we returned for another few dives at Turtle rock to film the seals. Everything worked very well. We even brought a generator along to power some very intense underwater movie lights to experiment with. They worked very well, although 'tending' the generator for an hour at a time, while sitting in the wind and blowing snow wasn't all that much fun. It did give us a good chance to just sit still and admire the seals (moms and pups) that are all over the sea ice surrounding the island.

Yesterday was an interesting day as well. We started out with grand plans, but were once again foiled by an evil Spryte. We planed to first photograph a group of scientists working at their field camp far out on he sea ice. Then we were going to head towards Little Razorback Island to drop off some water and do a quick dive, then we were going to stop at a series of ice caves in the Erebus Ice Tongue on the way back to the base. Alas, it wasn't to be. We made it as far as the ice camp (run by Dr. Randy Davis who is leading a collection of studies on seals) and then Spryte 510 (once again just back from the repair shop) lost all oil pressure and then stopped. We managed to get a ride back to base with the seal scientists at the end of the day, but then didn't have time to complete the rest of our plans.

The research being done by Dr. Davis and his group is just fascinating. They have a very elaborate encampment of several portable buildings (jamesway tents, polar havens, and the 'Solar Barn' -- covered with solar panels), a large generator and a lab tent that houses loads of computers and scientific gear and most importantly, a seal hole and seal. They moved a Weddell seal to the center of the sea ice shelf and drilled a solitary hole so that the seal must dive and return to the same spot. When it surfaces it breathes into a plastic dome over the hole and they are able to collect and study its respired gases. They can also take blood samples and perform other physiological tests. The really cool part of the project is that they have fitted the seal with a small electronic backpack that measures its diving depth, swimming speed and direction and has a miniature video camera attached. After a dive they can download the data, reconstruct the seals diving pathway and can see what it was doing via "Seal Cam". One of the things they hope to see with the camera is how and what the seals feed upon (i.e. what type of fish) - -something they have only speculated on previously.

Today we flew by helicopter to the ice edge and fortunately the helo operated much better than the Sprytes we have been using. We left early this morning, packed a mountain of dive and photographic equipment and flew towards the far side of the sound to see if we could find some whales and large groups of penguins. The weather was warm, clear and very sunny -- it would have been perfect if it hadn't been for the wind. It was blowing a steady 35 knts which made some of the work near the ice edge fairly hazardous. The wind was blowing directly out to sea and was threatening to break up and pull away the ice edge. To prevent disaster (i.e. us and helicopter floating away on a tiny ice floe) we landed a good distance away from the edge and then walked all the gear to the edge to check it out. There were large groups of Emperor and Adelie penguins sitting around in small groups, inquisitive as always (they would wander over to check us out -- some even wandered all the way to the helicopter, no doubt to check out how on earth such a thing could fly). The penguins were not entering the water because the edge was being patrolled by a group of about 20 Orcas. It was incredible how close to the edge they would come; you could almost reach out and stroke their dorsal fins when they came right in. Unfortunately, due to the direction and strength of the wind it was unsafe to spend much time right on the ice edge, waves were washing over and turning the surface into a slippery, slushy mess. More importantly, the waves were eroding the bottom of the ice edge and making it undercut. When we finally left and returned to the helo, waves had flooded a large section of the sea ice and was starting to push it further underwater. Flying over, huge sections were being broken off and were drifting out to sea.

We then flew towards Cape Royds, a place we had visited by ground vehicle just a few days ago. The winds were still high, but because there wasn't as much open water for the wind to blow across, the waves were not yet very large and dangerous. There was no slush or water on the ice and we had solid footing right to the very edge. There were quite a few penguins around where we landed, but not whales unfortunately. Norbert, the nature photographer, went into the water and mainly snorkeled along the edge waiting to catch images of the penguins entering and exiting the water. (they exit the water like slippery little ballistic missiles -- the Adelies land on their feet, the Emperors land on their bellies). We spent our time frantically pointing to where we thought the next penguins would appear to try to guide him to the next shot. We also rigged a drift line and float for him in case he ran into problems then we could drag him back to the ice. It worked very well and he hopefully managed to get some great pictures. Tomorrow we will try again.

We made it back to McMurdo just in time to catch dinner, after 9 hours out on the sea ice. Dinner? Roast pork chops, vegetables, scalloped potatoes and brownies for dessert. Captain Scott certainly never had it so good!

Antarctica Report, Nov. 15, 1530 hrs Weather: Condition 2, -10 deg C, 40 knt gusts

Yet another storm is rolling through, although this one doesn't seem very severe. We are hoping things continue to clear up over the next few hours so that we can head out for some dives this afternoon and evening. After another morning of running around preparing for our trip to Granite Harbor (we are scheduled to helo out Nov. 17) we are ready to get into the water again.

Yesterday we returned to Little Razor Back Island for some more filming. It was stunning as usual. What was most interesting was how much the shallow shelf ice had changed since the last time we were there. In fact, it seemed as if it was a completely different dive location and we had to get reoriented to the ice tunnels and escape holes all over again. The ice ceiling had compressed downwards and in most places was only about 1 meter high, just enough to squeeze through wearing all your gear. We were able to share the slightly more spacious tunnels with the seals to travel farther along the shelf.

One of the most interesting things we watched on the dive was an enormous female pulling herself out of the water through her breathing hole. To move such a massive body (many weigh more than 600 kg) up out of the buoyant water was an incredible feat of strength. By beating her hind flippers she was able to thrust her way up and out through the overhead snow and ice and doing so she churned a large hole in the underlying sediment.

There are many solitary pups around now, having just been weaned by their mothers. They are still spending most of their time on top of the ice though -- I have yet to see a solitary pup in the water. After leaving their pups, the mothers go into estrus again and will soon be receptive to the roving males. In the meantime they warily watch the males from their breathing holes and the males seem to spend most of their time, "cruising".

Later in the evening I returned to the Seal Camp I mentioned earlier (where they are studying the diving seal). The group there had asked if I could make a dive and clean off the windows of the underwater observation tube they use to watch the seal. The "ob tube" is a long cylinder about 10 meters in length that terminates in a small window filled chamber that allows one person to climb down a long ladder and look out under the ice. It is sort of a submarine in reverse. After it has been in the water for a while, platelet ice starts to grow on it and obscure the viewing windows....

Since I have been here I have made some of the most spectacular (i.e. the iceberg dives) and now the spookiest dive I have ever made in my life. I entered the water through the hole in the floor of the large science tent they use to study the seal (the seal had been moved back to its point of capture) and the water beneath the hole was over 600 meters deep. Since it was a "blue water" dive, I was able to do it alone because I was connected by a tethered line to my tender on the surface. Descending through the hole, the entire experience quickly became very surreal. The solid ice was at least 2 meters thick and then beneath that there was another 3-4 meters of platelet ice that had grown on the bottom of the sea ice. By the time I emerged into the open water I was almost 20 feet deep.

The water was incredibly dark. Pitch black below since the bottom was over 1000 feet away and dark above due to the thick ice and overcast evening. Very spooky and very quiet. I didn't see another living thing on the entire dive (larger than algae that is). I swam over to the observation tube, about 10 meters from the dive hole and tried to find the windows. Unfortunately, platelet ice, often more than 1 meter thick in places had covered the entire structure and to find the windows I had to pull, push and smash nearly all of it away. Fortunately it was very brittle and easy to pull apart. One of the camp scientists had entered the tube to try to take some pictures of the process, but was unable to see more than an occasional hand appearing out of the swirling ice, pushed up against a window. When I had completed the job I sank to the base of the observation tube and settled on the large ballast weight there and just looked down into the dark and then out into nothing. Wow. It makes you feel incredibly small, insignificant and very isolated. I followed my safety line back to the hole.

It was a study in contrasts. I surfaced from the very lonely and dark water, up though the long ice tunnel and into a warmly-heated Jamesway tent, filled with bright lights, flashing equipment, computer screens, science equipment, and some smiling faces to help me shed my gear.

The weather has cleared -- we're going to go for a quick dive....

Antarctica Report, Nov. 16, 1930 hrs Weather, Condition 3. temp -10 Deg C, winds 30 knts.

The weather had improved enough yesterday afternoon to let us make a quick dive at a nearby site. We loaded up the not-so-trustworthy Spryte and roared off for "Dayton's wall" at Cape Armitage, not 10 minutes from the dive locker. We had completely suited up an prepared our gear before leaving so we were able to dash out of the Spryte, yank the cover off the dive hole and jump in without getting too cold (we were out in the open -- no dive hut). The site is named for Dr. Paul Dayton who did extensive ecological work there for many years (and incidentally was my advisor at Scripps) and is a small but spectacular steep slope covered in all sorts of good stuff. A very lush benthic invertebrate community covered much of the bottom and we were disappointed to have to leave after a short dive (we were fairly deep, 120 feet, which limited our bottom time).

Today we spent the morning doing the final loading for the trip tomorrow and in the afternoon we drove ourselves and a few of our dive tenders (we weren't diving today however) up the coast to Cape Evans to see Scotts' Hut. A long drive but worth it. We spent a few hours photographing inside this most famous of Antarctic huts (Scotts main hut, where he left for his ill-fated journey to the pole). Low light and howling wind made it an authentic experience all round. The inside is remarkably preserved and like stepping into a time capsule. Quite remarkable what those men endured.

I had neglected to mention a trip we made one night out to the edge of the Erebus Ice tongue (a large section of glacier that protrudes far into the Sound) and into some ice caves there. The caves were a series of small chambers and tunnels that followed some large crevasses into the glacier. Snow had filled in the tops of the cracks so we could walk around underneath. It was the closest thing to diving I have experienced topside, akin to walking around inside a giant snowball. The ceilings of the larger chambers were completely covered with ice crystals and icicles. And the light that penetrated the roof and some of the clear walls was a stunning light blue. We had previously flown by helicopter over the top of this section of glacier; sweeping and soaring around the cliffs and cracks like in a giant amusement park ride and it was just as spectacular walking around inside it.

Tomorrow we fly off to our camp at Granite Harbor where we will be diving through ice cracks and off of ski doos. Sounds chilly but exciting. We will be gone for the week and I will try to send a report as soon as I return.

Antarctica Report, Nov. 22. 1100 hrs Weather: Condition 3, temp, -5 deg C, wind 5 knts not a cloud in sight...beautiful

We returned late last night from our weeks stay in a field camp at Granite Harbor.

Spectacular. Awe-inspiring.

This morning we did a bit of running around to reorganize for our upcoming week-long trip to Cape Bird (to work out of the Kiwis camp there). We will helo out Monday morning and return on Friday. It is difficult to exactly schedule plans since the helicopter flights change all the time as different field parties run into difficulties or require resupply etc. Regardless, we will spend some more time tomorrow morning staging our equipment for packing. This afternoon we hope to get away for some diving locally.

Granite Harbor.

The opportunity to make a trip like the one we just returned from is just one of the many reasons why this time Antarctica has been so special. Granite Harbor turned out to be a very impressive place, both topside and underwater. The weather was glorious almost the entire time -- just a few overcast hours (fortunately at night) and we had high winds only infrequently.

It was located about a 40 minute helo flight away, on the other side of the Sound on the continent proper. The "harbor" itself is an enormous bay surrounded by tall granite cliffs and by 3 separate glaciers that feed into the sea. The Mackay Glacier was the largest and most prominent. It had enormous icefalls and a glacier tongue that extended out into the bay. When you gazed out across the sea ice you could see glaciers, large mountains and cliffs far in the distance, and icebergs scattered around.

Our camp consisted of one Jamesway tent (for storing dive gear, cooking and filling tanks), a small Scott tent (pyramidal and photogenic yellow -- used as our outhouse), and a small cluster of mountaineering tents for sleeping. It was situated about 50 meters from the base of a granite cliff out on the sea ice, right alongside a convenient crack that we enlarged for some "close" diving. There were lots of seals hauled out everywhere there were larger cracks. These seals proved to be much more vocal topside than the groups we were aquainted with closer to McMurdo. You could always here them "honking" and groaning away.

The best diving required traveling by snowmobile to several different locations that also had cracks big enough for us to enter. It was fun zipping around on the skidoos, at least on the way out. The return trips were considerably less fun since we were typically wearing our wet dive gear and it got a little chilly! The sea ice had been blown free of snow and provided a skate-able hockey rink at least 100 square miles in size. Pretty nifty, but since we hadn't brought skates it made walking (and skidooing) around rather tenuous. (a few days previous a skidoo had skidded out of control on the ice, throwing the passengers -- both had concussions and one also dislocated her shoulder).

The cracks we were diving through also proved to cause problems. They gave us access to the water for diving, but they also made travel across the surface to distant sites rather serpentine. We had to search around to find safe places to move the snowmobiles and gear sled across them -- sometimes having to travel far off the quickest route. While we were there the cracks moved and opened noticeably. They were formed around pressure ridges of colliding ice masses and around the headlands and shores. We tended to the dive the cracks near shore since they were over shallower water and frequented by the seals.

A typical day included: getting up around 0700, eating some oatmeal, loading the gear sled with dive and camera gear, heading out for a dive, returning for a hot soup lunch, filling tanks, heading out again, returning for a fast "boil it up" noodle dinner, filling tanks and heading out again... Needless to say, most of the dive gear and garments never really dried out -- things were getting rather damp and smelly by the time we returned (no showers out there).

The underwater scenery was very different than on the other side of the Sound. Here we saw large granite boulders (some huge) and steep drops and cliffs rather than the more gently sloping cinder, mud or pebble bottoms. At one location we were almost right next to shore, yet the water under the dive crack was still 100 feet deep. There were many very large, white "volcano" sponges (some over 1 meter in diameter), lots of urchins, scallops, sea spiders and soft corals. Quite beautiful. In the shallow water starfish and urchins were in profusion, all feeding on the abundant seal poop.

To me the most impressive sights on the dives were the larger "big picture" vistas. At one dive (eloquently named, "Hole # 2") the surface crack was situated so that when the light was higher in the sky it would beam directly through the opening and because the water was so clear it would create a bright crack-shaped outline on the bottom. The edges often tinged by "rainbows" as the sharp ice edge worked as a perfect diffraction slit. In the midwater, the light formed a sinuous curtain of crepuscular rays (or "god beams") so bright that if you swam through them you left a diver shaped shadow on the bottom. Wow. Right up against the vertical shore line we found frozen waterfalls under the water. Melt water trickling down from the cliffs above had entered the sea and frozen along the rocks. They looked exactly like the long time- exposure pictures you see of waterfalls and river rapids on land. Here they were frozen in place, yet still appeared fluid.

One dive in particular is still burned into my mind (please allow me to wax rhapsodic for a while). After dinner one evening I traveled across the bay to dive the poetically named crack "200 meters south of Hole #3", (or "the dike" named for the black vein of rock in the cliffs above) with a few scientist friends in the camp with us (they are collecting sponges for natural products chemistry -- there were 7 of us at the camp). We hadn't dove this particular crack before so we didn't know what to expect. Our group had finished work for the day, so I was able to take the entire dive to go exploring.

I swam beneath a long pressure ridge and crack system that formed the icy roof above a shelf of large pink-granite boulders. Along one side of the shelf, the bottom dropped away, vertically in places into deep blue water. The other side of the shelf was a wall of ice and granite, with intermittent frozen icefalls, and shimmering curtains of platelet and anchor ice. Ice algae has started to bloom on the lower surface of the sea ice, so that light shining through is tinted a golden colour and looking up is like gazing into a glass of ginger ale. There were lots of seals around and now and then I could watch them glide past and the entire dive was accompanied by their singing and whistling.

In places where the cracks widened, shafts of light stabbed down to the bottom and I swam along these back and forth around and beneath the pressure ridges that jutted down to the shelf. Some of the ridges protruded 30 feet beneath the surrounding ice. After swimming wide-eyed for about 25 minutes along the ridge system, I dropped beneath a large ice ridge and slipped between some granite boulders on the shelf. On the other side the shelf opened into a large bowl and the ice arched upwards far over head into a colossal ceiling, split with gold and blue cracks. Around the outer edge of the ice roof, huge, 20 foot brine tubes hung down like teeth and on the other side a jumble of ice blocks and bright white ice coated the walls like cake frosting. I don't really have the words to adequately describe it...

The scenery had sprung directly from Colridge's mind:

It was a miracle of rare device,
a sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

When I emerged from the dive crack I saw the excited faces of the other divers -- they too had experienced something special. And when queried about what I thought, I replied, "I saw God on that dive." I currently don't believe in an omnipotent creator, however, after an experience like that dive, I really wish I had someone to thank. If that was to have been my last dive in Antarctica, or the rest of my life for that matter, I would consider my life underwater complete. In retrospect what is even more exciting is that I am sure there will be other dives just as spectacular and moving, if not in Antarctica, then elsewhere. I hope.

We have all come to Antarctica for different reasons. There are scientists here for research. There are people here to support the scientists and photographers and writers to record their visions. I think I came so that I could, among many things, have that one special dive.

Antarctica Report, Dec. 1. 1997, 2100 hrs Weather, Condition 3 (finally), -5 deg C. wind 5 knts (a beautiful evening)

If all things run smoothly, at 0700 tomorrow I will be sitting on board a C-130 Hercules flying back to New Zealand. The end of an exciting adventure.

I was lucky to get back to McMurdo today, in time to make "Bag drag" (taking cargo to the terminal for my flight out). I was stuck an additional 3 days at Cape Bird due to bad weather. Poor visibility from heavy fog over the land restricted all helo flights in the region and even prevented the airplanes from landing and leaving the ice runway. It was so bad, that our first attempt at landing at Cape Bird (the most northern point on Ross Island) was aborted half-way up the coast as the helo flew into impenetrable clouds. They have to be able to see the ground to navigate so they couldn't risk continuing. We waited until later in the day and managed to make it.

We did our flying to Cape Bird with the New Zealand "kiwis" pilots in their Huey. They run a much more casual operation than the PHI group out of McMurdo. We jammed all our gear (over 1200 lbs) into the Huey, squeezed ourselves in and the last kiwis crewman crawled up the load as well as us and squeezed between the cargo and the ceiling while safety belting himself under the roof. "No worries, Mates, " was all he said.

The Cape Bird station was a lone Kiwi hut, perched on the side of a cinder hill, just underneath a part of the Cape Bird Ice Cap. Stunning scenery. Down below on the beach and stretching out of sight was an enormous Adelie penguin rookery with over 60,000 birds. You would not believe the noise 60,000 penguins can make. And the smell.... Zowie. Standing downwind from that many screaming birds is a complete sensory experience. We spent a lot of our time wandering around between the birds, taking pictures of their various behaviours and having a good laugh at their antics.

What we were really hoping to get footage of were the leopard seals that cruise along in the ocean in front of the rookery. The penguins are making constant trips between their nests and the ocean to feed, and are the leopard seals' primary prey. As the penguins enter and exit the water, they are most vulnerable and the seals lurk just under the edge of the ice, waiting for a penguin to fall in, or miss a landing on exciting. The penguins can easily out-maneuver the seals in open water. Before jumping in, the penguins all pile up on the shore at a suitable entry point and then just sort of sit around, making noise, looking down at the water, pushing and shoving -- just to see who will be the first to enter, and possibly get eaten if there is a leopard seal nearby. If one falls in and swims away safely, or if some penguins swim up from feeding down below, then the entire group quickly dives into the water. Watching up and down the coast you could see dozens of groups of penguins waiting to get into the water.

The leopard seal is a very frightening predator. -- the scariest thing I have seen in the ocean (much more frightening than any shark since you can obviously see that they are very intelligent). They are big, over 3 meters long and they look almost reptilian with a long head and gaping mouth. They spent most of their time silently swimming just under the ice edge out of sight from above, sneaking up on their prey. When they do snatch a penguin, they grab it by the head and shake it vigorously out of the water until the outer skin and feathers pulls away. The researchers at the Cape Bird hut watched a leopard seal attack a Weddell Seal and almost manage to do the same thing to it -- whipping a thousand pounds of seal back and forth above the water to turn it inside out. Yikes.

On our first attempt to get close to the leopard seals, Peter and I tied a freshly dead penguin to a length of cord and tossed it just off the ice. Peter pulled it about 5 meters along the edge when a leopard seal popped up out of the water, not at the penguin, but at me. It hadn't fallen for the "dead penguin trick" and instead decided to check out the bigger and perhaps tastier morsels on shore... We didn't stand so close to the ice edge after that.

In the end we decided against getting into the water with them. A combination of poor visibility (just a few meters at most due to all the melt water run off and penguin poop), low light (it was overcast, snowy and foggy most of the time) and an uninteresting bottom fauna made it not worth risking injury for some mediocre pictures of the seals. We did manage to get lots of topside footage of the penguins and seals however.

The bad weather ended up trapping me at Cape Bird for an additional 3 days and I was beginning to get anxious that I would miss my flights home. Now I know the frustrations that friends had felt when their flights were delayed earlier in the season. No matter how wonderful and exciting a place can be, you can easily get depressed and begin to see it negatively if you really want to be elsewhere. I did. The snow and fog stretched on, delaying flights and ruining my chances at a last few dives in McMurdo over this past weekend. More importantly I was beginning to fear I would miss my return flights to Christchurch where I would be meeting my girlfriend who I have been missing desperately the entire time I have been gone.

Yesterday, when we knew I was stuck once again, I took a long hike with one of the penguin researchers to the "south rookery" about 3 hours south of the main camp. It was a large colony of about 30,000 birds perched atop a steep slope below the Shell Glacier above the iceberg dotted Wolfschlag bay. The sun came out occasionally and the scenery was magnificent and I did manage to cheer up a bit. There was nothing I could do about the missed flights so I was foolish to look at things in a black mood. We made it back to the camp in the evening, ate a big meal and I went to sleep after talking to helo ops on the radio who reassured me that they would try to get a helo out the next day and that the weather looked like it was improving. They were right. We made it back -- and tomorrow I should be on my way to Christchurch.

Before heading to Cape Bird I did manage a last couple of dives at Cape Armitage.. The visibility was still continuing to drop (probably only about 200 feet now) and hovering beneath the ice ceiling caused large clumps of ice algae to come raining down. My last images of the dive was of the bottom of the sea ice, sprinkled with brine tube stalactites stretching off out of sight into the darkness, and the bright blue dive hole above. Swimming up the hole was swirling through crackling and clinking platelet ice into the light and down beneath my fins was dark black water. The diving has been incredible and I will miss it.

Antarctica Report: Dec. 22. Epilogue Weather: Condition 3. temp +15 deg C, wind 10 knts (a nice sunny day in Monterey)

Hello Everyone.

I thought I might just make one last post.....

I returned to California safely 1 day ago and now I have had a little bit of time to digest some of my recent experiences.

Miracle of miracles, my plane (a C-130 Hercules) actually left on time -- there were no delays. I had a frantic last day of packing after returning from Cape Bird and then early the next morning, 20 other researchers and myself squeezed into the cargo-stuffed plane for an uncomfortable 8 hour flight back to New Zealand. We landed mid-afternoon on a hot, muggy summer day fully dressed in all our down survival gear (which must be worn on the plane). We made it back to the NSF Antarctic center staging area just before we had completely melted into little puddles of sweat. Ugh.

The next morning I flew from Christchurch (on the south island) to Auckland (on the north island) to meet up with Vera for a couple of weeks of R&R. We had a marvelous time traveling and camping about both islands. To make a long story short we managed to pack in hiking, climbing, caving, whitewater rafting and sight-seeing all into less than 3 weeks (we certainly wanted more time). Then it was time to return back to the real world -- or at least the real world according to academia in Calif.

Readjustments? It certainly was a bit of a shock traveling from McMurdo back to life in America, however, I think there might have been more of a shock if I hadn't had the "decompression period" back in New Zealand. Some of the little things that seemed strange were:

Driving. Cars are much faster than cruising around in the infamous Sprytes with their top speed of 11 mph. They are also less prone to bursting into flame, throwing tracks, filling with snow and you don't have to scream to the other passengers to be heard over the engine noise. Traffic was a bit of a change also -- the "rules of the road" are a little more relaxed when you have an entire icesheet to drive on.

Eating. Hmmm, no galley to cue up in for meals. However, now you have to do your own dishes, and if going out to a restaurant (or the gas station for that matter) you actually have to pay! But the choices in the supermarket! you can eat anything you want....

Noise. Except when in the hustle and bustle of a city the wilderness of New Zealand seemed pretty quiet at first.. There always seemed to be some sort of noise (most of the time) on the ice. The howl of the wind, a roaring helicopter or Spryte engine, cracking and booming ice, heating fans in buildings etc.. Under the ice there was the constant bubbling of our dive gear and the singing of the seals and whales. When it was quiet in Antarctica it was incredibly quiet, like in few other places I have been (with the exception of a few caves).

Rain. For a few days it poured in New Zealand...No rain in Antarctica, just snow and because the air is so dry you hardly ever felt damp. After a few days of downpour on the west coast of the south island Vera and I got pretty soggy.

People. Lots of them. In McMurdo you tended to interact with a small group of people most of the time. The others you at least recognized their faces after seeing them at meal time etc. Back in the real world there are lots and lots of different people, all the time, and most you will never see again.

Thinking back about our time on the ice some things still cling vividly on my mind. The diving of course. I can still see clearly the ice tunnels at Little Razorback Island and the stunning views under the golden ice at Granite Harbor. Thinking back, I have no way of remembering the sensations of temperature -- the numb hands and feet we would experience on the long dives. I just remember that we would get cold, but the actual feeling is no longer there (maybe that is a good thing). With such amazing visibility early in the season I had my best impressions of the vastness of the ocean. Nowhere else have I dove did you get the same feeling. Elsewhere you are restricted in your view to a hazy scene a few hundred feet around, or limited by the beam of your dive light. Under the Antarctic ice, when it was free from snow and the sun shone through you could see for hundreds and hundreds of feet in all directions and see animals poised in the water like we can see birds and clouds in the sky. The ocean will always seem to me to be much bigger now.

The ice, I think, was most spectacular. The benthic marine life and the life topside was wonderful, but the ice really seemed alive as well. Both topside and below the ice took on so many forms and it changed through the season. It moved, sometimes quickly, and made noise as it crashed together in sheets, or cracked with changing temperature.

I can still hear the songs and barks made by the Weddell seals and I will remember them giving birth in the howling wind of the blizzards we experienced. And the smell of thousands of penguins at the rookeries.

And the people of course. Some of whom have become close friends due to the peculiar circumstances that enfold such expeditions. When faced with such an extreme and often harsh and dangerous environment, that is also full of such wonders people can bond together quite closely through their shared experiences and the requirements of intense cooperation. I will miss them all and I hope that in writing my reports I have been able to let others experience some of the same feelings.

cheers,

Dale

Text ©M Dale Stokes.


Click to see the Diving Under Antarctic Ice web site resulting from this trip. DUAI presents a photo gallery, scuba diving information, a Field Guide, and personal journals based on the work of Norbert Wu's underwater photography team in McMurdo Sound.

Comments? Contact Dale through