A night on the ice
10/20/04
9:24 pm
I just read through this one and some parts are a little crude. Sorry Mom.
So I’m back at McMurdo after two long days of “Snowcraft 1: Field Safety Training” (AKA Happy Camper Training School). I just showered for the first time since leaving NZ and it feels pretty good. I even powdered my feet. So tingly. Here’s what stands out in my mind from the past 48 hours:
Breakfast is served from 5:30-7:30 on weekdays, so we had to get up at 6:45 to go eat. We then sat around for a while and headed over to the SSC (Science Support Center or something) for class at 9. We had a little over an hour of class taught by a woman named Suz who was rocking a sort of female mullet. My first impression of her was one of these people who loves to talk about all of the outdoorsy type stuff they have done, “I was a NOLS leader for 16 years before I came here, but then I quit to hike the AT 5 times and then I lived in a lean-to in the Rockies for the next 3 summers, then I killed small deer with my bare hands to survive the winter, etc, etc”. But she knew her stuff. And in the end, I really got to like her a lot. Anyway, after the class, all 19 of us suited up in our ECW and boarded a delta. Now a delta is like a diesel cargo/people transporter, Antarctic style – with bigass monster truck wheels, probably about 4-5’ tall. At the right speed, the whole thing kind of gently rocks up and down a few times a second. It’s actually pretty fun. A quick stop at the cafeteria for lunches and we were off. We headed up the main road and over the mountains that makeup the backdrop for McMurdo. Background info time. So McMurdo is located on Ross Island, which is made up of two huge volcanoes, Mt. Erebus and Mt. Terror. The base is on a little peninsula that jets out into the Ross Ice Shelf. On the other side of the peninsula is the New Zealand station, Scott base. It is almost entirely made up of green buildings. We drove for about 20 minutes, and as we did, things got more and more white. The brown volcanic rock that is everywhere at McMurdo was gone. We pulled up to a little stop with two buildings in the middle of nowhere and the back door swung open. We were on about the flattest, whitest place that I have ever seen (the Ross ice shelf). We made our way to one of the buildings, the I-Hut, the equivalent of a blue Iroquois Long Cabin. Inside, we ate lunch and were briefed on what we would do for the afternoon. We leared how to use the stoves and then started walking toward “Snow Mound City” where we would spend the next 24 hours.
Snow Mound City is the spot where the Happy Camper Training School is held, so there were several generations of ice walls, igloos and quinzees (hollowed out snow mounds). We started the day by setting up two of the big yellow Scott tents and learning how to anchor them properly with “dead men” (a clever name for a buried weight). Then, all 19 of us made a huge pile of our sleeping kits and started to bury them with snow. After about 45 minutes of shoveling and patting, we completed our giant mound of snow, probably 8-9 feet tall and probably twice as wide over the pile of sleeping gear. After the snow had fully set, the other trip leader, Alan started digging out a hole and pulling out the bags. A few of us continued digging out the inside, leaving a nice warm shell of packed snow with a spacious interior. A home. Next we had to build two ice walls to shelter several smaller tents that we had set up earlier. We grabbed saws and shovels and started quarrying – yes, quarrying – blocks of snow, which were on average about 24”x12”x18” and weighed about 30 pounds each. Sawing the snow was a real bitch. The saw kept getting stuck and we would hit patches of ice all the time. Physical activity really gets your body heated up too. I had to strip down several times and was walking around comfortably in a long sleeve shirt at one point in 5°F weather. Underarmor is a godsend. I didn’t feel sweaty once, even though I know that I was sweating like crazy at times. As the blocks started to come out, some of us started building the wall. We laid out a roughly semicircular wall around 20-25 feet long, which involved some precision adjustments to the block shape and size. It was a beautiful thing. In the end, the wall was about 4’ high and took around 3, maybe even 4 hours to complete. We had several reject ice blocks leftover and some of us took the liberty of decorating our wall. They started making ice turrets or castle towers. I decided to take an alternate route. I grabbed an ice pick and began sculpting a 12” idol head that slightly resembled its larger relatives from Easter Island. I told people it would ward off would-be invaders. They really liked it and were impressed with my sculpting skills. I didn’t tell them that I had been professionally trained in Sculpture I, where I learned to make plaster dildos.
So we finished the wall at around 5:00, when Suz and Alan took off and left us to fend for ourselves. Some people set about constructing ice shelters or igloos while others build a little kitchen area with a counter. As the water was put on to boil, we all started gathering in the little “kitchen coliseum”. We had some hot cocoa and started telling stories and laughing a lot. Everyone was in high spirits. It had been a good day and we had all worked together to set up camp so a bond had already been formed. As more water was heated, we broke out the dinner packets. I ended up with Sierra chicken. Inside was pasta, dehydrated chicken, a lot of red powder, some corn chunks and a “freshness packet”. I added some hot water, sealed it up and stuffed it in my parka for 5 minutes. It came out a little crunchy, but hot and somewhat tasty, so I wolfed it down with another cup of hot water. After dinner, Doug and I scoped out a place to sleep. We checked the older quinzees and igloos. It was like shopping for a new house. Some were too small, others had a tight entrance, others looked like they were about to cave in. We finally settled on what appeared to be a decent-sized quinzee and after a few issues with actually claiming sleeping bags, brought our stuff over and planted a flag, making it official.
A big group of us, warm, full and happy decided to go for a walk. We headed towards the Ice Falls, an incredible display of crevasse-ridden blue glacial ice not too far from our camp. We walked a loop that was probably around 2 miles long and got a chance to see our surroundings. Along the way, we came across a 1/2” crack in the path that extended as far as we could see in both directions. Proof that the ground beneath us was very much alive and moving. While I enjoyed the walk, I was also getting extremely tired and burning much-needed calories. When we got back I was getting ready to go to bed and then had a half hour conversation with a guy named Josiah who is heading to the South Pole in a week. I felt like I was talking to Win. It was a good conversation, I haven’t had a chance to talk with anyone like that in a while. I took one last trip to the outhouse and crawled up inside the quinzee to join Doug and Kate. After some debate about sleeping arrangements and whether or not the three of us could even fit, we decided to try. I remember thinking, “I could sleep in one of the tents, but when else am I going to sleep inside a mound of snow?” We laid out our pads and bags and dove inside (well, climbed up) sequentially. I should mention that the roof of this particular quinzee was not very high, probably 3 feet above the sleeping platform in the center. The Interior was maybe 8 feet in diameter, so it was really tight. I’m glad I’m not claustrophobic. But one advantage is the smaller the space, the warmer it will be. We were really giggly. Overtired, cramped and excited at the same time. I was farting a lot. They call me “Shean”. After a 10 minute laughing session, Kate said something along the lines of “The Midnight Sun will make ya crazy”. And that was just one night. It’s hard to imagine what two months would be like. I was pretty cold at that point, since we had essentially been sitting around on ice for 20 minutes. I quickly threw off my boots and parka and climbed into my sleeping bag. It took another 15 minutes before I started to warm up, but I quickly fell asleep. After about a half hour, at like 11:15, Kate sat up and announced that she couldn’t do it and was leaving for one of the mountain tents. I took her spot. So she scurried off and Doug and I slept.
The next thing I know, it is 2 am and I have to pee like no other. I spent 15 minutes trying to decide whether or not to get up. I was so warm and cozy and I knew that if I got up it would be awful. The outhouse was like 50 yards from the hut and I would have to put on my ice cold boots and parka. I finally couldn’t take it any more and got out of my bag. It was freezing. I couldn’t get my boots on because the rubber was so cold and stiff, so I had to completely unlace them, all the while my feet are losing all of their heat. When I finally got them on I threw on my parka, spilling trail mix all over the entrance to the quinzee in the process, and ran to the outhouse to pee. At least it was light out (the sun never sets). Man did it feel good to pee. I ran back, cold as hell and reversed the process. I tried to munch on some chocolate and drink some water to help my body warm up. I climbed back in my bag and fortunately, most of my body heated up again within 15 minutes. But my feet were still cold. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get them warm and that is the way it was until 8 am the next morning. It probably didn’t help that the entrance to the quinzee was right in front of my feet. I tried massaging my feet, putting my parka over the bag down there, but nothing really worked. It was a little bit frustrating. I got some broken sleep, but woke up again at 6:30 with morning wood and having to pee again. I wish I had control over where the blood went in my body. I remember thinking, “Why the hell is warm blood in my penis and not in my feet?”. I finally got up at 8 and put on the ice cold gear again. It took a good 20 minutes before I started to warm up. It was pretty miserable. Oh and I forgot to mention that every time I tried to sit up in the quinzee, I hit my head on the ceiling and threatened its integrity, sending shards of ice and snow raining down into my jacket and sleeping bag. At one point, I was questioning whether I could make it through 6 weeks of this. At least we will have cots and good sleeping pads for our camp. Staying in a big yellow tent on a cot will be luxurious compared to the quinzee.
We had some hot cocoa and oatmeal to start the day. People were pretty tired and cold, but still happy. We had survived the night. We broke down camp and Alan showed up at 9. We made our way back to the I-Hut for the day 2 instruction.
We talked about planning and logistical issues of field camps, ate some lunch, and then did radio communication training. We learned how to use VHF radio to communicate as well as HF radio equipment that was surplus from Vietnam (seriously). Next was a white-out simulation. We had to don white buckets over our heads, and using only a rope, the 9 of us had to find one of our instructors who had “gotten lost in the storm” going to the bathroom. It was pretty tough and there was a lot of confusion, but we managed to do it, and according to him, we did a damn good job. My bucket fell off as I was bending over to help lift him. I caught a glimpse of everyone else in their buckets, we looked pretty ridiculous, it made me chuckle a little. Finally, we had to set up emergency camp using the basic survival gear that we are required to have with us at all times and did some mock simulations to deal with cases of hypothermia.
We were all pretty tired at the end of that, and were happy to return to McMurdo. The ride back was less quiet than I had hoped – one annoying girl kept talking to people. We had to sit through a helicopter safety training video and then learn how to buckle the seatbelts. Finally, Alan talked for a few minutes about the Dry Valleys and emphasized the importance of having a pee bottle. While in The Dry Valleys, there is a “leave no trace” policy – which means everything you take into the field, you take out (EVERYTHING). Even if it wasn’t for environmental reasons, I would have a pee bottle in the tent with me after the experience from last night. So much more practical than getting suited up to run 50 yards to a big, shit-filled pit in the ice to pee.
And then we were free. I got back here at around 3:30 and slept soundly until around 5:30 when I met everyone for dinner. After dinner we went back to the BFC to get some gear ready. I was loopy and farting a lot. Adam said he was originally worried that Kate would be the problem in the field, but now was concerned that it was me.
The delta.
Building the quinzee and one of the Scott tents.
Doug with one of the ice walls.
The artist.
A view of the camp. The big snow mound is the finished quinzee. I slept in that thing.
The Ice Falls. Pictures can't do them justice.
A view from inside the quinzee. Those are my feet.
The first signs of insanity begin to appear. (and that's ice in my nose, not snot)
9:24 pm
I just read through this one and some parts are a little crude. Sorry Mom.
So I’m back at McMurdo after two long days of “Snowcraft 1: Field Safety Training” (AKA Happy Camper Training School). I just showered for the first time since leaving NZ and it feels pretty good. I even powdered my feet. So tingly. Here’s what stands out in my mind from the past 48 hours:
Breakfast is served from 5:30-7:30 on weekdays, so we had to get up at 6:45 to go eat. We then sat around for a while and headed over to the SSC (Science Support Center or something) for class at 9. We had a little over an hour of class taught by a woman named Suz who was rocking a sort of female mullet. My first impression of her was one of these people who loves to talk about all of the outdoorsy type stuff they have done, “I was a NOLS leader for 16 years before I came here, but then I quit to hike the AT 5 times and then I lived in a lean-to in the Rockies for the next 3 summers, then I killed small deer with my bare hands to survive the winter, etc, etc”. But she knew her stuff. And in the end, I really got to like her a lot. Anyway, after the class, all 19 of us suited up in our ECW and boarded a delta. Now a delta is like a diesel cargo/people transporter, Antarctic style – with bigass monster truck wheels, probably about 4-5’ tall. At the right speed, the whole thing kind of gently rocks up and down a few times a second. It’s actually pretty fun. A quick stop at the cafeteria for lunches and we were off. We headed up the main road and over the mountains that makeup the backdrop for McMurdo. Background info time. So McMurdo is located on Ross Island, which is made up of two huge volcanoes, Mt. Erebus and Mt. Terror. The base is on a little peninsula that jets out into the Ross Ice Shelf. On the other side of the peninsula is the New Zealand station, Scott base. It is almost entirely made up of green buildings. We drove for about 20 minutes, and as we did, things got more and more white. The brown volcanic rock that is everywhere at McMurdo was gone. We pulled up to a little stop with two buildings in the middle of nowhere and the back door swung open. We were on about the flattest, whitest place that I have ever seen (the Ross ice shelf). We made our way to one of the buildings, the I-Hut, the equivalent of a blue Iroquois Long Cabin. Inside, we ate lunch and were briefed on what we would do for the afternoon. We leared how to use the stoves and then started walking toward “Snow Mound City” where we would spend the next 24 hours.
Snow Mound City is the spot where the Happy Camper Training School is held, so there were several generations of ice walls, igloos and quinzees (hollowed out snow mounds). We started the day by setting up two of the big yellow Scott tents and learning how to anchor them properly with “dead men” (a clever name for a buried weight). Then, all 19 of us made a huge pile of our sleeping kits and started to bury them with snow. After about 45 minutes of shoveling and patting, we completed our giant mound of snow, probably 8-9 feet tall and probably twice as wide over the pile of sleeping gear. After the snow had fully set, the other trip leader, Alan started digging out a hole and pulling out the bags. A few of us continued digging out the inside, leaving a nice warm shell of packed snow with a spacious interior. A home. Next we had to build two ice walls to shelter several smaller tents that we had set up earlier. We grabbed saws and shovels and started quarrying – yes, quarrying – blocks of snow, which were on average about 24”x12”x18” and weighed about 30 pounds each. Sawing the snow was a real bitch. The saw kept getting stuck and we would hit patches of ice all the time. Physical activity really gets your body heated up too. I had to strip down several times and was walking around comfortably in a long sleeve shirt at one point in 5°F weather. Underarmor is a godsend. I didn’t feel sweaty once, even though I know that I was sweating like crazy at times. As the blocks started to come out, some of us started building the wall. We laid out a roughly semicircular wall around 20-25 feet long, which involved some precision adjustments to the block shape and size. It was a beautiful thing. In the end, the wall was about 4’ high and took around 3, maybe even 4 hours to complete. We had several reject ice blocks leftover and some of us took the liberty of decorating our wall. They started making ice turrets or castle towers. I decided to take an alternate route. I grabbed an ice pick and began sculpting a 12” idol head that slightly resembled its larger relatives from Easter Island. I told people it would ward off would-be invaders. They really liked it and were impressed with my sculpting skills. I didn’t tell them that I had been professionally trained in Sculpture I, where I learned to make plaster dildos.
So we finished the wall at around 5:00, when Suz and Alan took off and left us to fend for ourselves. Some people set about constructing ice shelters or igloos while others build a little kitchen area with a counter. As the water was put on to boil, we all started gathering in the little “kitchen coliseum”. We had some hot cocoa and started telling stories and laughing a lot. Everyone was in high spirits. It had been a good day and we had all worked together to set up camp so a bond had already been formed. As more water was heated, we broke out the dinner packets. I ended up with Sierra chicken. Inside was pasta, dehydrated chicken, a lot of red powder, some corn chunks and a “freshness packet”. I added some hot water, sealed it up and stuffed it in my parka for 5 minutes. It came out a little crunchy, but hot and somewhat tasty, so I wolfed it down with another cup of hot water. After dinner, Doug and I scoped out a place to sleep. We checked the older quinzees and igloos. It was like shopping for a new house. Some were too small, others had a tight entrance, others looked like they were about to cave in. We finally settled on what appeared to be a decent-sized quinzee and after a few issues with actually claiming sleeping bags, brought our stuff over and planted a flag, making it official.
A big group of us, warm, full and happy decided to go for a walk. We headed towards the Ice Falls, an incredible display of crevasse-ridden blue glacial ice not too far from our camp. We walked a loop that was probably around 2 miles long and got a chance to see our surroundings. Along the way, we came across a 1/2” crack in the path that extended as far as we could see in both directions. Proof that the ground beneath us was very much alive and moving. While I enjoyed the walk, I was also getting extremely tired and burning much-needed calories. When we got back I was getting ready to go to bed and then had a half hour conversation with a guy named Josiah who is heading to the South Pole in a week. I felt like I was talking to Win. It was a good conversation, I haven’t had a chance to talk with anyone like that in a while. I took one last trip to the outhouse and crawled up inside the quinzee to join Doug and Kate. After some debate about sleeping arrangements and whether or not the three of us could even fit, we decided to try. I remember thinking, “I could sleep in one of the tents, but when else am I going to sleep inside a mound of snow?” We laid out our pads and bags and dove inside (well, climbed up) sequentially. I should mention that the roof of this particular quinzee was not very high, probably 3 feet above the sleeping platform in the center. The Interior was maybe 8 feet in diameter, so it was really tight. I’m glad I’m not claustrophobic. But one advantage is the smaller the space, the warmer it will be. We were really giggly. Overtired, cramped and excited at the same time. I was farting a lot. They call me “Shean”. After a 10 minute laughing session, Kate said something along the lines of “The Midnight Sun will make ya crazy”. And that was just one night. It’s hard to imagine what two months would be like. I was pretty cold at that point, since we had essentially been sitting around on ice for 20 minutes. I quickly threw off my boots and parka and climbed into my sleeping bag. It took another 15 minutes before I started to warm up, but I quickly fell asleep. After about a half hour, at like 11:15, Kate sat up and announced that she couldn’t do it and was leaving for one of the mountain tents. I took her spot. So she scurried off and Doug and I slept.
The next thing I know, it is 2 am and I have to pee like no other. I spent 15 minutes trying to decide whether or not to get up. I was so warm and cozy and I knew that if I got up it would be awful. The outhouse was like 50 yards from the hut and I would have to put on my ice cold boots and parka. I finally couldn’t take it any more and got out of my bag. It was freezing. I couldn’t get my boots on because the rubber was so cold and stiff, so I had to completely unlace them, all the while my feet are losing all of their heat. When I finally got them on I threw on my parka, spilling trail mix all over the entrance to the quinzee in the process, and ran to the outhouse to pee. At least it was light out (the sun never sets). Man did it feel good to pee. I ran back, cold as hell and reversed the process. I tried to munch on some chocolate and drink some water to help my body warm up. I climbed back in my bag and fortunately, most of my body heated up again within 15 minutes. But my feet were still cold. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get them warm and that is the way it was until 8 am the next morning. It probably didn’t help that the entrance to the quinzee was right in front of my feet. I tried massaging my feet, putting my parka over the bag down there, but nothing really worked. It was a little bit frustrating. I got some broken sleep, but woke up again at 6:30 with morning wood and having to pee again. I wish I had control over where the blood went in my body. I remember thinking, “Why the hell is warm blood in my penis and not in my feet?”. I finally got up at 8 and put on the ice cold gear again. It took a good 20 minutes before I started to warm up. It was pretty miserable. Oh and I forgot to mention that every time I tried to sit up in the quinzee, I hit my head on the ceiling and threatened its integrity, sending shards of ice and snow raining down into my jacket and sleeping bag. At one point, I was questioning whether I could make it through 6 weeks of this. At least we will have cots and good sleeping pads for our camp. Staying in a big yellow tent on a cot will be luxurious compared to the quinzee.
We had some hot cocoa and oatmeal to start the day. People were pretty tired and cold, but still happy. We had survived the night. We broke down camp and Alan showed up at 9. We made our way back to the I-Hut for the day 2 instruction.
We talked about planning and logistical issues of field camps, ate some lunch, and then did radio communication training. We learned how to use VHF radio to communicate as well as HF radio equipment that was surplus from Vietnam (seriously). Next was a white-out simulation. We had to don white buckets over our heads, and using only a rope, the 9 of us had to find one of our instructors who had “gotten lost in the storm” going to the bathroom. It was pretty tough and there was a lot of confusion, but we managed to do it, and according to him, we did a damn good job. My bucket fell off as I was bending over to help lift him. I caught a glimpse of everyone else in their buckets, we looked pretty ridiculous, it made me chuckle a little. Finally, we had to set up emergency camp using the basic survival gear that we are required to have with us at all times and did some mock simulations to deal with cases of hypothermia.
We were all pretty tired at the end of that, and were happy to return to McMurdo. The ride back was less quiet than I had hoped – one annoying girl kept talking to people. We had to sit through a helicopter safety training video and then learn how to buckle the seatbelts. Finally, Alan talked for a few minutes about the Dry Valleys and emphasized the importance of having a pee bottle. While in The Dry Valleys, there is a “leave no trace” policy – which means everything you take into the field, you take out (EVERYTHING). Even if it wasn’t for environmental reasons, I would have a pee bottle in the tent with me after the experience from last night. So much more practical than getting suited up to run 50 yards to a big, shit-filled pit in the ice to pee.
And then we were free. I got back here at around 3:30 and slept soundly until around 5:30 when I met everyone for dinner. After dinner we went back to the BFC to get some gear ready. I was loopy and farting a lot. Adam said he was originally worried that Kate would be the problem in the field, but now was concerned that it was me.
The delta.
Building the quinzee and one of the Scott tents.
Doug with one of the ice walls.
The artist.
A view of the camp. The big snow mound is the finished quinzee. I slept in that thing.
The Ice Falls. Pictures can't do them justice.
A view from inside the quinzee. Those are my feet.
The first signs of insanity begin to appear. (and that's ice in my nose, not snot)
posted by LankyPoobah at 9:24 PM
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