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Welcome to a New Year of the Halley diary. I remember reading the diary each month throughout last year from home back in England with great interest and excitement as I knew I would be coming down here to live and work this year. So many thanks to Lil for having created such an insight into life at Halley, and now as she moves off to warmer climes we hope to continue the Halley diary and share with you the events of the year 2001. |  |
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| Cathy Moore with an Adelie penguin at the foot of the Simpson building at Halley. |
On the December 22 RRS Ernest Shackleton reached the Brunt Ice Shelf and we had our first view of Antarctica afte rfour weeks sailing from the Falkland Islands. We were greeted by huge white cliffs spanning all the way along the horizon, with around 500 m of sea ice in front, and a couple of surprised emperor penguins.
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A Sno-cat and sledge with the Halley winterers appeared and everyone came aboard for lunch and there was much excitement aboard ship as stories were swapped. Later in evening there were Christmas carols on the cargo deck of the ship, with mulled wine and mince pies, organised by Alex Gaffikin (with the carols all written down from memory!)
About half of the people aboard ship then went the 11 km journey to Halley on a sledge towed by a Sno-cat to help with the cargo relief on the base side, while others remained to help on the ship side. It was amazing to see Halley slowly appearing on the horizon. It’s hard to sum up my first impressions of the base, the buildings are so unusual. All the buildings are on stilts, and some of the smaller ones on skis, so that they will not get buried by the snow accumulation throughout the year. There was a large hollow underneath the main accommodation building (the Laws platform) where the wind had created a snow scoop. It made the building appear even higher as it loomed over us. It felt strange to be moving into a base that has been the home to just sixteen for the past year and that it was now being invaded by sixty! but the winterers all seemed really happy to see us all and helped us settle in.
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| travel by sledge can be very cosy! |
The cargo relief period started straight away (see December's diary) The shifts were split into day and night to take advantage of the twenty-four hour daylight. It really was very strange to be on night shift but in broad daylight with the midnight sun. Everyone got stuck in to their jobs whether moving fuel drums, driving Sno-cats, sorting cargo. Work carried on through Christmas Day although the chef, Richard Turner, prepared a fabulous meal that evening. The second year winterers spent the evening opening their personal boxes, sent down from friends and family, with much excitement. Even the smallest things were hugely appreciated as there is no post here from early February until late November ("yippee! Conditioner!" Shouted Cat Gillies with genuine glee)
We had two New Years here. One at 9 pm (which is midnight GMT) when we managed to hear Big Ben over the radio which was tuned to the BBC World Service, and then another New Year at midnight local time. The chef cooked an amazing three course meal which included duck and steak. Then we had a bit of ceilidh dancing later on organised by Thomas Rieley (new Wintering doctor) and there was a great performance by the Halley band; Gary Wilson, Steve Marshall, Cat Gillies and Alex Gaffikin.
On New Years Day we went back to the ship and it sailed round the coast to a place called 'Windy' where there is a colony of emperor penguins. We all went ashore and a lot of camera film was used that afternoon. We could get surprisingly close to the penguins and especially the chicks, which are now as big as the adults (up to 1 m tall). They don’t have the distinctive markings yet and the typical black and white colour, instead they are dark brown and fluffy. The chicks were gathered together in creches, minded by an adult. The weather that day was lovely and there was even a halo around the sun all day. Halos are formed due to ice-crystal cloud, especially cirrostratus. They can be seen about a hand span away from the sun with an outstretched arm, and all the way round it, and are beautifully rainbow coloured. Last year's winterers had seen these chicks when they were just hatching only a few months ago, so it was great for them to be able to return to see how much the chicks had grown.
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January has been a very hectic month for everyone. At the beginning of the month everyone was taking advantage of the particularly bright clear days. At the moment the temperature is about -6 degrees Celsius but it can feel really warm when the wind drops and the sun is out. The sun can be very strong here and you have to wear factor 30 suncream everytime you go outside to prevent sunburn. I think it gave most of the new people here completely the wrong impression of Antarctica, many people were walking about in only T- shirts. However, on January 16 and 17 Jan we experienced our first ‘blow’. This is when the winds are so strong they blow the snow up from the ground severely reducing visibility at eye level, at times we couldn’t see more than 200 m. During a blow the contrast is severely reduced because the light is reflected from so many different surfaces. The snow surface and the sky become indistinguishable which can be very unnerving.
The water we drink at Halley has to come from melting the snow. Twice a day during the summer we take it in turns for a small group of people to dig the snow which goes into a shaft down to the melt tank. So there are no long showers unless you want to do some extra digging! The melt tank has to be filled even in bad weather
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| Cat Gillies digging snow for the melt tank in a blow. |
The clear days have given the opportunity for outdoor activities. Many people have been skiing, snowboarding, kite flying or just walking out and about. There have been some grueling circuit training sessions organised by Tom O’Connor (aircraft mechanic) as well as outdoor aerobics classes given by Chris ‘Ricky Martin’ Miller (summer vehicle mechanic). It was a sight to be seen - electricians, mechanics, scientists, ... all trying their best to keep in time with the music (played from a sno-cat). One Sunday a game of football took place on a very random and varying sized pitch of snow. It was great fun as it’s very hard to run in the soft snow and the ball doesn’t move as you would expect, it just plops into the snow.
The new winterers have also been having training sessions in the use of radios, medical boxes, skidoos, and field equipment. For part of our training we were taken out in groups of two by our field general assistant, Dave Routledge, and spent a couple of days learning crevasse rescue, how to set up pyramid tents and lash equipment to the Nansen sledges. The skidoos were roped together in pairs and each one also towed a sledge. This was as practice for crossing possible crevassed regions. Driving at a constant speed to keep the rope between taut was very tricky. The skidoos taken on field expeditions have heated handle bars which are needed for long journeys as your hands get very cold quickly, even when wearing thick gloves. We were taught how to use crampons, ice-axes and ‘jingly-janglies’ (carabiners, ice screws, small pulleys etc..) Abseiling into the crevasse near the coast has to be my most amazing experience so far. Inside the ice glows a deep blue colour due to the ultra-violet light and beautiful stalactites made of snow crystals grow down from the roof, up to a foot in length. I had not even known these existed, they are so fragile that at the slightest touch they will disintegrate. We camped in a pyramid tent for the night and even had the door open as our sleeping bags are so warm in the relatively mild temperatures of the Antarctic summer.
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On another field trip Paul Sharp, Dave Routledge and Karl Farkas were fortunate enough to see an Orca (killer whale) swimming around the coast at Creek 5.
I've been doing lots of jobs that I never imagined I would be doing here, including skiway duty. The planes (Twin Otter aircraft) that land here all land on skis. Tom O’Connor has been teaching the winterers how to refuel the plane and help unload the cargo. Refueling planes is one thing I didn't expect to be doing here!
The aircraft journeys have been continuing and with briefly having two planes much progress has been made. Several parties had been out in the field slightly longer than expected due to bad weather conditions although with enough food taken on each journey to last several weeks. This delay was no problem and gave the people involved time to take a break from hectic base life and a chance to catch up on some reading or letter writing. There have been visits to A77 (an Automatic Geophysical Observatory at 77 degrees South) by Alan Burchell and Dave Maxfield, A80 and A81 by Dave Maxfield and Rob Hibbins, A84 by Neil Farnell and Dave Maxfield, as well as the deployment of 3 LPMs (Low Powered Magnetometers) at M79, M83 and M85 and at all of the AGOs by Dave Glynn. The network of magnetometers have been installed this season on the Antarctic plateau and Antractic Peninsula. They are designed to provide information about which chemical elements are present in the upper atmosphere on the magnetic field line that threads through each system.
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Russ Ladkin and field assistant Alasdair Reid have been to the Lyddan Ice Rise at 74 degrees South to measure snow accumulation and ice movement by measuring the height of snowstakes. There has also been a visit to Berkner Island, a raised dome in the Ronne Ice shelf at about 80 degrees S., 50 degrees W, to take ice core samples and to survey the movement of snowstakes using GPS to give an indication of iceflow movement in the area. This information will be used when a larger ice core drilling project takes place within the next couple of years. A new Automatic Weather Station (AWS) was also installed and information retrieved from snow accumulation loggers. Both these projects involved the parties camping in the field for several days in pyramid tents.
On January 20 the base expanded still further in numbers as pilot Dave Leatherdale flew across from Rothera in a Twin Otter bringing with him, Karl Farkas, the wintering field General Assistant, Pat Espy, upper atmospheric scientist, Geoff Porter(pilot) and Paul Maclean (air mech)
The MAMOG (Magnetism as a Monitor of Gondwana break-up processes) team out in Dronning Maud Land, several hundred miles to the east of Halley, have been returning this month after seven weeks out in the field. Some of the winterers have been lucky enough to be able to co-pilot some of the flights out to collect them. It will take around eight flights out to them to bring them and all their equipment back. I expect the six people will be glad of a long shower after that length of time (and I’m sure the rest of the base will be glad when they do too!). These flights require a large amount of fuel and many people at Halley have been involved in the fuel raising needed to retrieve around 160 barrels of Avtur. The barrels become buried with the snow accumulation each year and so fuel raising is a frequent event at Halley.
Work has been continuing with the relocation of the skiway to the north of the Halley station. This is to allow the construction of an area which can be used for research without receiving any atmospheric pollution from the base. The steel legs for this CASLAB (Clean Air Sector Laboratory) are now in place, the remainder of the construction will be brought in next year in the form of two containers which will be installed on top of the legs. Another annual project that has involved most people here has been the jacking of the Laws Platform. The building needed to be raised 800 mm. To do this one person manned each of the twenty legs which were raised simultaneously in steps of 20 mm. Fortunately this was done using a mechanical jack rather than a manual one as was used in the past (and is still used in Winter!)
To finish, here are some pictures to show just some of the work which has been going on during January.
Best Wishes,
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