Click for full screen.  The video of Facebook (link opens new window) ended up being higher quality.

The final time-lapse of 1200 images shows a pretty neat dance of exhaust from McMurdo and the auroras in the distance.  

Here is the first time lapse of just over 300 images covering the first few hours of the night.

The clear skies this weekend left me with many trips out to Hut Point to set up my camera for hours of photos.  There will be at least three time lapse videos and star trail images coming up this week.  In the meantime I have about 5000 images to deal with.

Every week or so there is a beautiful calm day in McMurdo.  I try to go for a run every time it is calm enough to do so.  This week is the first time that McMurdo has felt like a mountain town to me.  It had been calm all day with low clouds and the weather drew me to free myself from the indoors and go for a run around McMurdo.  The low clouds blocked out the sky and dropped ice crystals all over town as if all the stars had fallen and stuck to the cold ground.  They sparkled just as brightly leaving the same feeling that you get when you look up at a sky full of stars.  

My run took me part way up Ob Hill overlooking McMurdo and I could here the dull roar of the town. It was the same dull roar that any town puts off at night.  The lights of town cast an orange glow on the lower hanging clouds and I momentarily felt at home.  I felt like this was a place, seemingly forgotten at the bottom of the earth, that I might be able to spend some time in.  There have been a few moments in my last nine months there that I've felt this way.

On that note I can't wait for the sun to come up.  Only 52 more days until that happens.

Only 18 days had passed since the second last plane of the winter took off from Antarctica before the third last plane landed in the dark winter night.  It was just about enough time for much of the equipment to get put away from the last flight.

These subsequent medevac flights have taken on a life of their own because of how close together they were, the people that go out and come in on them, and the mystery that theytry to shroud them in.  They have even gotten nicknames: Medevac 1.0 now known as WHOOPS (Why Have Only One Plane Sent) and Medevac 2.0 has been dubbed OOF (Operation Old Flame because of some of the passengers arriving.)  

After a four-hour delay I fired up the Hagglund to drive out to Pegasus Airfield.  Since the Hagglund has tracks it was decided to use it to help transport people and baggage out since the road wasn't in the best shape for normal wheeled vehicles.  I enlisted the help of two others to help me open the giant doors (acting as sails in the wind) of the Science Cargo building, where we park the Hagglund in the winter.  After the vehicle was warmed up and moved outside it only took one person to close the doors.  The wind had stopped.  We could stand outside and look at the stars without goggles and a face mask.  In a matter of minutes a terrible ground storm turned into a cold serene night.  I say night, but it was only 2pm. 

The C-17 was set to land at 6pm.  Everyone was poised and ready next to the runway when we got the call to turn off our headlights.  All that was left was the glare of the runway lights pointing to the north and the distant lights of McMurdo and Scott Base.  The stars of the Milky Way were in full view in the cold clear air.  By this point in the evening only one cloud had developed to the north—directly in the flight path.  Far in the distance above the clouds I could make out a faint flashing red light.  There was a different type of anticipation for this flight than there was for the last one.  For WHOOPS there was the excitement of a plane coming in and the dread of why and how the plane was coming in.  But OOF carried a different excitement with it.  It carried fresh food, firefighters, and a bunch of cargo.  There wasn't the dread since the patient wasn't in such a critical condition as before.  It was as if USAP was finally deciding to correct things from last time.

The flashing red light of the distant C-17 slowly grew brighter and brighter and then completely disappeared into the only cloud in the sky.  Nothing else in the sky moved except for the exhaust floating from the pipes of the many vehicles it takes for such an operation.  My eyes were fixed upon the cloud trying to guess where the red light would reappear.  Despite the hum of numerous diesel engines it seemed silent because that sound has become so normal over the last seven months.  My heart rate slowed for what seemed like quite some time until the red light of the plane reappeared and still seemed very far off.  The rest happened very fast so the plane wasn't as far away as it had seemed.   My radio sputtered an announcement to have the runway lights turned down to 50%.  Then the flashing red light flared as the bright white spotlights on the plane were turned on.  A voice from the radio said to have the runway lights turned off.  I wonder what was seen from the cockpit through the night vision goggles.  It looked as if the plane was heading straight toward the group of people and vehicles sitting near the fuel tank beside the runway, but it landed perfectly on the newly groomed ice runway. 

The plane turned around and it was go-time for everyone.  They offloaded one pallet of cargo from WHOOPS and the plane was on the ground for 40 minutes.  This time they took 7 or 8 pallets of cargo off and it seemed like the plane wasn't on the ground for much longer thanks to the elite team of former and newly trained cargo handlers.

Offloading cargo from OOF

The plane soon took off and winter started again with new people and fresh food for the third time in just over two months.  Auroras on the eastern horizon welcomed the re-restart of winter.  The relative calmness felt after the plane took off ended not long after arriving back in McMurdo.  The wind had picked back up in town and somehow word had spread about the pallets of fresh food (locally known as freshies) arriving in town and a large crowd had gathered to help unload everything. 

Despite the ensuing gas from not having eaten fresh food in months, the mood at lunch the next day was livelier than it had been all season. Simple fresh food had quite the effect on an already jovial table of people crazy enough to spend the winter in Antarctica. 

Last week we had a medevac flight come down to evacuate a worker who needed further medical care.  It wasn’t that our medical staff couldn’t handle this person’s condition (they do amazing with the few resources they have); this person needed more advanced long-term care than could be provided here.  The United States Antarctic Program (USAP) has proven again, as it has in the past, that if something really is wrong they will get you out of here. 

This was by no means a good thing.  We’d be losing a valuable member of our already small community. It also meant thousands of man-hours of work to get the runway cleared of snow and get equipment up out of the cold and running to support a flight.  Most of this was done in the extreme cold and limited daylight of the winter.
  

It was also an opportunity for USAP to correct a few mistakes it had made and to maybe even get a little extra cargo down since major cargo flights won’t start until mid-october.

Instead an empty C-17 was sent to New Zealand from the US.  It was then loaded with a bag of mail, a few (but not all) of the CAT equipment parts that were needed, and some ducting and a secret box of fresh food for New Zealand’s Scott Base.  None of the much-needed medical supplies or fresh food for the Americans was brought down.  This 800-pound pallet was all that was shipped down-leaving 90,000lbs of unused cargo weight.  I also fully understand that the whole point of this flight was to evacuate someone and they wanted the plane on the ground for as little time as possible.  

The plane had more cargo going back to New Zealandthan it did coming down here.   Besides the person that the medevac was for we lost four additional people—this included one third of the firefighters.  McMurdo now with its 139 people and 100+ buildings only has four firefighters for the next 4-5 months.  Rumor has it that two replacement firefighters were in LA about to board a plane to come down here when they got a call to go home because the C-17 was coming down a day earlier than planned.  Imagine quitting your job, packing and getting all the required medical checks in a matter of days to rush down to Antarctica two days before the last sunset.  Then being told right before you board a plane to go home. 

I won’t rant anymore because I don’t want it to overshadow what the people of McMurdo did to make this flight happen and to save a life.

By this point, much of the mechanical equipment and vehicles have been put to sleep for the winter.  This mean all the airfield fire trucks, fuel equipment, runway lights and all the other strange machines that it takes for a plane to land here had to be brought back to the land of living for this flight.  Untold hard and painful hours were spent out at the runway digging out the fuel pits and plowing snow off the ice runway.  I had a relative small and easy job in this process (simply bring supplies over to the clinic when they were running low on items) so I have a huge amount of respect for everyone who put in more countless hours in this. 

It is pretty amazing what people will do for another person.  For a few days many people didn't even know who they were building the runway for.  Things like this make me proud to be a part of this community.

Things are slowing back to normal now with the population now at 139.

I've walked out to Hut Point to take in the sunset quite a bit in the last few weeks and I've hoped to see a seal every time.  They were there almost every day this summer, but most of the seals have moved to other waters for the winter.  Luckily I caught the last straggler.

The juxtaposition is interesting with the industrial looking town in the foreground.  I'm excited for the darkness, but I'm also excited for this same type of light to come back in August because it will be even more amazing after a few months of darkness.  

The Milky Way photo is at: http://www.greatoutdoorscontest.com/bin/Rate?image_id=2011300249 

This penguin photo is at: http://www.greatoutdoorscontest.com/bin/Rate?image_id=2011300248

Thanks for the help!

I was in a hurry to leave McMurdo and get out to a small hut on the McMurdo Ice Shelf called Square Frame.  Square Frame is a large insulated box with a few windows that sits on top of a man-made snow drift and contains a few beds, a couch, a heater, propane stove and card table.  It is maintained by the Kiwis, but is set aside for one weekend a month for the Americans to use.  The USAP used to have a hut near here called the A-Frame, but that blew away in a storm years ago and I think the Kiwis decided to mock us by putting up the Square Frame.  No one else signed up on Saturday night so we got the place to ourselves.   

The sun set about an hour before we arrived at Square Frame, but the few clouds in the sky were still highlighted in orange.  The rumors of auroras and a meteor shower (and a clear night) left me eagerly anticipating the darkness.

It was great to be out of McMurdo and again enjoy the simplicity of no electricity or internet.  To pass through the twilight hours I beat Liz in a few games of cribbage and started watching the movie Encounters At the End of the World.  It's a movie about the people who work at USAP and about being down here.  After spending the last six and a half months down here I could only shake my head at what Werner Herzog (director & narrator) had to say about his little bit of time down here.  I would highly recommend watching the movie on mute with some great music in place of his negative tone and terribly accented dialog.

Just like a little kid, every few minutes I would get up and run to the window to see how dark it was outside and see how many stars were out or if the auroras were starting yet.  

Finally it came to the point that I decided it was either dark enough or I couldn't handle Herzog's voice anymore and it was time to go outside and take some photos.  It took some time to set our cameras and layers of clothing ready to go.  

Amazingly there was no wind and the temperature felt fairly warm (for Antarctica) so it was pleasant to stand around outside for awhile.  I imagined some of the photos that could be taken, but I had no idea what would actually show up in my camera after that first shot.  I've always drooled over photos of the Milky Way and auroras.  After recently doing some research I had an idea of how to capture them.  But what appeared on the cold, tiny LCD screen blew me away.  I wanted to keep taking the same photos over and over again just to prove to myself that these photos were real.  

I went back in to warm up and finish the movie and prepared to head out again.  I wanted to take photos throughout the night, but wanted to get some sleep also.  I hooked up a remote and put that in a mitten filled with hand warmers.  I also put hand and toe warmers all over the camera (concentrated around the battery) and wrapped the whole set up in a Patagonia Nano Puff Jacket, MicroPuff Jacket, DAS Parka and a pair of puffy pants.  I set the camera to take 30 second exposures with 30 seconds in between for 180 shots.  I didn't think the batteries would last that long.  This worked!  I'll put together a time lapse movie of what happened and post it soon.

If this is just a glimpse of what the winter has to offer I'm even more excited about the darkness and trying to hone my star and aurora photography skills.

Last weekend we "fell back an hour" to end daylight savings time.  Between this, and the days becoming so much shorter, the sun now rises after I go to work and sets before I get off work.  I look out the window in the early afternoon and see evening light which makes me feel like I should be getting off work soon.  But hours later the sun finally goes down and hours after that I finally get off work.  

 I guess I'll be able to take a few more sunset photos next week AT LUNCH!  

Sun dips behind Hut Point and Scott's Hut on 4/3/13

I walked outside after tonight’s SAR training feeling overwhelmed by the need to organize so much training for the winter SAR team in the next few weeks.  I stopped in my tracks because something was different.  Yes, it was dark out, but it’s been getting dark at night for a few weeks now.  The wind wasn’t blowing a hard as usual so I was able to take off my hood and stand still for a moment without immediately freezing.  There were a few dozen stars in the moonlit sky and a slight orange glow highlighted the mountains to the West.  This scene calmed my overwhelming thoughts and the rest of my walk home was full of excitement about a few months of darkness.

I landed in Antarctica 6 months and 10 hours ago.  This has been the longest I’ve stayed in one place since high school.  My college semesters didn’t even last this long.  Part of me feels trapped here, but the other part is relieved to know where I am sleeping every night and know that I have a paycheck every two weeks and do not have to worry about catching the next plane to somewhere in the world.

I don’t know how much has changed about me since I got here.  But I have adapted to be content with where on earth I am and what my life is right now.  I have watched everything change around me.  The sunlight and sea ice have gone from being ever-present in my life to disappearing and reappearing on a daily basis—all trending toward disappearing all together.  This cycle will reverse itself before I know it.   The faces of the people around me have changed and now the few faces that I see will get paler and paler, except for the bright red moments when one enters a building from the biting wind and cold.

I know everyone has seen that photo already.  It is one of my favorite photos of people that I have taken down here.  The empty flagpoles pointing at the last plane leaving and everyone looking up to catch the last glimpse of their missed escape captures the exact feeling I was hoping to get when I walked over to the champagne toast with my camera.  I shared it with many of may coworkers and it soon made it into two articles in the Antarctic Sun newspaper:  

and 

Notice that the photos in the newspaper have no watermark on them and the one that I posted above does.  This is the result of an original publishing of the above photo on the front cover of the weekly McMurdo station report that is sent out to hundreds of people at the Antarctic Support Contract headquarters in Denver, CO, the National Science Foundation in Washinton, D.C.  This report was immediately rejected because of my photo. Because it has a watermark on the corner.  Apparently official government documents cannot use "copyrighted" photos.  The station manager then went up to the vehicle maintenance shop and took a picture of someone working on a truck and used that for the official report.  So to be safe we used the photo without the watermark for the newspaper articles.

Apples, onions, potatoes and eggs will last for the rest of the winter and we'll have sprouts throughout the dark spell, but we're at the end of everything else fresh.  The skuas will even be leaving soon.  I have no idea where they go from here.  McMurdo is thousands of miles from anything living and edible besides a few seals and penguins. There will be only 143 living things left (besides a few gnats and fruit flies that live in the buildings)....slowly turning into zombies with the darkness that is increasing by the hour.

The weather is nice and the sun still shines, but the planes are gone and the fresh food is dwindling.  McMurdo feels like a deserted mining town with a few foolhardy souls who stubbornly refused to leave for the season.

I haven't had much time on my hands lately to take photos, but I have found a few moments to open the window to my room and stick the camera out to capture a few sunsets.  I'll work on the backlog of photos that I have and try to get the sunsets up as often as possible.

I need to take advantage of the beautiful light while I can before it all disappears into the Antarctic night.