It's an interesting thing, this South Pole adventure. For everythin from it's complete emptiness, to it's unreal temperatures; Today was -27 F (-60 windshield), and we consider this an incredible day! --It is, if you consider that just over 24 hours ago it was -50 (-78 windshield).--So what is it that attracts people like us to come here? --Not just once, but in a lot of cases, people here have made careers of it! There is some kind of strange draw to the Antarctic continent. A draw to test yourself, your will, endurance, your inner core, over and over again, every day, 24 hours a day. -I'm not kidding. For one, most of us construction folks sleep in the eqivalent of tents. Large canvas tents. The heat is constantly on, but depending on your proximaty to the furnace, this doesn't necessarily mean you'll have a completely warm room. For instance; my bed is warm, but I put a six-pack on the floor one night, to chill, and to my surprise and dissapointment the next day, it was completely frozen. -Then there was the morning the heater went out altogether. Just let me say, it wasn't too hard to get dressed that morning, knowing that my Extreme Cold Weather gear would be warmer than where I was sleeping! --Sleeping. Another challenge in itself, and a true test of your mental stamina the first week you're here. One would think that a person working outside for 9 hours in -45 weather and carrying around 30 pounds of clothing wouldn't have a problem sleeping. That would be true if said person went home to their quiet bungalow in the country afterwards. We, however, live in tents in the center of a massive construction zone. A lot has to happen here in the 4 month window mother nature allows for man to try and keep his footprint here. All the snow that blows in during the other 8 months has to be cleared from around the station and pushed about a 1/2 mile downwind. This requires a 24 hour plow operation with an army of D9 tractors, pushing that snow, right by our happy tent city. Many nights, you are awakened by the ground shaking operation happening 100 ft. from where you sleep. -Some nights however, the groan of the tractors are a distant roar, and you do get used to it, but trying to sleep while a c-130 cargo plane lands and idles for a half hour is another thing altogether! They're on a round the clock schedule as well. --Why don't we jump the next available c-130 out of this ridiculous madness? --There is just something about this challenge that you can't quit. We all owe it to ourselves to see it through, and as mad as it sounds,-- it's a really, really good time.
Sammy and I are *so* there next year.
;)
-13 huh......been about that here in the last frontier also......brrrr. miss you....
your doing a good job--I can't hit a nail in warm weather!!