So, as you heard yesterday from Little Melissa, we spent the day at Palmer Station, waiting for the wind to die down enough to offload all of the equipment and supplies that we had brought them. The wind was howling all day yesterday with sustained winds around 40 and gusts up to 50+. Unfortunately, there was no glacier hiking for us! We took some great video of the winds, but we will have to wait until we get home to show that to you, as our bandwidth on the boat doesn’t allow us to upload or e-mail videos.
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| A photo of us girls as we took our first step onto the Antarctic continent. The buildings of Palmer Station are behind us (L to R: Melissa P. (science Melissa P., not MST Melissa P.), Katie, Chelsea, Melissa M. |
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| Thumbs Up for SCIENCE! The whole science party (with the exception of Peter Wiebe, who is taking the picture) takes a quick picture in front of the LM Gould as we step onto Anvers Island. (L to R Back Row: Ann Bucklin, Chelsea, Melissa M. Katie, Joe Warren, Melissa P; Front Row: Paola). |
Since this is my first trip to Palmer Station, I thought I’d give everyone at home a brief introduction to the station, through the eyes of a “newbie.” The station, which is located on Anvers Island, an island west of the Western Antarctic Peninsula, was established in the 1960s and was originally a U.S. Navy station. It is my understanding that civilian scientists did not start to occupy the station until the late 1970s or early 1980s. Currently, there are 38 people living at Palmer Station this spring. Twenty-three of those people are support staff. The support staff are the people who are responsible for all the day-to-day maintenance and operation of the station, from running heavy equipment and clearing snow to making sure that everyone has 3 hot meals a day; these are the people who make the station a working, habitable environment for the scientists to do their research. And then there are the scientists…there are researchers studying every part of the ecosystem down here, from microscopic phytoplankton to the seals and penguins that call this island home.
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| You need some heavy machinery to work in conditions like these. Take a look at those tires! |
Palmer Station is comprised of a series of blue aluminum-sided trailer-like buildings and within the walls you will find the following amenities: a galley which serves up 3 hot meals a day (and plenty of snacks in between) for everyone living at the station, a lounge with comfy leather sofas, Lazy Boy chairs and blankets to curl up and watch one of the several hundred DVDs that line the walls of the lounge, a bar area with a pool table, a dart board and a popcorn machine, several hallways of berthing areas, washers and dryers, community bathrooms and showers (like at the gym), a sauna, an outdoor hot tub (which yes, I went in and yes, it was cold) and a station store, where you can purchase toiletries, souvenirs for your friends and family back home. Yesterday, I walked into the galley and was handed a lovely hot beverage while I sat and talked with several researchers; a game of cards transpired at the table next to me. It is a much more civilized community that you would probably expect to find on Antarctica.
And then of course there are, as you would imagine, a plethora of science labs with state-of-the-art equipment that allow the researchers here to do their amazing science. But you already knew about that part!
Well, finally around 6 am this morning, the winds died down to fewer than 25 knots and we were able to offload the rest of the equipment for Palmer Station and head out. We are currently traversing through the Gerlache Strait with the intent on starting our science stations this afternoon, weather permitting. Right now, however, the weather is amazing. There are beautiful blue skies and the sun is shining brightly on the white ice and snow of the mountains, glaciers and icebergs that surround us. It is truly breathtaking.
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| A beautiful view of the massive icebergs and glaciers in the Gerlache Strait. See, there is blue sky in Antarctica, between all these storms! |
So, wish us luck that the weather stays beautiful and that we are able to start getting some science done. More about what we are actually doing out here in a later blog.
Signing off for now…
Melissa
(aka Big Melissa, aka Ancient Melissa, aka Beefy Melissa, aka Big-Haired Melissa, aka Patty O’Mally)
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