The summer season has begun…
October 28th, 2009 Posted in Antarctica
Well, the summer season is truly upon us and it feels like it’s arrived all too quickly! It’s quite a shock for those of us who’ve been here through the winter to suddenly have scores of people arriving and everyone is working flat out to get the base into high gear and get all the field equipment ready for deployment any day. An unfortunate strike of flu in the Falklands delayed the arrival of one group of incoming personnel – that included Crispin, the first of my team to be joining me. That’s meant (because I’ve been the only qualified radio operator on base) I’ve pretty much been confined to the ops tower talking to aircraft every day for the last fortnight… and we’ve seen a lot of air traffic in that time! Right now on base we have two of our Twin Otters, the Dash-7 is doing passenger runs from Punta Arenas and the Falklands almost every day, two Twin Otters from the Chilean Air Force are visiting and a DC-3 came in last night and departed for South Pole this morning. Thankfully Crispin arrived yesterday on the Dash and, after getting quickly back into the swing of things today, it looks like I can finally have a lie-in tomorrow!
Around base the weather hasn’t changed much yet, we’ve had a few nice days but there certainly is a great deal more sunlight, noticeable every day. It won’t be long before we’re light throughout the night and there’s certainly enough light now to go for a good long walk round the Point after dinner which is a novelty.
Right, I could go on about what a strange experience it is for us to be alone for so long and then suddenly have all these strangers descend on what’s become our home but, to be honest, tonight is my first chance for some good rest in quite a while and I’m going to make the most of it!
9 Responses to “The summer season has begun…”
By Mark on Oct 29, 2009
Good to hear it’s all going well (i.e. you’ve not lost fingers etc).
When you getting back? there’s a lot of geek news to update you on when you return.
Mark
p.s. I’ll be leaving QQ at the end of Nov, been made redundant.
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By Dad on Nov 8, 2009
I just noticed that you’ve changed your banner picture - nice one!
How are the new arrivals getting on? For those that haven’t been there before, it will be a huge change compared to northern climes.
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By Craig on Nov 11, 2009
is that a basler turboprop version of DC3 (or similar) to cope with the conditions or does no one use the original type radial engines anymore.
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By Zoe on Nov 12, 2009
I was about to ask the exact same thing
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By Craig on Nov 12, 2009
still on the DC3 thing is it just using turbine engines keeps the types of aviation fuel stocked to a minimum?
See your dad noticed the new banner picture. the snow leaning against the hills behind looks a bit thick, is that just a snow drift or more bits dropping off from several years accumulation
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Andy Reply:
December 7th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
As I understand it the Basler turboprop conversion to the DC-3 is nothing particular to the climate down here, it’s just the modern standard with re-lifed airframes… and don’t they look the business!
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By christine on Dec 4, 2009
I check the webcams most days and am missing the main view. When are you going to fix the camera? I also have noticed that the JCR has arrived so you are all probably busy unloading and storing all the goodies they have brought. See the snow is fast disappearing but still looks cold.
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Andy Reply:
December 7th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
The webcam will be back up and running when we get sent a new one! Hopefully we can source something and get it carried down in someone’s pocket on a flight in January…
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By Class Four on Dec 10, 2009
We keep checking your blog for updates - but nothing for ages!! We guess you are really busy. We finish next week for Xmas. We hope you have a lovely Xmas-at least it will be a white one!
Class Four
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