Amundsen Bust

Yep, it looks like him.

Biggest crowd ever at the South Pole

Speech by Norwegian Prime Minister Stoltenberg at the Centennial, South Pole, 14 December 2011

Crowds of people at the Ceremonial Pole, the Norwegian Prime Minister, and the covered-up (ice) head of Amundsen.

Me, after the ceremony, posing with Mr. Amundsen's ice head.

Dear friends,

Congratulations!

Exactly one hundred years ago, on the 14th of December 1911, five brave Norwegians led by Roald Amundsen were the first people to reach the South Pole.

We are here today to honour these five men. We are here to celebrate one of the most outstanding achievements of mankind. And we are here to highlight the importance of this cold continent for the warming of the globe.

14th of December 1911 was a proud day for Norway. A young nation that had gained its full independence only six years earlier. The polar expeditions of Roald Amundsen helped to form our new national identity. And the qualities that enabled Amundsen, Hassel, Bjaaland, Hansen and Wisting to reach the South Pole, were precisely those that the young nation wanted to be recognised by: Courage, determination and endurance, and readiness to meet new challenges.

Today is also the time to pay tribute to the bravery of Robert Scott and his men. Scott and his team paid the ultimate prize. But their names will forever be inscribed in Polar history. They will always be remembered for their courage and determination in reaching one of the most unhospitable places on earth.

When Amundsen reached the Pole the team put up its tent, and they named the camp “Polheim” – Home at the Pole. Today the South Pole is “home” for many of you who are celebrating with us today. More than 200 people have their daily work here at the Amundsen-Scott Base during the summer season. I would like to thank you and the US National Science Foundation for receiving us here with such warm hospitality in a frozen environment.

Some of you have experienced the hardship of skiing to the Pole. You have seen the beauty and the fascination of the Antarctic wilderness. And you have learned how challenging and unpredictable this frozen continent can be.

Today, Antarctica is a continent of international cooperation, regulated by a well-functioning Antarctic Treaty, where peace and stability, environmental protection and international scientific research, are at the heart of our joint efforts. Researchers from all over the world are trying to discover the secrets of this vast continent. The Norwegian Troll Station is at the forefront of Norwegian research in Antarctica. Norway and the United States have a long history of scientific cooperation. The US – Norwegian Antarctic Scientific Traverse in 2007 made important findings. The Antarctic continent has been changing more rapidly in recent years than at any time in the past 800 years.

Some of the most rapid and large-scale impacts of climate change are first being seen in the polar regions. The loss of ice in Antarctica can have dramatic global effects. It is our common responsibility to save this planet for future generations.

Roald Amundsen, Robert Scott and their men were prepared to make an extraordinary effort in order to reach their ambitious goals. We need to be prepared to do the same. That is the best way to honour a century of science and exploration at the South Pole.

Thank you.

To mark the historic achievements a hundred years ago, it is now my privilege to unveil this bust of Roald Amundsen here at the South Pole, made by the Norwegian artist Håkon Anton Fagerås.

Busy Amundsen Day at the South Pole

Skiers are coming in, and there are 93 tourists staying out at the tent camps north and south of the station. Later today, at 4PM local time, there will be the unveiling of an ice Amundsen bust and some words by the Norwegian Prime Minister (who toured the science experiments at Pole yesterday on skis). After dinner I've been invited to a reception for the PM.

The actual anniversary is at 4AM tomorrow morning. Not sure what will happen then, but I do plan to check it out. Only happens every 100 years...

Right now I have to get on my warm layers (my ECW, extreme cold weather, gear) and go out and supervise some trenching for the ARA experiment. Hope to make it back for the ceremony!

Some drill photos for your amusement

Drill hose in the foreground, heaters in the middle, and the insulated water storage tank in the background.
Diesel heaters being worked on. Air temperature is -30C or so.
Water tank plumbing. Think about how to keep water plumbing from freezing at these temperatures. Warm glycol or warm water only to keep it from freezing.
The heaters with their exhaust stacks.
Heater firing up, smoke and flames everywhere.

Friends and colleagues in Antarctica

A number of my friends and colleagues are also in Antarctica, both McMurdo and South Pole, and have interesting blogs to follow as well.

In McMurdo, working at the Long Duration Balloon facility (though judging from the blog entries, perhaps not working so hard...) is my old ballooning colleague Scott Nutter and his blog Astroparticle Physics in Antarctica. There's a lot of good information in there about recreation and around McMurdo Station. Good pictures too! Though let's not tell him that he hasn't actually been to Antarctica since Ross Island (where McMurdo is located) is off to sea from the actual continent of Antarctica. Okay, it depends on your definitions I suppose!

Although he left this season before I got here, John Jacobsen has an excellent website for his work and art, along with a blog of his South Pole trips from 2006 through 2011. Great photos and a number of posts that I wish I had made. :) Last year we overlapped a bit at the South Pole and then again in transit headed north through McMurdo.

Here at Pole right now is Laurel Bacque, the IceCube press liaison and general PR person (which I mean in a good way!) who keeps a blog called Chica en Uruguay (though obviously the Chica is en South Pole right now). Check out the excellent "South Pole Myths" and "How to use the women's restroom on an LC-130" in particular.

There's also some of the skiers headed to Pole posting on the Adventure Blog. Hope to see these folks soon.

For a different, darker and colder Antarctica, check out the Winter-Over blogs of Freija and Christine from this past winter season. More links can be found at the unofficial South Pole Station website.

Questions for South Pole?

Feel free to collect any and all questions, have received some from some students following my blog from Madison, and send them along to me. Will write up one long response to the sets of questions. Thanks and cheers, Mike

michael.duvernois.guest AT usap.gov goes directly to my South Pole address.

Fuel delivery from the traverse

The traverse delivers fuel in these black bladders (they stay warmer and more flexible in the sun than the older off-white bladders). The sleds are made from UHMWPE (ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene, think big plastic kitchen cutting boards).

And a steel hitch/spreader bar setup.

That is bolted to the plastic.

These are still awaiting offload into the station fuel supply. Other sleds and bladders were left along the path to fuel the return trip to McMurdo.

In flight from McMurdo to South Pole

Passengers in the paratrooper jump seats.

Our cargo, stowed on the rear ramp of the plane.

Stunning views (albeit through small windows) of the Trans-Antarctic Mountains.

Some spots not covered completely with snow and ice.

And something familiar, cargo that I packed months ago, enroute south with me.

A slight rewind...the flight from McMurdo to the South Pole

Out of McMurdo we fly south in an LC-130 (Hercules transport plane equipped with skis to land at the Pole). They're operated by the New York Air National Guard, and are a rather friendly and laid back group (compared to the Air Force folks flying the C-17s).

We boarded the plane, took off, and almost immediately turned around and landed again. There was a failure in the bleed air system which takes engine air and ducts it into the plane for, among other things, a deicing system on the leading edges of the wing. It was that part of the system which had failed.

There were DVs (Distinguished Visitors) on the flight though, so the ground crews scrambled, offloaded all of the cargo, and we got another plane. The DVs were taken back to town for food, but the rest of us were dumped on the runway to wait for ninety minutes or so for the new plane to be ready. These DVs made up a Presidential Blue Ribbon panel looking at US facilities in Antarctica.

South Pole Traverse

The South Pole Traverse (SPOT) came in over the weekend. They drive large tractors up from McMurdo to the South Pole Station taking about 30 days to get here. They pull their own sleeping and eating accommodations and a large supply of fuel for the station. (South Pole requires vast amounts of fuel for heating, vehicles, and electricity. Most of it is delivered at staggering expense by air, by the New York Air National Guard LC-130s that also bring the passengers and the cargo to Pole. The traverse is a much more economical way of delivering the fuel.)

One thing is different from the others...

These are a row of safety equipment (mostly breathing gear) in the South Pole Station.

Well...I'm at the South Pole and getting settled in

Will get some additional photos and text up soon, but for the moment rest assured that it's colder here than where you are.

McMurdo arrival

So, you've flown from home all the way to Christchurch on the south island of New Zealand, felt saddened by the earthquake damage, been issued your ECW (EXTREME Cold Weather) clothing, and flown on a load, crowded military transport for hours. Now what?

Well, you hop off the plane into the brilliant sunlight (sunshine plus reflected sunlight off of all of that ice), feel some wind and surprisingly warm air (it is Antarctica, but it's summer, you're on the coast, and it's probably around 20-25F). What's next?

A slog of bureaucracy. Load up and go to the NSF Chalet HQ and hear about safety, recycling, rules, regulations, changes in the rules, and then you explain what you want to do when you leave Antarctica (for the travel office) and then you get a room key. Drop your stuff off in the room, go to the laundry facility and get some sheets, drop off the sheets, find some food. Then your bags arrive on the base and you go haul those off to your room.

And for those of us heading on to Pole, we turn our bags back over to the cargo folks, get ourselves weighed again, and prepare for another flight. Hopefully the next morning.

From the C-17 cockpit

As a nice treat, we got to go up into the cockpit of the C-17 enroute down to the ice.

Went up there once in the middle of the flight and then again later as we were crossing the ice sheet (see previous entry for some photos).

Aerial images of the approach to McMurdo

Military cargo aircraft tend not to have very good windows for folks in back... Got a few pictures out of the small windows.


The sea ice breaking up as we get closer to McMurdo and Ross Island. (So, the Antarctic ice sheet sits on top of land, and in a few places there is exposed land, one of those places is Ross Island home of McMurdo.)
Open water channel. Not sure on the map where we were exactly. These last couple of shots were taken from the cockpit.

Post-quake Christchurch (The somewhat good)

One good sign was the number of cranes in the central business district, work is going on. Buildings being demolished, and hopefully others repaired, restored, and rebuilt.

On the weekends, you can follow the safety instructions and take a walking path (down the middle of the street past broken buildings) into the Cathedral Square. Was in Christchurch during the middle of the week, so that wasn't an option for me. But good to see some access to the city despite legalish and safety issues.

It wasn't exactly hopping, but there is a new "mall" build up of ISO standard shipping containers (which I happen to, as a true geek, like a lot). It looks pretty good, kind of edgy and surprisingly effective for small, specialty shops. I could picture a shopping mall of containers working in a US city as well. These were built in an older established shopping district whose previous buildings were destroyed by the quake.

No trams running any longer. The red containers in the middle (with windows) are a coffee shop.

And the World Buskers Festival will be back in 2012. I'll probably be back through Christchurch next year and hope to see big improvements.

Post-quake Christchurch (The BAD)

Each year when I go to Antarctica, I spend time in Christchurch, New Zealand for a few days before and after Antarctica. It's a green place, warm in the middle of the Southern Hemisphere summer, and quite friendly. There are good restaurants, and if you've forgotten something from up North, you can find it in New Zealand.

Last year in December and January when I was there, the city was recovering from the September 2010 7.1 magnitude quake. The city was recovering rather well I thought, you can look back to last year's entries and see some damage in photos, but most things were in good shape. Well, not long afterward there was the February 2011 6.3 magnitude quake which caused significantly more damage, and many deaths. 10,000 homes to be demolished. Most of the larger buildings downtown need to be brought down as well.

So, I spent a couple of nights in Christchurch on my way south to Pole, and took a look around...

There are a lot of commercial buildings that look like this now. Standing, but with broken windows and emptied offices. Some are being demolished, others are just fenced off. Probably to be demolished later. The businesses are gone, elsewhere or nowhere.


One can just see the Christchurch Cathedral in the distance, but one can't go any closer. The whole central business district is fenced off, maybe a radius of 4 blocks or so centered on Cathedral Square. I circumnavigated the fencing, seeing lots of abandoned and badly damaged residential and commercial buildings inside and outside the fence line. There were also a number of empty lots of previously demolished buildings. And this is now nine months later!


A church at the periphery of downtown, the roof is collapsed and there are workers who are appearing to try to preserve the bell tower section of the church.

I looked through the window of a coffee shop, and there was still a copy of the 22 February 2011 newspaper sitting on the counter. The building abandoned, it didn't appear too badly damaged, but it was right on the edge of a very dead commercial zone.

Active demolition work and abandoned piles of debris on many street corners.

It was very sad to see the city in this condition. None of the downtown hotels I had previously stayed at were functioning, all were within the exclusion zone. None of the businesses (mostly restaurants, coffee shops, and tourist gift shops) that I knew were extant. Many were inside the fence, some outside the fence had simply vanished, others were closed but some signs were still present.

There was various mentions of blame for the failure of reconstruction on insurance companies unwilling to insure buildings and, in some cases, workers in buildings in Christchurch, and also on safety rules that might be reasonable in ordinary conditions, but that were a huge problem in emergency conditions. Hard for me to tell much about this from a quick visit.