Antarctica, Austral Summer 2019 - 2020 (Part 6 - Things Get Interesting)
Another Wednesday rolled by which meant another day off for me at McMurdo. A friend of mine suggested going to Hut Point to see the seal pup that was living in the area. Temperatures at McMurdo are definitely starting to warm up and have been in the upper teens and lower 20s for the last week or so.
Hut Point is a short 15 minute walk from the center of McMurdo and we stayed out there about an hour watching the pup get nursed and waddle around for a bit while its mother just laid around lazily. It completely blows me away how these creatures can withstand these kind of temperatures completely exposed to the elements.
Sadly, as humans we began to get cold and decided to head back into town to get lunch at the galley. After lunch we went our separate ways as I had to do my usual day-off chores like doing the laundry and tidying up my room a bit.
Later that night, I went to the coffeehouse which was officially opening for the season as a wine bar with a fiddle concert in the theater room.
My next week and a half at work were relatively uneventful but things finally got interesting starting on Tuesday, November 12th. At around 4 AM, a telescope was set up on the stairs of building 155 to watch Mercury transit in front of the sun.
With a powerful UV filter, we were able to stare directly at the sun and see Mercury as it passed between us. The closest planet was appeared as a tiny spec as we observed it. It could just as easily have been a small spec of dust on the lens for all I knew but it was still very cool to witness something like this as it was the last time we would be able to witness this event until 2032.
Later that day, I was asked if I wanted to take the Antarctic Field Safety (AFS) course on my day off the next day. Since taking this course is required to go on “morale trip” which also known as a boondoggle.
Boondoggles are working trips where you usually get to fly or drive out to a remote base or location and help do things like dig out fuel caches or any other kind of manual labor they may need help with. The AFS course lasts about four hours where upon you learn how to pitch a tent, use a fuel stove, and how to survive outdoors in the case of an emergency on a boondoggle.
One of my good friends on base, a firefighter named Kyle, had his roommate move to Pole so I asked to move into his dorm in another building.
My move was approved and I began moving in after my shift on Thursday. Little did I know that a pretty strong storm was rolling in that night which made my move a bit uncomfortable. After moving in to my new building, 201, I headed back to building 155 to get dinner at the galley and watched the storm roll in.
Things got even more interesting the next day. What started off as a regular day turned into a lesson on Murphy’s law. Starting at around 3 PM power around the entire base began failing.
To the best of my knowledge, we have two jet fuel-powered generators that provide electricity to the base. These generators are connected to one another through a regulator that creates a balanced output between them. Unfortunately this regulator broke down meaning that the unbalanced power loads were causing the power to fluctuate, overloading the system and causing it to shutdown and reset.
The outages got progressively worse as we got closer and closer to dinner service and with an all-electric kitchen this made getting dinner ready difficult but we managed to get it done. At 6:30 PM, the power went off for about 10 minutes at which point the entire station was ordered to disconnect and shut down all non-essentials. At that point we were instructed to shut down all of our action stations: burrito bar, pizza oven, and egg station.
Around this same time, Jay, the sous chef in charge of the overnight shift, informed me that he was going on a boondoggle so I would have to run the shift in his absence. This also meant that I was going to work nearly 11 hours straight without a break.
At 9 PM, my only production cook until 11 PM, Marina, arrived so we got to work hard and fast as we were informed that the power plants were planning to shut down power for at least an hour in the near future. While I was in the freezer getting some of the items for MidRat lunch, I felt a pop in my Achilles tendon. I limped out of the freezer at which point Marina informed me that she got a call from the power plant, we had 20 minutes before the power was cut.
At this point it became a mad dash to try to get everything ready before time ran out. Marina manned the fryers while I got the warmers ready and got food in and out of the ovens. By hook or by crook we managed to get everything cooked and into the warmers before we ran out of time. Surely enough, power came back at 11:58 PM, two minutes before MidRat lunch was supposed to begin.
On Saturday morning my Achilles tendon was considerably sore so I went to medical to get it looked at. They say it was just a strain and offered to give me a note to take the day off. I did not accept and went to work on it anyways. I may have pushed myself a little too hard and began limping noticeably. I was allowed to leave early after I completed some administrative work in the office to keep me off my feet.
The next morning I was informed that, due to my request for more responsibilities and considering my experience in fine dining, I would be put in charge of Distinguished Visitor (DV) meals. This was not a responsibility I was going to take lightly since I would be given a great range of creativity and better quality ingredients to make dinner for VIPs every few Thursdays.
The impact of the power failures lingered for a few days even after the problem was solved and the power grid was stable. The drinking water on station is created by reverse osmosis. This process requires a lot of energy and during the power failures the plant was unable to convert sea water into fresh water. The levels in the water reservoir dropped to concerning levels and the base was put on a station-wide water restriction meaning:
No laundry (except under approved, extenuating circumstances).
Two two-minute showers per week for all McMurdo residents.
Dining Facility meals are served on paper plates.
Limit industrial use of fresh water.
No mopping of floors apart from Medical and Dining Facility.