On Sunday, January 4th, the Velvet Ice team woke up, as we had countless other times in the past three weeks, to prepare for Transport at 7:15am. (If you don't know what Transport is, check our blog from December 21 called "Hurry Up and Wait" about the process of flying in Antarctica.)
After getting up, packing our bags, stripping our beds of the linens, grabbing breakfast and lunch to go from the cafeteria, and visiting the "cage" where we were to store the belongings not meant to travel to the research site with us, we reported to Building 140.
We stood around the passenger terminal, awaiting further instructions. Before long, someone came and checked our names off of a list, and verified that we were wearing our ECW (Extreme Cold Weather) Gear.
Same people, same stuff, different day. This was the fifth bag drag for this flight.
Within about fifteen minutes, we were loaded into a 'Delta' which is a big red box on wheels, which gets hitched to a cab (kind of like a semi truck).
Boxy, but good. Just like a Volvo!
Tiffany was excited to see a Girls on Ice sticker amongst the others on the wall of our Delta. FMI: girlsonice.org
The driver, who calls himself "Monk," gave us a list of five instructions for safely riding in the Delta, before driving us to the passenger terminal at Willy Field, about half an hour out from McMurdo Base. The most vital instruction was to fasten our seatbelts, because the ride, as we were to find out, was quite a bumpy one!
Monk's instructions for safe Delta riding included fastening our seat belts, not opening the back door, having a designated radio operator to communicate with the cab, etc.
We sat around for hardly ten minutes in the passenger terminal before we were called to board back on the Delta to be driven to our plane.
Basically a big storage container, converted into a waiting room. Quite possibly the only airport left in the world with no Starbucks!
When we arrived at the plane, an American "Herc" (ski-equipped Hercules LC-130), the Air National Guardsman told us to hurry up and board, saying he would give us a safety briefing once we were all seated. Once on board, he said to grab anything we'd need for the flight out of our bags, and then give him the rest, which he piled up in the middle of the plane and strapped down for the remainder of the flight.
Almost immediately, the plane got switched on, making any sort of safety briefing moot, since we could not hear anything over the deafening roar of the engine. Everyone put on their earplugs and noise-cancellation headphones, and within what felt like minutes, we had taken off.
Tiffany, Rachel, and I looked at each other, amazed and excited, but slightly weary. We all knew that it wasn't really over until or unless we landed at WAIS Divide.
Four hours later, we began our final descent into WAIS Divide.
It is almost one month to the day since we arrived in Antarctica, and we have finally arrived at our destination!
The Velvet Ice team getting off the Herc at WAIS, excited to FINALLY be here! Photo credit: Gary Clow
Our research schedule has been cut down so drastically, from one month to ten days, that there is no time to spare. We begin data collection first thing in the morning. We're exhausted, but excited to get to the real work of Velvet Ice!!
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