A tour of McMurdo Station
February 12, 1994
7:15am
It's another cold, gray morning. It's about 27F outside,
with a 20knt wind gusting to 30knts. There's snow in the air. Again, I
expect that our group will be landing around 8:30am. I plan to go on the
base tour, then consider climbing observation hill to get a look around. I
don't think that I can resist, even if my hands are falling off.
(Unfortunately, that would be a very real possibility, without good
gloves...)
12:30pm
This was truly an exciting and illuminating
morning! We left the ship around 9:00am. The zodiac raft was bouncing
up and down in the watr, making it difficult to step on when we left the
ship. The trip across the sound was very cold (windy) and very rough (high
waves). We landed on the ice and rock at the beach just beneath the
station.
At the station, we were led up a very rocky, steep road through the
buildings. They looked rough and uncomfortable on the outside, a lot like
sheds. It was interesting to note that the ground was just loose rock and
dirt, and little had been done to make it more like a standard base that
you'd find in North America, for example. They were clearly leaving the
terrain as close to the natural norm as possible. On either side of the
roads there were large ditches, because th eroads were raised for the most
part above the standard grade. Everything was steep up and down when moving
inward from the shore, but quite level when going parallel to the shore.
'Penguin Ops' -- McMurdo's air traffic control center
We passed by the "Penguin Ops" building, where they coordinate the air
traffic around the base. Then, we entered the new large, multi-wing, Crary
Science Lab building...
You can enter the Crary Science Lab, or
return to today's table of contents.
'Penguin Ops' -- McMurdo's air traffic control center