The team is (pretty much) all trained up and ready for flying! Over this past week, we have attended training classes to teach us about fire safety, how to sort our trash, how to drive a truck, how to walk around McMurdo safely, and how to survive out in the field. One training that Elina and I will be doing tomorrow is crevasse training. We will utilize this training primarily at Evans Knoll in West Antarctica, if we do indeed go there. I’ll send updates about that in another post.

Elina sitting in our lab.

The view from our lab across McMurdo Sound! That’s Mt Discovery in the distance.

Learning how to make fire in the Field Safety and Training course.

Lee and I have also met with the fixed wing (Twin Otter) and helicopter flight coordinators to discuss our flight plans in McMurdo, and at WAIS and South Pole. We all have also gotten our cargo organized, both that we shipped south from Madison and that we’ve left here in McMurdo over winter. All of these preparations led to us being on the flight schedule for the first time today! We were on the Otter schedule to fly to Margaret and Gill, but we were canceled due to weather (which is why I can spend the time to write this). A storm is coming into the area, with high winds and blowing (and some accumulating) snow expected around midday in McMurdo.

Here’s to good weather tomorrow! Cheers.  -Dave

P.S. Tug of war! The US and New Zealand faced off, with US women losing 2-1, US men winning 2-1, and US coed winning the only match!