Long Day / Night

I am at the end of a very long day, or night, depending on how you want to call it. We left McMurdo at around 1:30 PM yesterday afternoon. The plan was to do unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flights through the afternoon and evening. If things were going well we’d keep going into the night. We got back to McMurdo around 6:30 AM. During that entire time at Pegasus we were only able to get in three flights. We were fighting a lack of wind the entire rest of the time. There were two times where we loaded up the van and drove onto the runway. We got out of the van, verified the winds were good to launch, went back into the van to do the pre-flight checklist, and when we went outside to launch there was not enough wind. During the first time that it happened, we stood with our faces into the wind for five minutes, ready to launch, and waiting for the winds to increase. I even have video of those five boring minutes of us standing and waiting (we were hoping to make a video of the launch).  The second time, around midnight, we launched the UAV but it did not have enough lift. Fortunately, John was able to do a controlled landing and there was no damage done to the UAV. We didn’t get another shot at a launching the UAV until 5:00 AM. The data from the three flights will likely be interesting and useful, however, the more flights we have the better. By the time we were done with the third flight, we decided it was time to return to McMurdo. I also had an appointment to do a Skype session with kindergarten class at 8:00 AM.

The reality is that such a scenario, as we had during the last 24 hours, is the life of field work, especially in Antarctica. Instead of doing flights every two hours as we had hoped, we did a total of three in 15 hours (6 hours in between the first two and 9 hours in between the last two). This experience was also very representative of our last 2 1/2 weeks since the accident. It has been a continual battle in getting enough wind. During other years, there have been WinFly field seasons where the scientists and contract workers have continually battled too much wind. You never know what you are going to get and how it will impact your field work. The key is you have to roll with whatever comes your way, and hopefully keep your sanity in the process. The second part is the trickiest.

Being out at Pegasus all night also allowed me to experience and see just how much the conditions have changed since I arrived 4 1/2 weeks ago. The temperature at Pegasus Airfield was a few degrees above 0F overnight. That is in comparison to the -40sF that we were experiencing 2 1/2 weeks ago. The length of the day is now around 14 hours and the sky never went completely dark. In fact, at about 3:00 AM there was a little aurora australis in the sky but because the sky was not fully dark, the aurora was difficult to see. 

The first priority for today (Thursday) is to get some sleep. We might go back this evening or delay until tomorrow afternoon and into the evening. Either way, we have concluded that we have one more attempt to get in a series of UAV flights. Saturday is reserved for packing the cargo, returning equipment/supplies, and cleaning the lab. Sunday is an off day for most everybody in town and Monday is the day I am scheduled to fly north to Christchurch to end the season. This WinFly field season is coming to a close very quickly.