Jan. 10, 2011
Well, I write from the tomorrow again (it’s after 12:00). Today was one day off for the station folk so we had to fend for ourselves in the kitchen, which really meant digging through the massive stocks of food for breakfast and then eating the best leftovers I’ve ever had for lunch and dinner.
Station folk spend their time relaxing, watching movies, playing music, hiking, camping and taking boats around to the islands that are open at this time of the year. It was overcast again today and a little windy. Remember, it is summer time down here and it hasn’t been above 35 degrees since I’ve been here. You definitely get used to it, though. I find myself getting lazy and not wanting to take the time to put extra layers on when I go outside, but then freezing when I get there.
Just a heads up: Fen Montaigne, who wrote a book on Bill Fraser’s work on penguins around Palmer Station called "Fraser’s Penguins," will be on the Colbert Report tomorrow the 10th. Please check it or the book out or look these items up on the Internet.
(Find the Colbert-Montaigne Interview clip at:
They are quite interesting. Bill Fraser is the person who Mark is collaborating with on the project to look at penguins and their food source, so this happens to have a direct link to all of us.
We did not have the day off, but got to sleep in a little bit and move a little bit more slowly since we did not want to impact the station crew on their day off.
We worked on the vehicles a little more and prepared the transponders (acoustic devices that the REMUS uses to help it navigate in the water) to be deployed in the water. We had to get weights to keep the transponders on the bottom and get line to hold the transponders to the weights and then buoys to make sure everything floats so that we can pick them up in a couple of weeks.
The vehicle also uses GPS to navigate around, but it helps to have an accurate source close to home to help it return home. We loaded everything into the boat and took off around the point to locate our first transponder site. We normally have very accurate navigation charts in the United States, but similar information is very hard to come by down here.
The ocean floor also changes rapidly so it took us a while to find our first site. But we finally got everything measured out, turned on and then set on the bottom. We repeated this at our second site. We returned after boating around some of the islands and a small glacier to make sure we know where everything is located.
Some penguins kept coming by to check out what we were doing. They are very curious animals and remind me of dolphins and sea lions who also want to know what we are doing in there ocean.
After returning, we ate some dinner and then put the REMUS units and gliders into the tank in the lab to make sure they all float properly in the water so that they can fly more efficiently and more importantly come to the surface when they need to. I set up a couple more instruments and played with the vehicle a little more and then it is off to bed.
Mark just came down and pointed out one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. It is really amazing, because it lasted so long and was an amazing pink.
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