IceHoles

This is a tractor-mounted rig setting up to drill just offshore from McMurdo Station. A large hole would normally not be drilled so close to a line of snowmobiles, but the drill location approval came first, and the machines were parked without checking the map. Principal Investigator, Stacy Kim, kept hoping one of them would fall in, so she would have a chance to photograph it on the bottom during her dive.





This is Pat scooping ice chips off the water after the rig is through. The ice here is eighteen feet thick, but the water comes up to within a foot of the top of the ice. Two feet of snow have been piled on top of the blue ice in the process of making the nearby main ice road going out from McMurdo, so the slush is three feet down, and devilishly hard to reach. It is necessary to clear the slush to keep the hole from freezing shut too quickly. This large hole will be used for diving in dry suits to investigate populations of critters on the bottom, and compare them to locations further away to gage whether any are being affected by activities at the station.

This is a ski-mounted hut parked above a slightly smaller hole about three miles away from McMurdo at a location known as Cape Armitage. this hole is being used to test a miniaturized remotely operated vehicle being built at a shop in McMurdo. The same Investigator, Stacy Kim, is in charge of this project because it will support her studies of sea-bottom life under the ice. The vehicle is known as SCINI. Check out the web site to learn what that stands for. http://scini.mlml.calstate.edu
Nice ride known as a Pisten Bully.


This is Pat removing the cover from a solar panel on the side of the hut. There is another one already open on the roof. These supply power for computers, fans, and radios. The hut is well heated by propane.