Music thanks to Audio Network

The ship has arrived and the E-Base team are boarding and leaving King George Island. It’s been an amazing and emotional 10 days and we hope that you’ve enjoyed following the expedition. Please adjust your sets as we join the IAE 2009 expedition.

Music thanks to Audio Network

Music thanks to Audio Network

Any time away from home can be tough. This is now well into our third week away from home for all of the E-Base team. I know that homesickness can be difficult for people and having spent a miserable week away at cub camp at the age of 7, I have bad memories of being away from home.

Everyone in the team here is amazing, each bringing their own personality and fun to the mix. Without them I could be back to my cub camp feelings again! The work we are doing doesn’t allow you to stop to think about life outside Antarctica for 5 minutes. So although I’m sure we all miss home, we are keeping ourselves very entertained in our work. I also personally want to thank my wonderful Jacqui and my great family for all their support. Without that I probably wouldn’t be here now.

I love doing the education videos (does it show?), but even that can take Jamie, myself and Jonny (our fantastic camera man/director/co-script writer/co-science advisor who you never see as he is behind the lens) several hours to put together, mostly due to me taking a several takes to get it right….sorry Jonny! We had our first real break today and stopped working this afternoon for a while. We had lunch with one of our amazing new friends here in Antarctica.

His name is Alejo and is part of the 2041 team and maybe one of the most amazing men you will ever meet. He has spent so many years working in this continent that he probably knows more about Antarctica through experience alone, than anyone else around. He has almost lost count of the number of times he has been to the South Pole and his adventures are legendary. He has pioneered climbing new mountains and also works as a rescue worker, saving numerous people from this harsh continent when things don’t go to plan. I personally can’t think of anyone else I would rather have supporting this team.

Alejo took us out on a Zodiac speed boat to visit a local penguin rookery and onwards to see an incredible blue ice glacier. We have seen lots of penguins and seals since our arrival, but today we were fortunate enough to see five leopard seals up close. They are creatures not to be messed with, but again simply down to his experience Alejo kept us safe and secure around these potentially dangerous wild animals. The fog had descended in Bellingshausen but as soon as we found the Leopard seals at the glacier, the sun burnt through and the photographs we took look stunning.

Everything I see here makes me understand more and more how precious life is in Antarctica and how fragile this ecosystem is. I am here to make a difference to the way we think about and use energy. If you are interested enough to read this, then just maybe you can help make that difference too.

Justin
npower

Music thanks to Audio Network

Stuart asked whether Alejo had been to the South Pole. ‘Yes, yes, seventeen times. Once was by walking, twice by skidoo and the rest was flying,’ was the casual reply.

He regaled us with tales of life in Antarctica, dropping into conversation such snippets as climbing Mount Vinson with Reinhold Messner, having a cup of tea with Prince Andrew and how to survive an avalanche.

Jonny has been filming interviews with him over the past couple of days and we will be putting up a video later this week. ‘There’s enough here for a full documentary,’ was Jonny’s first comment, reviewing the tapes this evening. Let’s hope someone commissions one soon!

Music thanks to Audio Network

Another video that the E-Base team have created as part of the E-Base Live 365 expedition. The video complements the 2041 Journey to Antarctica Curriculum (see Lesson 3: Rising Tides of the curriculum for further resources).

You can try the experiment at home or at school. How do you think that melting ice in the Antarctic and the Arctic will affect people around the world?

If you have any questions that you would like the team to answer whilst they are in Antarctica, please post them on the Message Wall. We can’t promise to answer all of them, but we’ll do our best!

It’s the weekend and a beautiful sunny day. The wind has been up and the turbines have been churning out up to 750W each – an amazing amount of power. But something seemed wrong with Kelly. There was no power coming through.

We had to wait for a lull in the wind. No one wanted to take down a wind turbine in full flow. The wind dropped and the team rushed out, bringing Kelly down and taking the head off to find out what was wrong. There seems to have been a small problem with friction between two of the plates, with the cable ties rubbing off, allowing some of the wiring to come loose and shorting the circuit.

This is going to have to be a phone call back to the UK to see what we can do to adjust the settings. Just a difference of 3-4mm could make a massive difference. We’ll see tomorrow what needs to be done and take it from there. It was never going to be plain sailing and we’re constantly adjusting and improvising to make things work.

With repairs to Kelly on standby, we took a walk along the coast to the Uruguayan base just down the way. It was the first time that we’d ventured outside of the immediate area around the E-Base, apart from heading down the hill to fetch water.

We wound over headlands and pebbled beaches. The slopes were speckled a pale luminescent green from the lichen and moss. The Uruguayan base is laid out on its own, a cluster of small red buildings and a larger modern accommodation and research unit. As we crossed the bridge over a small gully leading to the base, there was a sensation of entering a different country. The Uruguayan flag cracked in the strong gusts and a large sign proclaimed ‘Bienvenido a Base Cientifica Antarctica Artigas’.

The base seemed deserted as we wandered through. A voice called out welcoming us and asking if we wanted to stay for a cup of coffee. It was the Base Commander Waldemar Fontes. He is currently on a 3 year secondment, having spent previous years in the Congo and southern Sahara. Apparently he likes the isolation.

Coffee turned into a tour by the base doctor. Envious eyes took in the pub, sauna and pool table. The doctor’s specialisation is psychiatry. No one volunteered to be case studies. The tour turned into lunch. A magnificent sit down affair in the communal building. Wood panels were covered in team photographs of the winter (March – October) base crews and plaques from visiting diginitaries and high-ranking officers.

Bread was a treat we had missed, as was real meat. Well meat that wasn’t cooked using the ‘just add boling water and leave for 12-15 mins’ method. And fresh fruit! A reciprocal visit has been arranged for Monday for the Base Commander and the doctor. ‘Would you like to stay for dinner?’ offered Russell.

The base commander tactfully asked which one of the team did the cooking, and on hearing that we sort of shared rehydrating packet food and boiling up pasta, said, ‘I think we will just stay for coffee.’

Continuing towards the glacier, the fact that we were in Antarctica started to sink in. A fur seal blended into the seaweed, roused itself to menace us as we disturbed its sleep. A Weddell seal was more relaxed, slowly opening an eye then rolling over back to sunbathe. Gentoo and Chinstrap penguins waddled across the rocky foreshore, before the sea allowed their grace and agility to show.

On the glacier, the melt-water had carved a network of small channels in the muddied ice surface. As we sat there looking out to sea, bright blue above, with gurgling glacial brooks and a buffeting breeze, it really did start to sink in. This is a special place.

Music thanks to Audio Network

Another video that the E-Base team have created as part of the E-Base Live 365 expedition. The video complements the 2041 Journey to Antarctica Curriculum (see the Layers, layers, layers section of the curriculum for further resources).

You can try the experiment at home or at school. What kind of materials would you use to insulate yourself in Antarctica? Test these out to see how they will stop a bowl of water from getting cold if you put it outside or in the fridge.

If you have any questions that you would like the team to answer whilst they are in Antarctica, please post them on the Message Wall. We can’t promise to answer all of them, but we’ll do our best!

It’s only been a few days that we have been here and already we have slipped into routines. A wonderful breakfast of porridge with tinned fruit cocktail or yesterday’s special of chocolate porridge and pears starts the day off. Then it is off for the day’s work.

Now that we have a sustainable (fingers crossed) source of clean energy, our next challenge is to wire up the weather station and webcam, so that we can broadcast live video and weather data to the 2041 website 365 days a year.

Education has been a big focus for the team this year, whether it’s been Russ with his handy tips on energy conservation or Justin chatting up penguins or manfully stripping down to his thermals on a glacier, just so pupils can gain an insight into some of the lessons we can learn from this amazing continent.

If we can get the weather station and webcam hooked up to the internet, it will mean that there is a source of education about the Antarctic climate available year round. There won’t be the Iwo Jima heroics of getting the first turbine up this year, but there will definitely be cheers around the E-Base if we can provide a window on this amazing place.