Redeployment Half Three

That is the third and last a part of a three-part sequence. Take a look at
part one and part two if you happen to haven’t already!
Good day and welcome again! We’re going to choose up proper the place we left off.
In Redeployment Part Two, we received our first flight of the season and handed over
obligations to the summer time crew. Then, lastly, I departed South Pole for McMurdo.
After simply over 3 hours within the air, our aircraft landed at Williams Subject in McMurdo and parked for the “evening”:
There aren’t any direct flights from Pole to Christchurch – everybody connects via McMurdo.
More often than not, folks departing Pole must spend a couple of hours or perhaps a few days in McMurdo. That is
primarily based on flight schedules and delays. Efforts to schedule “straight via” flights, the place you switch to
a Christchurch-bound aircraft proper on the airfield, are often thwarted by climate or different elements. Typically
it really works out, however more often than not it doesn’t.
In our case, we have been scheduled to depart McMurdo the next afternoon, which meant spending the evening.
Our experience from Williams Subject into McMurdo was a “Delta”. These are McMurdo’s oldest still-operating passenger
autos. The experience into city was about 40 minutes.
After we landed in McMurdo, we began respiratory sea-level air for the primary time in a really very long time.
After dwelling at 10,000 feet for a 12 months,
after which out of the blue arriving at sea degree, you instantly discover variations. Most significantly –
you’re feeling like a superhero. The air is so thick and stuffed with oxygen!
The impact solely lasts a couple of days, however it’s time to
sort out any hikes in McMurdo. It was enjoyable to scramble up Remark Hill with this newfound, sea-level power.
It was nice being again in McMurdo, if just for a day. I received to meet up with buddies from
my time in McMurdo final summer time. Many people descend on Antarctica from far-flung locations,
and it’s not all the time assured we’ll see one another once more in Actual Life. I attempted to benefit from my temporary
cease on the town.
It was surreal nonetheless being in Antarctica, and assembly up with people once more.
Most of my buddies had left, had day without work, and have been now
again for extra, right here for a second season. I even knew individuals who had left, come again, after which had already
left once more. In the meantime, I used to be nonetheless on-continent. I used to be simply now, lastly, preparing
to go away after my first mega-season.
There are professionals and cons to experiencing Antarctica the way in which I did.
I used to be lucky that I received to check out a lot of what
this system has to supply, multi function single, very lengthy season.
The one main USAP Antarctic websites I haven’t seen but are
Palmer Station
and the research vessels, at the moment the
R/V Laurence M. Gould and the R/V Nathaniel B. Palmer.
I arrived in Antarctica at Winfly, and I received to expertise McMurdo winter.
Winter transitioned into summer time,
and I received to witness the majestic splendor of the nice and cozy, sunny, and muddy peak season at McMurdo.
I flew to the South Pole on the peak of summer time, and I skilled the
bustling chaos because the station frantically ready for the upcoming winter. When the
last flight departed, the station slowed down for winter.
After sunset, Pole entered an extended polar night.
I noticed sunrise at Pole
and I noticed the station reopen for summer time.
Now I used to be again in McMurdo, lastly able to depart.
Most individuals… don’t do all of this directly. I used to be lucky that the chance arose for me to do that.
I used to be lucky that
my life circumstances occurred to line up in a means that I used to be capable of settle for.
14 months on ice is a very long time. It’s a very long time to be away from buddies, household,
and “actual life”. It’s a very long time to decide to a single, unusual place. I don’t remorse taking the chance.
However, for anybody contemplating one thing comparable, please don’t make this resolution evenly.
On the night of November 17, 2023, I departed McMurdo.
I used to be headed out to Phoenix Airfield, the place I might catch my flight out of Antarctica.
Our experience to the airport was one thing a lot completely different – we rode out within the Kress. The
Kress is a big transport car, one in all McMurdo’s latest.
It’s designed for transferring dozens of individuals between far-flung McMurdo websites. These websites embrace airfields,
in addition to different infrastructure out on the ice such because the
Long Duration Balloon (LDB)
website.
This was my first time seeing Phoenix Airfield within the “daytime”. Recall that once I arrived
in McMurdo from Christchurch in August 2022, it was darkish out.
Our experience again to Christchurch was an Italian Air Pressure C-130J. There are a variety of nationwide Antarctic packages in
this area, moreover simply the USA Antarctic Program.
Most of them use Christchurch as their gateway metropolis and Phoenix Airfield as their
intercontinental Antarctic runway. It’s frequent for packages to share infrastructure. Typically USAP will fly
personnel for different nationwide Antarctic packages on our flights, and generally different packages will fly USAP personnel.
And with that, we have been off! We departed Antarctica at 9:22pm on November 17, 2023. This marked 446 days since
I arrived on-continent on August 28, 2022.
What an journey!
At simply after 4:00am, on the morning of November 18, 2023, our C-130J arrived at Christchurch Worldwide
Airport. Taxiing to an unloading space was quick, however it felt like an eternity. We have been drained from an extended flight,
however we have been additionally giddy with pleasure about lastly being again within the Actual World.
It was darkish, however it was heat. And most significantly it was humid. After we stepped off the aircraft,
we might odor rain, filth, and dwelling issues, for the primary time in over a 12 months.
If you arrive in Christchurch from Antarctica, you’re required to clear customs and immigration. The precise nuance of
New Zealand immigration regulation, because it applies to US Antarctic personnel, is far outdoors the scope of this put up.
Suffice to say, the primary order of enterprise was to get us all processed.
There was a bit on the traveler type that requested “Abroad Port the place you boarded THIS plane/ship”.
Within the absence of any clarifying instruction, I simply wrote “Antarctica”. It’s a moot level, as a result of we had
a particular customs agent present up only for us (customs isn’t usually open presently). They have been
nicely conscious that we had all come from Antarctica.
Nonetheless, it’s amusing once I take into consideration this way being filed
in a drawer someplace at NZ Immigration. We did, certainly, arrive from “abroad”. Far, far abroad,
from a world that, already, had began fading from our minds.
Did we actually simply come from Antarctica?
As soon as we have been via customs, we proceeded to the USA Antarctic Program’s
Clothes Distribution Heart (CDC). We have been all issued Excessive Chilly Climate gear earlier than we
departed for Antarctica, and we returned all of it now that we have been achieved.
This clothes is property of this system, and it will get cleaned and re-issued to new workers.
Lastly, we have been issued our complimentary resort reservation data. Most of us have been taking private
journey in New Zealand. This journey, in fact, isn’t paid for by this system. This system covers one evening
in a resort, for us to have a delicate touchdown and get our bearings. This is identical factor that they
provide to people who find themselves flying straight house, referred to as “First Obtainable Air”, or “FAA”.
Fortunately for us, as a result of we arrived so late, we received the remainder of our present evening (by this time it was 5:30am),
and the next evening. It was good to have the ability to sleep in.
And with that? They turned us unfastened. We have been achieved.
All of us groggily stood in line to verify into our resort at 5:30am.
We had simply spent 7 hours on a navy aircraft. We had departed an odd land, stuffed with 24×7 daylight,
folks in puffy coats, and US Antarctic Program logos all over the place. This had been our actuality for over a 12 months.
All of a sudden, we discovered ourselves listening to clean jazz, within the smooth foyer of an airport resort, because the resort
receptionist talked about continental breakfast, check-out instances, the resort wifi password, public transit, and
factors of curiosity round city.
We have been again in civilization, again in the true world. For ASC help workers, our contracts
ended the day we landed in Christchurch after departing the ice. We instantly stopped receiving a wage.
Our medical insurance was paid via the top of the month. I went from dwelling and dealing
in Antarctica, into my Christchurch resort, after which… that was it.
I used to be out of the blue by myself, on trip, in Christchurch.
I spent my leisure time in New Zealand consuming recent fruit and greens nonstop.
I averaged about three flat whites per day, constituted of recent espresso and actual milk.
My translucent Antarctican pores and skin, recent off a whole season of darkness, and usually lined by 30 lbs of
clothes regardless, didn’t survive first contact with the New Zealand solar. I nearly instantly received a sunburn.
Christchurch, and Actual Life, in a short time started to really feel regular, even after being away for therefore lengthy.
A bunch of us met up for dinner. We ate in a restaurant, went to
a bar, referred to as a taxi, and navigated via day-to-day metropolis life. We rode trains. We hiked via mountains
and forests. We relaxed on seashores.
After two weeks of much-needed relaxation and rest in New Zealand, I flew again house to San Francisco.
This flight was paid for by this system, fulfilling their last obligation to return me to my
Airport of Departure (AOD).
On December 1, I departed Christchurch at 12:00 midday. Due to the magic of time zones, I arrived in
San Francisco, additionally on December 1, at 7:00am.
I landed, and I took BART house to my condo.
My condo was simply how I left it, again earlier than I began this wild journey, on August 12, 2022, once I
departed San Francisco for Christchurch, Antarctica, and the strangest 16 months of my
life.
It was stunning to me how… regular it felt to get again to actual life. I had simply accomplished 14.5 months on the
ice. For greater than a 12 months, I labored, ate, slept, showered, relaxed, laughed, and cried, all on the whim of a
federal authorities company and its designated contractors, nearly all underneath one roof, on the backside of the world.
We definitely had private autonomy, however it was inside an outlined framework. It was at a small, remoted
location.
Typically I’d have a realization that I used to be doing one thing for the primary time since I
had left house, 16 months earlier.
First time pumping fuel. First time ringing a doorbell. First time going to a grocery retailer.
First time swimming. Every of those situations introduced with it a small feeling of novelty,
however it didn’t quantity to a lot. It took aware effort to keep in mind that I used to be pumping fuel for the primary time in 16
months. It felt regular.
I used to be again in my actual life,
and though I put it on maintain for Antarctica, it was ready for me once I received again. Antarctica was a
a special world, a radical departure from my regular actuality. It was so completely different, in truth, that I merely
couldn’t merge the 2 realities into one. I had my actual life, and I had my Antarctica life. When my
Antarctica life completed, I resumed my actual life.
I hope everybody loved following alongside on this journey. I definitely loved writing in regards to the expertise.
Reality be instructed, once I began this weblog, I used to be writing for an viewers of about 6 folks, family and friends
again house. Sooner or later in November 2022, this weblog took off in reputation.
I wasn’t anticipating this, however it has been lots of enjoyable writing one thing that has introduced pleasure to so many individuals.
I recognize everybody who reached out alongside the way in which. Individuals wrote to me from different Antarctic stations.
Individuals recounted their very own Antarctic adventures from years or a long time up to now. People with upcoming
McMurdo and Pole contracts reached out to ask for recommendation.
So, with that, I’ll go away you with my favourite photograph I took all season. That is from Could 8, 2023, taken off
the again deck of the A1 berthing pod. It reveals our energy plant and all of the yard outbuildings. Simply
out of body to the left is the geographic South Pole marker. It was -70°F. The one gentle was from
the moon. In case you walked out just some hundred toes from station, it was pindrop quiet. The closest subsequent
inhabited station was a whole lot of miles away. Really a special world, and one which I’m fortunate to have
skilled.
That is the third and last a part of a three-part sequence. Take a look at
part one and part two if you happen to haven’t already.