I'm Baaaack!

Yes, I am back in McMurdo. This time I am here in January instead of December. There should be many differences: the weather is colder, and the ice breaker is coming, along with the cargo vessel. There could be penguins and Weddell seals.

My job is different this time. It is now to go out into the field and recover the CREAM instrument instead of help prepare it for flight. This is a great opportunity for me - it means I will get to see something of the Antarctic continent! Typically the instrument comes down on the Ross Ice Shelf or on the Antarctic plateau behind the TransAntarctic Mountains near Ross Island where McMurdo is. I will fly out to the site and over the course of a few days disassemble the instrument, have it flown back in pieces to McMurdo, pack everything carefully into large shipping containers, and then have it shipped back to the States on the cargo vessel due here in the next couple of weeks.

This year three cosmic ray balloon experiments were launched: CREAM, BESS, and ATTIC. You can follow the progress of each experiment at the NASA Challenger Scientific Balloon Facility Antarctic Operations site. At this time CREAM (my experiment) is nearly finished with its second revolution, and we are in the process of trying to decide about a third revolution.

I arrived about a week ago (Jan 5, 2008), and had not decided to continue this blog. However, enough interesting things have happened that I think it is worthwhile to document some of them. Keep tuning in!

You can learn a lot about McMurdo Station from the posts in this blog from my previous visit, in December 2005. they are linked in the archive listings in the sidebar.