Oh the weather outside is frightful...

Hello everybody!

So here we are! At WAIS Divide, the field camp we were supposed to get to on November 5, you ask???? Why, no! We are still in McMurdo. The weather out at WAIS has not been good enough for us to land in. I guess I am very happy (as is my family) that they are so cautious about when we fly, but we're pushing 2 weeks with only a small sampling of clothes to wear. We had to do what they call "bag drag" a week ago this past Wednesday, so most of our belongings are strapped to a wooden board out on the ice runway. We can't get to them. So a few loads of laundry later and grinning and bearing it, here we are!

The past couple of weeks have been good. But everyday since Thursday, November 5 we have been getting up early to check the flight schedule. Okay... maybe just Eric has been getting up early, but he is nice enough to come and tell me whether the flight has been delayed or canceled. If it is delayed we stay on alert, watch for further flight information and then if it is canceled we then go to work. If not and this happened once this past Tuesday, we make our way out to the plane. We got on the plane, took off, then about 20 minutes into the flight, heard over the intercom,
"The visibility at WAIS has just decreased to a level that is unsafe to land. We are going back to McMurdo." Agghhhhhh! So frustrating. We almost made it. So 9 tries later we are still here now enjoying a condition 2 storm. High winds,(up to 60MPH) blowing snow and chilly. Some of the carp shop got the day off due to weather and that included me! So I decided to take the time and update y'all on what's been happening down here.

Life is still great here. Work is good, food is good and I've been learning a lot. This past week I was able to use a jig saw, belt sander, router, mag drill and auger. I made a #1 sign for a hut that needed to have the #16 put on it. We already had the 6. Pictures of it are on the side. I was very proud of it, as it was the first thing I made all by myself. I also got to help demo an old hut that was used for seal research. It took 2 days and a lot of work but was great to see it come down. We were able to take out some of our flight delay aggression out on it!

On Thursday I got to be a part of what they call an MCI drill. That stands for Mass Casualty Incident. It is in the event of an accident where there are more casualties than the small clinic here can handle. So we turn the fire station into a make shift hospital and bring all of the victims there. This again was just a drill, but it is taken very seriously. I have volunteered for the stretcher bearer team, so was able to go out to the scene of the accident and assist as needed. The scenario was 2 vehicles had collided and there were 18 victims. When I got there I was asked by a firefighter to assist him with a "victim" that had a neck injury. We got his head secured with tape and I sat by his side for 30 minutes talking to him and making sure he stayed with me asking him pertinent questions etc. It was a very neat experience and I was so glad that so may people took it so seriously. It really felt quite real. The victims had fake blood on and everything.

Saturday was great. I had the day off, Eric's still went to work at the carp shop, and we have today off as well. Last night we went to the Banff Film Festival where they had various short films as well as a long one for our viewing pleasure. Lots of mountain biking, mountain climbing, cliff jumping (I'm talking up to 100 feet, not the cliffs at Lake Travis), and walking across a rope tied to two cliffs with nothing but hundreds of feet below them. Wow! And I thought I was being adventurous! Great films and we were lucky to have them down here.

We will try for the 10th time to get to WAIS tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed. Enjoy the new pictures, e-mail if you have a chance and thanks again for joining me on this journey!

Love from Antarctica,
Erika

P.S. Go to http://www.usap.gov/videoclipsandmaps/mcmwebcam.cfm for a live weather camera of McMurdo Station and to learn more about the US Antarctic Program.