Burton Island (AGB 1) - Naval Cruise Book

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-.--.-.- -yr -.rn-1-4-,L-t-tfahi- i-.- - ...-.-,.1..-v-4-1-:T 747.4-.Ti-1 n-Q-1 - i i , 5 i i fi , its ig l These ominous flags, in various combinations, warn of an approaching weather condition that is generally more serious than it would be in civilized surroundings. When two of the square flags are hoisted, one above the other, they signify Storm Condition One. The red triangle means Low Visibility Condition One. ..I.-,.. . 'Rope Yam Zero-zero at McMurdo. A 40-knot wind carries the snow in from the south, and the flags at Antarctic Support Activities QASAQ Command spell out Storm Condition One. As in 1902, when Shackleton first saw it, the ground is covered thickly with the dull ashes thrown out by Mount Erebus. i'The whole place had a weird and uncanny look, and reminded me of the desert in iChilde Roland to the dark tower came' ii - The teletype for Commander Task Force 43 says: EXTER- IOR CONSTR WORK SUSPENDED DUE TO WX . . . AIR OPS SUSPENDED DUE TO WX . . . MCMURDO SHIP CHANNEL ,10 MILES LONG. NOW 15.7 MILES FROM HUT POINT. 36 HOURS OF STRONG SOUTHERLY WINDS HAVE CLEARED 80 PERCENT OF THE BRASH FROM THE CHANNEL. The message is copied by the icebreakers Glacier and Burton Islanal iiThe breakers like to have a strong wind in their face, says Lt Glen Drummond in the weather room, Hbecause it blows the loose ice outf, It is copied also by Calcaterra, which is on station about halfway to New Zealand. i'Bulldog7' Drummond thinks the weath- er ships have the worst duty on the ice. 'iThey send up balloons and track them with radar. Maybe they have to send up as many as five, to get one clear, because of the seas and the wind and the rolling. They hang 'em in the antennas and everything else. Calcaterra and Thomas Gary, both DERS Q destroyer escorts with radarj, are alternating this year on picket duty, three weeks on station and three weeks off. HWe haven't always had two, says Drummond. HThe ship would take six to ten days off, then get back out as quick as it could get refueled. They are the main reporting point on the 2,200-mile flight line between Christ- church, New Zealand, and McMurdo Station. They are there, also, in case an aircraft has to ditch between these two points. It is not much worse than a blizzard in New England, except that there are no trees to stop the wind. The polar air flows down from the plateau, unhindered, for more than a thousand miles. The snowfall on the whole Continent averages only a foot or two a year, but at 15 miles per hour the wind begins to pick up drift. The next message says: ICE RUNWAYS 15f33 GRID. AND 0'7f25 GRID CLOSED UFN DUE TO SNOW COVERAGE. Down at BOQ-10 where the staff officers live, which ordinarily has a view more exciting than the Bay of Naples, they pull back' the curtains at the picture window. There is nothing but a white void. A small speaker in the overhead warns all personnel, ex- cept those on urgent business, to remain inside. HRope yarn?- says someone in the hut, and it raises a wistful laugh. This, elsewhere, means a day off. In the side of a big shabby building is a little door with HHerman,s Rest Home scrawled on it. The interior is jammed with vehicles, and is so vast and gloomy that a man working on I0

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their small units, and take pride in producing or repairing some- thing on which many people depend. The harshness of the en- viromnent, the loneliness, and the long hours are relieved by close companionship and a rich humor. Thishumor hides their serious- ness and their genuine idealism. Like the support forces of other nations, the Navy offers assistance to anyone who requires it, whether to a Russian aircraft, an Argentine traverse party, or a New Zealander studying pen- guins. Dr. Henry M. Dater, the staff historian of Deep Freeze, says this attitude comes from 'fthe ancient tradition of the sea of giving help to ships in distress and the feeling of polar explorers that, where nature is implacable, man had better unite for his own survivalf, As a precedent for the world, this arrangement in the Antarctic, extended by treaty for 30 years, may turn out to be historic. On the ice, space and time are not what they seem. An air- craft leaves McMurdo today and arrives at Byrd Station yester- day. Mountains are farther away than they look, and the ground - in some weather - is closer. The latest communications equip- ment reports the geology of three hundred million years ago. To reflect the feeling of the Antarctic, this book takes certain liberties with space and time. A Hercules LC-130 aircraft at Williams Field. A taxi-run that may be an all-time record was made by one of the Hercs in Deep Freeze '66, With visibility too low to take off, it simply taxied from the main station at Byrd to the VLF lVery Low Frequencyl substation l4 miles away. Machines are especially beautiful in the Antarctic because they are rare. They stand out dramatically on the ice, and their purpose is immediately clear.

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Below: The Royal Society Range, seen from Hut Point. lt was named for the Royal Geographical Society in grati- tude for its assistance to early English expeditions. At the foot of these mountains are some dry valleys which are left ice-free by receding glaciers. Most of the ice in this area of McMurdo Sound breaks out by January. At right is Marble Point, where the Navy at one time ex- perimented with a permanent runway carved out of solid rock so that wheeled aircraft would not have to land on the unpredictable bay ice.