Probably nothing on an Australian Antarctic Station is as iconic to an expeditioner as a "Hagg" or a Hagglunds tracked vehicle. They are the workhorse, the gateway to adventure and the shelter when you have had enough of the harsh environment down here. So what do you have to do to take one for a spin? Is it as simple as someone throwing you the keys and going for a drive down the street? Well, yes and no. As with all things Antarctic, there are a few things we have to do that are not exactly like jumping in the car and heading off for the day at home.
Above: The Hagg.. noisy, sometimes uncomfortable but the perfect tool for the job in Antarctica
First ( assuming you have done your day long induction and training ) you wander down to the "Line" where the Haggs are all tethered or parked. I say tethered because they kind of are. The "line" is where they are parked in a line and are plugged into 240VAC power.. not to keep the battery charged but to stop the oil and other fluids in the engine block from freezing. If you find for some reason they are not plugged into the power you'll have to do it and wait for at least an hour for them to warm up. Once that's done you can start the engine... but not before you open the covers over the exhaust and radiator compartment. This stops all the fine talcum powder like snow from blizzard conditions getting into places that can render the Hagg somewhat useless.
What's worse, if you fail to close these covers once you have finished using the Hagg, the Diesos (Mechanics who service the Haggs) will rip your arms off and beat you around the head with them. They don't enjoy fixing things filled with Blizz snow and will make sure you don't do it again!
Above: Open the Blizz covers before starting the engine.. and shut them when done!
While you are waiting for that heating to occurr, you can head off to the Comms workshop and collect your Satellite phone, a personal tracking device and a Personal Locator Beacon (PLB). These are all for the just in case things go wrong scenario if it actually comes about. If it does, you really want to be able to contact the Station to come and help you out and for them to know where it is that they have to come to! Getting stuck with a breakdown, an injury or getting trapped in a crevasse is something that can lead to you being dead pretty quickly if it all goes wrong.
You will also need a Trip Leader ( someone with experience in Antarctic travel and rubber stamped by the Station Leader as such ) to come along and make sure you don't do dumb things requiring people to come and rescue you. You will write up the details of your trip ( where you are going, what you're doing there, who is going and when you expect to be back ) on the Trip Board in either the Ops Building Comms Centre or the one in the mess area. Then you will take the tag with your name on it from the list next to the Trip Board and move it to the "Off Station" space where you have entered the trip details. Then, if you are travelling outside normal work hours, you will need to find someone to act as your Comms contact who will track your progress via a Website showing your location reported by your personal tracker and Hagg vehicle tracker. This person (who during normal work hours is often me ) will be listening to make sure you report in at the required times so we know you are not dead or needing help to stay not dead.
How often you must report in to prove your lack of deadness depends on where you are travelling. If you are travelling on the Sea Ice you must call in via Radio, Sat Phone or Satellite Text message every hour. If you are travelling inland on the Ice Plateau ( on the Antarctic continent itself ) you must report in as you leave the Station and when you arrive at your destination.
So.. once you've got all that sorted out don't forget to pack your Field Survival Pack ... a backpack with sleeping bag, spare clothes, gloves, coats, Plastic shelter "chip packet" plus food snacks, drinking water, noise cancelling headphones and other things to make your trip generally more comfortable. This includes the infamous orange Pee bottle. If you need to take a leak you are not allowed to make the yellow snow here in Antarctica... no you must use said receptacle to catch the liquid and end up taking it back to the station for disposal. Doing this in the windy cold -25C temperatures is a skill that requires perseverance, patience and practice. (Did you see what I did there with all the P words for using the Pee bottle.. and I wasn't even really trying). I will leave the practical details to your imagination.
Above: The Field Survival Pack. You can see the Yellow "Chip Packet" survival shelter strapped to the left hand side. The yellow rope in the middle of the pack is a throw line to throw to someone who falls through the sea ice and the orange bottle is the Pee bottle as mentioned above. The Field survival Pack also contains a First Aid Kit, sleeping bag and anything else you can stuff in of use... mostly chocolate bars or toasted sangas you prepared earlier.
SO... after all that, yes you may now load up and drive off into the white and grey wonderland. They do drive pretty much like a car.. steering wheel, brake, accelerator etc... but no Bluetooth sound system or electric windows. The Haggs are Left Hand Drive though so that's a bit different and you also need to follow the track as shown on the GPS/Radar display. Not doing this can lead to situations like falling into crevasses without a known bottom or testing out the floating ability of the Hagg in the cold water lurking under a thin patch of ice, which is in fact quite good..they do float.. which is just as well as you will see below.
We have here at Mawson, ( which appears to be unique at Australian Antarctic Stations ) upstairs in the bar area, the Wall of Fame/Shame depending on your perspective. It is adorned with photographic evidence of the adventures of Hagg drivers and their crews who decided to test out said floating capability and other not recommended methods of use for the Haggs. This year we were privileged to witness an addition to this wall when our very own Doctor Dave decided to reverse the back caboose of our Blue Hagg ( they tend to be called by their colour which is not very imaginative but relatively straightforward ) into the only tall lump of ice within 200 metres and cause it to roll over and have a little nap. It only took the two diesos and a cast of thousands ( well OK it was only 5 of us but that was 25% of our total population ) about three hours to roll it back over and limp it the three kilometres home for a Bex and a good lie down. The photos below show some of the other adventures had by hapless Hagg crews here at Mawson over the years.
Speaking of our beloved Dr Dave, I thought I would show you around the medical clinic we have here on station. If you don't like the look of it you can always travel about 650kms to "nearby" Davis Station over the sea ice or crevasse filled Ice Plateau and find.. much the same thing there. So inevitably we like ours. Antarctica is not really a great place to get any disease or bodily breakage of any significance as facilities are limited, especially when you are reminded that the assistants to the surgeon if required who will be looking after you are an Electrician, a Carpenter. the Met Bureau Observer and the Warehouse Supervisor. Better than nothing though as they have done a few weeks serious training at the Royal Hobart hospital before coming down and are very keen to pump you full of all sorts of interesting drugs.
So with that excitement out of the way, what else has happened in the last month I hear you say. Well quite a bit actually. Being October we thought it only fitting that we should have a crack at running our own Oktoberfest night.. well two of us thought it was and so it came into being. We did our best to get out some form of Lederhosen and I was in good form as I had actually brought down some fair dinkum German Wheat beer (Weissbier) which I was introduced to by a Bavarian family we stayed with last year in .. Bavaria. It was a good night if not altogether accurate in terms of our portrayal.. but who really cares.
Below: Mark ( Electrician ) and I feeling the Oktoberfest love. FYI my Ugg Boots were decreed close enough to Bavarian footwear by the authorities... as well as everything else I was wearing.
With the warmer weather arriving ( above - 10 C is awesome! ) the animals are returning and breeding. Apart from the Emperor Penguins having chicks and the Adelie Penguins building stone nests and preparing to lay eggs, the seals are popping up out of the hole in the ice and giving birth to their pups. There are no real predators on the top of the ice and they are quite safe just lying around getting fat from Mums very rich milk. They are also pretty cute as we found out on a trip earlier in the month to see some.
The Adelie penguins are grumpy little suckers full of attitude and seem ready to walk right up to you and beat you to death with their seemingly puny little flippers. Be warned however.. those puny flippers hurt. A few of our more experienced expeditioners have felt the wrath of the Adelie and they pack a punch if they get to close! They make nests out of the only thing available down here... rocks. Maybe that's why they are so grumpy.. having to sit on a bed of rocks for weeks to raise chicks. You would think that there are plenty of rocks here to share... there isn't much else other than that and ice and snow. But Adelies are also lazy and happily steal the rocks from their neighbours nest anytime they can get away with it. Sometimes to apparently no real protest as seen in the example we witnessed below on Welch Island not far from station.
The warmer weather also means we have received a batch of new Summer Expeditioners to do all of the jobs we are sick of doing.. I mean to conduct Science Research and the like. A Canadian Company is contracted by the Antarctic Division to perform the fixed wing flights between the Stations in Summer due to their Polar experience both here and in the Arctic north of Canada.
They fly from Canada, down through the USA, South America and eventually get to the British Base in Antarctica at Rothera, South of the tip of South America. They then fly to Scott-Amundsen Base at the South Pole ( USA Base ) and then fly across to McMurdo ( another USA base) before eventually ending up at the Aussie Davis base. It takes them the best part of two weeks to get here depending on the weather. Aircraft used are smaller twin engine Twin Otters and also a couple of C-47 ex military aircraft. They are pretty old but have been heavily modified for use in Polar regions.
One of these actually flew on D-Day in 1944 in WW2 and it's still going... as I said though it has had a bit of work done to it!
When the weather is right they land on the sea ice just outside Horseshoe Harbour, about the same place the RAAF did the parachute air drop of a heap of freight for us in May this year. The video below gives a worms eye view of the first C-47 landing.. apologies for a couple of expletives coming from those under the plane but it was a tad close!
So with these new people arriving ( and three of the winter crew heading home for various personal and professional reasons ) it really is starting to feel like the end of our Antarctic year is not far away. With the sea ice now beginning to reduce in thickness instead of growing and larger cracks appearing in it, we are trying to fit in a few more trips before it gets too dangerous to keep heading out on the ice. That is still probably going to be around Christmas but that isn't that far away any more! The Nuyina ( re-supply ship ) is scheduled to be back here to do the re-supply and take us home around the middle of January so its coming up quickly now.
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