Eclipsed

We have just a little over a week to go before we leave McMurdo Station for our round the world travels and our thoughts have turned to warmth, grass, rest and fine dining. Life is still pretty frenzied here as most of the personnel on station are involved in unloading the giant re-supply ship that arrived on February 6. Every year it seems that the weather turns cold and ugly just at the precise moment the ship arrives and this year was no different. It has been bitterly cold and windy for the past several days (nothing compared to the interior of Alaska, though, which is reporting minus 70 degrees F today); however, this didn't dampen my enthusiasm for standing outside to view the near-total solar eclipse yesterday afternoon.

At 3:22 pm local time, the moon started to pass in front of the sun and by 4:30 we had a near total eclipse. The light was gray - more like a storm was coming than darkness. Luckily, we had contacted one of the metal workers in advance to get a welding helmet filter so we could view the sun safely. Here are some photos of the event.