Cool Presentations

One of the highlights of life in Antarctica is the Sunday Night Science Lecture, or in the case of last week's lecture...the Sunday Night Not-So-Much-Science Lecture given by a BBC photographer and producer who are working on a 10-hour series, called "Life". "Life" is a follow- up to the wonderful "Planet Earth" series but this one will focus on critters rather than environments and eco-systems. It is due to air in the States in 2010 and in England (maybe the Netherlands, too???) in late 2009.

The presenters didn't talk much about the footage they are working on here except to say that they are using a very expensive camera called a Cineflex mounted under one of the helicopters. The Cineflex minimizes movement and provides excellent aerial footage of our vast landscape. They are also doing lots of underwater/under-ice, time-lapse photography of some of our large and weird sea creatures. Cold work, for sure.

The real highlight, though, was hearing the stories about how some of the amazing sequences in Planet Earth were filmed - such as the first images ever taken of snow leopards in Pakistan and the polar bear emerging from her snow den with 2 cubs. We really felt like we were in the midst of celebrities and the packed dining hall filled with "oohs" and "ahs" as we viewed the footage.

Science from the ice. AGAP

Here's a link to a yahoo website with info on one of the science projects:
AGAP

Our address in Antarctica

The latest rumor here on the ice is that next year the NSF is going to put a stop to our ability to receive packages. So this year might be the last year. For those of you who'd like to send us mail (or packages) while we are on the ice, here's our address:

Michiel Gitzels, RPSC
McMurdo Station
PSC 469 Box 700
APO AP, 96599-1035
USA


ps
A lot of stuff is not allowed to enter New Zealand or to be sent by mail (alcohol). Here's a useful link:
NZ customs

Back on the Ice

We've returned to McMurdo for another Antarctic summer! It's nice to back and see old friends. By now we've already passed the date of the last sunset. Continuous daylight from now on.
Current weather:

Open Mic Night in Denver

I took a short trip to Denver for training before heading back down to Antarctica and as luck would have it, almost all of the Porn Spill band members were in town. The guys thought it would be fun to do an Open Mic night at a local wine bar called Vines. The bar is an upscale locale that features hundreds of premium wines and specialty cocktails, including an Antarctic Freeze (or something like that), which is a vodka drink named for one of our ice colleagues who frequents the bar.

Lacking a set of bongos or a conga drum, I pounded on a 5 gallon bucket. Our 4 song performance got rousing applause....maybe because we packed the place with our workmates. The other patrons were a little non-plussed to see a 5-person act (plus bucket) squeezed into the corner of their swanky establishment.

Here are a couple of mood-lit photos.....