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First photos from Devon Island
Jul. 6th, 2009 07:37 pmHi Folks,
I made it to Devon Island a little over a week ago now. I've not had comms until today because we only just got the Ka-band satellite dish working this afternoon, so this is the first chance I've had to get these out and to catch up on the week's backlog of email.
Windswept
It has been pretty windy here -- up to and just over 30 knots some of the time. It's forecast 60 - 75 in Resolute in a couple of days, which means we'll get hit pretty hard too. Hopefully our tents will survive, but cube law and all that -- double the wind speed, increase the force by a factor of 8. My tent is staked out with enormous tent pegs, fully guyed out, and every peg has a bigass rock sitting on top of it. It's also a brand new Mountain Hardware Trango 3.1, which is designed for nontrivially bad conditions, so I should be OK. I'll be tightening my guy lines and checking the pegs before bed tonight though.
Tributaries
This is an aerial shot from the DHC6 on the flight over from Cornwallis. There was (still is) quite a bit of snow cover that will probably disappear by the end of the arctic summer.
The facilities
These are, um, the facilities. You know, *cough cough*. Actually, you probably don't *want* to know.
Setting up camp
Setting up camp, particularly in the first few days, involves a lot of manual labour. Heavy lifting, moving stuff around, getting things out of storage, setting up electrical and comms systems, getting the heaters going, etc. It takes about a week in total before people other than the core team start arriving.
Sea ice off Devon
These are some odd shapes in the sea ice just off the coast of Devon as we were flying overhead.
River and snow
The addition of snow makes Devon even more photogenic than usual, I think. And oddly moves me to do more colour -- this is rare for me.
Polygon river
Another (gasp) colour landscape. The name comes from the river in the middle (duh) and the fact that the ground either side has a polygonal surface structure. This forms due to expansion and contraction due to freezing, and is also found in the polar regions of Mars.
Pauline
We typically have several local Inuit working in camp. This is Pauline, from Grise Fjord, the northernmost settlement in the world. *waves, if you're reading this!*
Outpost
This is actually the comms tent that houses the satellite equipment and other various raio gear.
On takeoff
On board the Twin Otter, just as the pilots opened the throttles to start the takeoff run. The DHC6 is an amazing aircraft -- older than I am, yet better than anything else at takeoffs and landings on short gravel airstrips, which makes it a mainstay up here in the far north.
On DHC6 Twin Otter before takeoff
This was taken by one of the pilots. It's me with my pelican case full of cameras, sitting on top of a big pelican case full of robot control system. :-)
Illuminati
Definite signs of Illuminati activity. This requires further investigation.
Hold on to your hat
A shot of the weather station's display panel during the last wind storm.
From a window
From the window of the Twin Otter, just as we were crossing the coast of Cornwallis Island on the way to Devon.
Diesel
The semi-permanent work tents are heated by diesel stoves. This barrel feeds the heaters in two tents.
DHC6 Cargo
I was the only passenger on the flight -- the rest of the plane was full of cargo. It is quite amazing what those planes can handle.
Devon coast
I can't wait to get a chance to print this one...
Bitten through fibre
One of the messier bits of setting up camp was the main gigabit fibre from the comms tent to the core, and back out to the office tent had been chewed through by an animal (probably an arctic fox) over the winter. Since it's essentially impossible to repair a fibre, particularly with the equipment we have here, it was necessary to pull it all out and replace it with new cables. It got done, but it was messy and required digging up the conduit because the connectors were too chunky to let themselves be pulled around the 90 degree bends in the pipes.
Around Camp
This is a shot between several of the work tents. You can see the CSA's autonomous Arthur C. Clarke greenhouse project in the background.
I made it to Devon Island a little over a week ago now. I've not had comms until today because we only just got the Ka-band satellite dish working this afternoon, so this is the first chance I've had to get these out and to catch up on the week's backlog of email.
Windswept
It has been pretty windy here -- up to and just over 30 knots some of the time. It's forecast 60 - 75 in Resolute in a couple of days, which means we'll get hit pretty hard too. Hopefully our tents will survive, but cube law and all that -- double the wind speed, increase the force by a factor of 8. My tent is staked out with enormous tent pegs, fully guyed out, and every peg has a bigass rock sitting on top of it. It's also a brand new Mountain Hardware Trango 3.1, which is designed for nontrivially bad conditions, so I should be OK. I'll be tightening my guy lines and checking the pegs before bed tonight though.
Tributaries
This is an aerial shot from the DHC6 on the flight over from Cornwallis. There was (still is) quite a bit of snow cover that will probably disappear by the end of the arctic summer.
The facilities
These are, um, the facilities. You know, *cough cough*. Actually, you probably don't *want* to know.
Setting up camp
Setting up camp, particularly in the first few days, involves a lot of manual labour. Heavy lifting, moving stuff around, getting things out of storage, setting up electrical and comms systems, getting the heaters going, etc. It takes about a week in total before people other than the core team start arriving.
Sea ice off Devon
These are some odd shapes in the sea ice just off the coast of Devon as we were flying overhead.
River and snow
The addition of snow makes Devon even more photogenic than usual, I think. And oddly moves me to do more colour -- this is rare for me.
Polygon river
Another (gasp) colour landscape. The name comes from the river in the middle (duh) and the fact that the ground either side has a polygonal surface structure. This forms due to expansion and contraction due to freezing, and is also found in the polar regions of Mars.
Pauline
We typically have several local Inuit working in camp. This is Pauline, from Grise Fjord, the northernmost settlement in the world. *waves, if you're reading this!*
Outpost
This is actually the comms tent that houses the satellite equipment and other various raio gear.
On takeoff
On board the Twin Otter, just as the pilots opened the throttles to start the takeoff run. The DHC6 is an amazing aircraft -- older than I am, yet better than anything else at takeoffs and landings on short gravel airstrips, which makes it a mainstay up here in the far north.
On DHC6 Twin Otter before takeoff
This was taken by one of the pilots. It's me with my pelican case full of cameras, sitting on top of a big pelican case full of robot control system. :-)
Illuminati
Definite signs of Illuminati activity. This requires further investigation.
Hold on to your hat
A shot of the weather station's display panel during the last wind storm.
From a window
From the window of the Twin Otter, just as we were crossing the coast of Cornwallis Island on the way to Devon.
Diesel
The semi-permanent work tents are heated by diesel stoves. This barrel feeds the heaters in two tents.
DHC6 Cargo
I was the only passenger on the flight -- the rest of the plane was full of cargo. It is quite amazing what those planes can handle.
Devon coast
I can't wait to get a chance to print this one...
Bitten through fibre
One of the messier bits of setting up camp was the main gigabit fibre from the comms tent to the core, and back out to the office tent had been chewed through by an animal (probably an arctic fox) over the winter. Since it's essentially impossible to repair a fibre, particularly with the equipment we have here, it was necessary to pull it all out and replace it with new cables. It got done, but it was messy and required digging up the conduit because the connectors were too chunky to let themselves be pulled around the 90 degree bends in the pipes.
Around Camp
This is a shot between several of the work tents. You can see the CSA's autonomous Arthur C. Clarke greenhouse project in the background.