the weather, the Mawson 2008-9 crew finally started to make an
appearance at Mawson.
The first trip was yesterday (both S76 helicopters fly together in
case one has a problem), and then today, after a cancellation at
0700, at 14:00 we were off at last.
Why did it take so long? In part, we've just been unlucky with
weather, but the reason for that is because the 4-hour flight from
Davis to Mawson takes in several diverse areas each with different
weather patterns. Therefore, when it was fine in Davis, it often
wasn't at Mawson, or it was fine at both ends but in between it was
bad. The helicopters are not rated to fly in snow, and need to have
good visibility of the ground as well for the whole distance, which
is about 300 nautical miles.
The first part of the flight is to Sansom island, named after the
doctor on the 1968 Amery Ice Shelf expedition. It's a small rocky
island just off the mainland, right beside the enormous Amery Ice
Shelf which has a whole pile of helicopter fuel drums on it and one
small "apple" hut. After topping up the fuel tanks, we headed off
across the Amery, a great chunk of featureless 300 metre thick ice
floating in the sea, extending two hundred km across. Although
remarkable for its sheer magnitude, it was fairly dull to experience,
since you might as well have been just flying over a great sheet of
cloud.
Eventually we could see distant mountain ranges and the sea on the
horizon, and the helicopter started to climb up over the continent,
maintaining about a 1500 foot altitude over the surface the entire way.
By the time we got to 5000 feet, it was about minus 12 in the cabin,
so my toes were starting to get a bit chilly, but after a quick fly
past the nearby mountains, we landed at Mawson to be greeted by
the 2008 winterers.
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