Blazing Ice (41 page)

Megan was the first Antarctican I ever met. In 1993, I stepped off the plane at Denver's Stapleton Airport and wandered to a designated rendezvous prescribed to new hires. Finding no signage, no sign of anything that spoke of Antarctica to me, my eyes fell upon a diminutive female sporting a thick, auburn braid. She wore a combination of hiking and traveling clothes, and sat on a duffle bag. A backpack sat on the ground beside her. I had a duffle bag, too. Taking the chance, I asked, “Antarctica?”

She answered simply, “Yep.”

When Megan joined us this evening, our dinner conversation turned to things new at Pole. A person could now get off the airplane, brave the cold walk to the new station, take up quarters, change into a t-shirt and jeans, and spend their entire season in its warm confines. Such wasn't the life chosen by most of the Polies, though. Scotty's job with cargo and Megan's job with heavy equipment required outside work. But the simple fact that one
could
come to Pole now and never venture outside portended a lifestyle change, a cushy environment for administrators and their ilk. Their numbers would grow.

After dinner, Scotty had business to attend to. So I asked Megan if she'd tour me around the elevated station, killing time before the evening's lecture.

Megan led me out of the galley and graciously walked me around the new building. On the galley level and down a central hallway she showed me a large community room equipped with a dozen personal computer stations. Farther down the hall we found a designated music room that had been commandeered as a smoker's room. Somewhere through what had become a maze of hallways and stairs, we entered a spacious gymnasium, equipped for half-court basketball. In another wing of the station, Megan led me through a high-ceilinged lounge, down another hallway, and into a dormitory section. Here she showed me her
room. Like every other space in this new station, her room had a window … so different from the dark, windowless spaces of the older navy constructions. Megan's room had a telephone and a personal computer line.

For all the luxuries she showed me, what struck me most was not the contrast of today's conveniences to the dearth of them in days past. The legendary hardships of the earliest explorers to reach here, less than a century ago, belonged to another age. Nor was the contrast with the tamer life in the Jamesway Summer Camp particularly stark. We had seen this coming. Rather, the sheer volume of materials and supplies that went into building and furnishing this massive station, the realization that every bit of it had been flown in by LC-130 aircraft, awed me by the logistical audacity of it. Our proof-of-concept delivery was puny by comparison.

Megan led back to the galley where we parted company, she to find a seat and I to find Scotty-Bob Smith, captain of the South Pole plumbers. The large room was already filling up with people. At the far end of the room, recessed into the back wall, a saloon provided standing room for numbers of people. Along the sidewall, where the buffet line ran, folks took standing room there, too. Our crew sat scattered about the room, and I was glad they were there. I needed their support.

Scotty-Bob approached me, extending his hand in greeting. This was the first time we'd run into each other since our arrival. During the off season he and Jerry Marty hinted that an evening lecture on the traverse would be welcome, if we got to South Pole. I gave Scotty-Bob a disc then, containing a slide show covering the first three years of our project. He'd carry it to Pole by plane and set up the projection and audio systems in advance. In exchange, he gave me a shoebox to deliver back to him.

“This is the largest crowd we've ever seen, for any lecture.” Scotty-Bob beamed through his whiskers. The smiling plumber was always up-beat, volunteering his time boosting station morale. “The community is really, really interested in your traverse.”

“Well, it's all of ours, but we've a good story to tell, and some neat pictures to show. Do we have a way of blocking the light coming through the windows?” I asked. It was 7:30 at night on December 23rd at South Pole. Broad daylight streamed into the room.

“Yep. We'll get the blinds drawn.”

After a thoughtful introduction from B. K. welcoming us once again to the station, I found the energy to turn on.

“Thank you, B. K. And thanks to all of you who have welcomed us to your holiday celebrations.” I gazed around the full room. “We've been four years getting here. Tonight, let me tell you what that was like. Let me show you where we've been.”

Entertaining pictures of mule trains, camel caravans, and ship convoys couched our project in the context of hauling cargo over trackless wastes. Text slides described our mission as “proof-of-concept,” and introduced the idea of matching machine mobility to the peculiarities of the Antarctic terrain. Turning from concepts to progress, pictures showed finding and filling crevasses at the Shear Zone in Year One, slogging through the Ross Ice Shelf swamp in Year Two, and winning our way across the Shoals only to be turned around at the top of the Leverett in Year Three. Interspersed maps depicted our advancing route to Pole. Missing, however, were any pictures of our Plateau crossing.

I described what happened along the trail this year, and what we found for terrain between the top of the Leverett and Pole. They learned of Sastrugi National Park, and the Plateau swamp outside their back door. When I described adjusting to loss of tractors and the mind-numbing shuttling, trail weariness settled over me again.

One astute young man asked, “What efficiencies does the traverse offer over LC-130s?”

“That, of course, is the
big
question we hope to answer. Unfortunately, we can't answer it yet, because we haven't finished. Early feasibility studies suggested traversing could deliver twice the payload for the same fuel consumption as an LC-130. I've steadfastly refused revising those early conclusions, because we don't have solid data yet. But I don't see any reason why that projected performance, or better, shouldn't hold. Understand, this proof-of-concept project spent a lot of time finding the way here and breaking trail. Future traverses won't have to do that. We've not just been pointing our tractors south, and we've yet to make a real snow road out of this trail we
have
found.”

The young man may have been asking about cost as well. I added, “As for dollar efficiencies, based on our lessons learned from this project we'll get a handle on the operating costs. Likewise we'll design the future traverse fleet.
All that must wait until we're done. As far as capital costs, three seven-tractor fleets complete with sleds might cost $25 million. One new LC-130 might cost $80 million. So the capital outlay encourages us to look at traversing.

“We're not sure that three traverse fleets based out of McMurdo are the best way to go. It may be that a single plateau fleet housed at Pole and a single ice shelf fleet based at McMurdo is a better way. That's about the best I can offer you now. If you like, I'd be happy discuss your very good question further. Why don't you catch me at one of your meals here?”

The bright young man accepted my invitation, and in the days to come we would have that discussion.

“Is there another question?”

A few followed, and I met each with the best answer I could. But the last question struck an emotional chord: “Did you ever doubt you'd make it here?”

I stared pensively at the floor, replaying all the days from the beginning when NSF announced its full support for traverse development.
When had there not been doubt?

With a deep sigh, I looked up. “There is always a way. We didn't necessarily know what that way was. But if you're willing to invest the time and the money, then you will find the way. For us, it has never been easy. Not with time. Not with money. Not with terrain. Our route was mostly unexplored until we explored it. And plan though we might, we never knew what we were getting into until we got there. In October of this year, still at McMurdo, it was a question: could we make it? It is a question no more. We are here.”

The community as one gave a prolonged, warming round of applause.

I added a post script: “We have brought 218,000 pounds of Christmas gifts to you, and we look forward to officially delivering those. Tonight we are proud to make our first delivery. Would Scotty-Bob please come to the front?”

Scotty-Bob worked his way around the tables and chairs and folks standing in the aisles. Looking beyond him to the audience, I announced with all the drama I could muster: “Ladies and gentlemen, the South Pole Traverse Proof-of-Concept Project proudly makes its first delivery.” I held aloft a cardboard shoebox for all to see, a box Scotty-Bob recognized.

“The mail!” I cried. The box contained several hundred commemorative envelopes, stamped and cacheted “Delivered via Surface Traverse from Mc-Murdo to South Pole.”

Scotty-Bob accepted the prize to deafening renewed applause. He and Jerry Marty later distributed those decorated envelopes to every person at South Pole Station.

I closed by introducing our crew by name, one at a time. From scattered locations around the room, each stood and acknowledged the community with a smile and a wave. We invited the community to come by our digs downwind of Summer Camp.

“Consider it open house, and you're invited. If you've any more questions, do not hesitate to ask any member of this fine crew. They'll have better and more interesting answers than I. For now, I'm talked out. Thank you for having us as your guests.”

Over Christmas Eve and Christmas we mixed happily with the Polies. Our open house found many takers at all hours. One evening Scotty Jackson dropped by with a bottle of Irish whiskey and shared it to the bottom with those who happened to be around. Another night a carpenter's helper from New Hampshire serenaded us with a medley of her old-time banjo music.

Polies, equally proud of their facilities, guided us through their changing environs: the new elevated station, the new power plant, and the old station under the dome. Scotty Jackson toured me, Judy, and Greg through the tunnel network we'd dug under the station several years before.

I found Scotty on Christmas Eve at breakfast and asked if he'd like to join me in
Fritzy
. I needed to retrieve the sleds still back at the hold-back line. He was all for it. We'd meet at his cargo office in an hour. But Brad, who happened to be eating breakfast with us asked, “How'd you like me to bring in the milvan sled?”

“Brad, you don't have to do anything today unless you want to. Scotty and I can get it.”

Brad said, “Well, I was sort of thinking I'd go out there in
Red Rider
…”

“Gotcha, Brad. Scotty and I won't be out there for a while. You two have a good time and enjoy the views.”

“Thanks.” Brad left right away.

After dawdling over late coffee and rolls in the galley, I rendezvoused with Scotty and we strolled to the traverse camp.

“I missed seeing you when we came in. But I got to tell you, that sign you left in the berms … I completely lost it. I mean, I've been consumed with this traverse every minute of every day on the trail. I lay awake at night imagining what might happen, wondering what I've missed that might get somebody hurt. When we pulled into the station and I saw your sign … that was the first time it all got to me. I broke down.”

“I know how you feel, John,” Scotty confessed. “Sorry I couldn't be there either. But when I put up that sign … I got all choked up, too.”

“Then I'm glad you weren't there! 'Cause then everybody at Pole would have seen two grown men bawling their eyes out!”

We rounded the corner of the Summer Camp Jamesway lounge into a full view of our parked fleet.
Red Rider
was back. The milvan sled was parked next to our two tank sleds. Above the living module, our hometown Stars and Stripes stretched out atop our flagpole. At the same time, we both noticed there was no wind. Yet our flag posed stiffly unfurled atop the pole, against a clear blue sky.

“Imagine that,” Scotty laughed. It was frozen.

“Scotty, you ever run a Challenger tractor?” I asked, approaching
Fritzy
.

“Not yet.”

“Well, walk around it with me and I'll show you the check out. I'll take her out to the hold-back line. You can sit beside me in the helper seat.”

Fritzy
's engine temperature rose quickly to 100 degrees Celsius after starting. It was a warm day by Pole standards. We drove back out toward Marisat and turned right to cross the skiway. Since no airplanes came on Christmas Eve, we crossed unannounced. Then passing the flat rack sled, we pulled up to the five black panels and climbed out onto the snow.

“Scotty, these panels were our target coming into Pole. Take a look out there to the north, along our tracks. Can you see the green flags to the right of them?”

Scotty squinted a moment, then exclaimed: “Oh, yeah! I see them.”

“Standing here, and looking out there, I want you to understand. Starting at these black panels, a continuous line of green flags, planted no more than one quarter mile apart, leads all the way back to McMurdo, all 1,028 miles. You want to walk back to McMurdo? Those green flags lead the way.”

Scotty got it. He'd been working when I gave my lecture. So I told him of the terrain we encountered from the top of the Leverett, about the extent of
the Plateau swamp, and about shuttling our loads. We had just one more load to shuttle. The flat rack sled.

“How about you run
Fritzy
and bring the last load, the last mile into the station?”

On Christmas Eve, at the second of three seatings, we joined in the station's all-out dinner. The galley staff and a host of generous volunteers put on a culinary
tour de force
that would win raves from any gourmet. B. K. wore a black sleeveless dress, which was a killer combination for the slender, long-haired blond. She met us entering the room, and escorted us to a long table in the middle. Behind us sat a table from cargo. To their side sat fuels workers, fuelies. All these people worked hard with one another, day in and day out, and they still wanted to sit down to a holiday meal together.