End of Winter Harvest

 I planted carrots when I first arrived at Summit. Tomorrow we are expecting a plane for 8 new people, so we harvested the largest carrot as an end of winter treat!

We cut it in little pieces to share it. It was delicious! 

Another Balloon

Balloon in the Moon from Marissa Goerke on Vimeo.

Wind Storms and Snow Caves

 I made a window out of ice (water and large cookie tray). and built it into the snow cave that is serving as the escape route from the science office in the greenhouse. This way the mouth of the cave is not open to the elements and does not fill with snow every few days and still lets light in.

 After the last big storm my window finally got completely covered so I dug it out and built this igloo type shelter for the hole so it would not fill with snow and I'd have to dig it out again.

Here is the inside view. it's about eight feet deep. Took about 4 hours to dig out and build.

And this is what it looks like to launch a balloon in 30 knot wind!

Balloon in 30 knot winds from Marissa Goerke on Vimeo.

Clouds, Food and Snow Fumaroles

Pink clouds!

For safety/ERT meeting on Saturday we talked about dealing with people with altitude sickness. This is a gamaw bag. You can increase the pressure inside the bag and effectively make the person feel like they are at a lower altitude. This is important because we are expecting a plane next week with eight new people on it and if they have issues with the altitude we will have to help them until we can get another plane.

The snow is pretty with the sun on it.

Indian food night!

During high winds, snow will creep under the door and make these fumaroles looking cones that spew more snow.

I can to dig this out of the way before I can open the door to let the balloon out.

Calm before the storm

The sunset was very dramatic today. I was in the middle of making some cheese (paneer for Indian food night) and the sun sun started to look so magical out the window I had to go run to the other building and take my camera outside. I missed the first part, but I did get these two. 

 The forecast is up to 40 knot winds the rest of the week and it is surprisingly clear and calm at the moment, it's a little eerie.  

This was a sunset from a couple days ago, the sun has been gaining about 20 minutes a day now for just about a week. 

More Balloons!

We launched another plastic balloon! Here is the time lapse of the whole affair!
8k Plastic Balloon from Marissa Goerke on Vimeo.

The sun is out so the other tech broke out his picture taking kite again.

The tower is more visable now in the bright daylight. Very sad looking tower.

The drifting has gotten quite bad.

Cleaning towers! For science! That railing is there because that is actually the roof of the Greenhouse.

The bright spot just above the fuel tanks is Venus. The spot to the left of it is Mars. The really bright spot to the left of  that is the moon.

Moon? Balloon? Yes.

It was a very nice night!

The Sun is back!

The sun is back! And it was finally a beautiful day we actually got to see it!

 Along with the sun came a bunch of frost (this is unrelated to the sun completely, I think.)

 The polar bear has put on a nice fluffy winter coat.

It's nice to see things lit up by the sun again, the colors are so pretty!