Solar Powered Icecore Drill

These are the ice core drillers from a science group that came through last flight period. They brought a new kind of drill down to test out. It's a solar powered drill set up that weighs 200 lbs in total.

Here is the bore hole which the wire is lowered down. The wire is connected to a winch to lift the core out and is also the electrical connection to the motor in the drill itself.

This is what the drill head looks like.

Here are some cores from about 80 meters down. This ice fell as snow in the late 1700's.

These cores are just for testing the new drill so they won't be used for science. (They will be used for chilling drinks).

These are the real cores drilled by a more heavy duty drill and have been sent back to the USA for study. 

Snow Melter

Water for the camp comes from melting snow. Snow is mined from a clean pit with a loader and bucketed into this "hopper" which has seed water in it to melt the snow. 

 Water is them pumped from the hopper through several filters and then into a tank for station use.

Here is the tank and the pump that sets the main water pressure. We use about 600 gallons a day with ~30 people on station.

Carrot Harvest

Last November I planted carrots, they struggled through the winter and finally with the return of the sun they were able to grow to a respectable size!