This next series of photos are of Scotts hut here at McMurdo. this was brougth here from Australia and re assembled. It was last used in 1910 or 1912

Inside the hut

scenes from inside the hut

Hard to imagine that sixtten men lived in this space for months

The heavy equipment operators and the maintainence dept built an underwater viewing room. Its placed in a hole in the ice about 80 to 100 feet off shore. there is a warming house and a tube sticking out of the ice

You decend down a 8 or 10 foot tube placed in the ice

after decending the tube you sit in a small room with four windows under the sea ice

this is plate ice which is the fresh water that freezes letches out of the colder salt water

small fish in the water

This is thc Crary science lab building. This is the main research and technonogy center in antartica. The research covers everythiing from weather ,water ,animals,geology, volcanos,Ice etc.etc.etc. Ibelieve there are over 100 different research projects going on this summer and all are co-ordinater through and supprted by the staff of this building. We got to tour the facilities and see some interesting exhibits.

These are antartic cod. they spend their whole life under 70 feet of sea ice. Coming to the surface seems to be an exciting novelty to them

The touch tank is filled with beautiful and unusual creatures

This is a type of snail like animal that' shell felt like partially hardened playdough

Creatures in the touch tank that live on the sea floor under the sea ice

There was a huge Holloween party in the gym on saturday night.

This is one of the diningroom attendants. They are invaluable to the operation of the food service department. Do all the cleaning,dishes,line attending, dining room cleanup and on and on. Agreat bunch of hard wordking young people. He's dressed as Ob hill the 800foot mound of volcanic debris just on the edge of town. Fantastic costume

I went as Skua Man. Skuas are the scavaging seagull type birds that are beginning to show up. It is also the name given to the recycling center here on base. People leave stuff they dont want to take home. Other people skua in for their own use. I skua'd my whole costume and the day after holloween I took it all back to skkua for someone else to use

It was a great party!

I got to go out on the ice with the two divers on staff Rob Robbins and Steve Rupp. Their combined expierence diving in Antartic waters under the ice is over 35 years.

They had a small heated house on the ice over a hole drilled through about 10 feet of ice

Prep your gear, sit by the hole and....

Drop into the hole. They were down in 28 degree water for about 20 minutes. They checked gear, took some video and collected sea urchins from the sea floor for the sceince lab touch tanks.

Dick's address!

Richard A Koontz - NANA
McMurdo Station
PSC 469 Box 700
APO, AP96599

I will try and post more photos soon. I'm closing with a photo of me and Mt. Erebus the southern most active volcano in the world. Taken Sept 24 at 7 pm Love to all and happy October.

Nacreous clouds. These clouds form about 20 to 30 kilometersin the sky only in exteremely cold areas. The coloration is caused by the chemicals in the ice crystals difussing the light from the setting sun.

Antartica- Cold, White, and Endless.....

Building 155 the heart of the community, my dorm is here along with 20% of all the people here. Also the kitchen and dining room, the store, computer center. craft room,barbershop,housingoffice, atm machine.etc...

Mcmurdo base from Ob hill

The view south from 1/2 way up Ob hill. Looking southwest, the Ross Ice Shelf with Antartica in the background

Ob Hill just on the east edge of McMurdo base

Out looking at the stars in late August. Temp was about -15 but no wind and very beautiful

the view out the lounge window across the hall from my room

Hi everyone, I'm going to post a number of pictures each with an explanation. Hope you enjoy them, I'll sign off at the last posting

Hello everyone, Sorry I havent posted anything for three weeks but not much to tell. The weather here has been cold, no warmer than -8 and often windy and snowy. We have had wind chills as low as -55 below. The bright spot is the sun . Daylight now measures almost 10 hrs a day, and growing at the rate of 20 to 30 minutes a day. Soon with warmer weather and light I hope to begin giving you a better sense of what this place is really like. The facilities are very nice, comfortable beds, t.v. and refrigerator in every room, very good food and fun and interesting people. The vast majority of the people working down here have been coming to work in this place for years. 7, 9, 12 years is not uncommon.Truly a hardy lot but they all seem to love it. For me its going to be 1 season and out. Thank you all for your e-mails, wonderful to here from everyone. Love for now.

I left Seattle on Sunday Aug 8th and flew to Denver for three days of orientation and training. On Wednesday approximately 80 of us flew to L.A. and then took a 13 hour overnight flight to New Zealand. We changed planes and then flew to Christchurch where the Unites States Antarctica program is headquartered. We spent three days in Christchurch and on Monday Aug 16 we boarded a C-17 for a 5hour flight to Antarctica . We landed in total darkness at 6 in the evening. Currently we are experiencing about 5 to 6 hours of twilight with a actual sunrise taking place within the next week Daylight will increase to 12 hours by late September and24 hours by late October.
The weather here is cold and windy , 15 to 35 below zero and an average wind of 8 to 15 mph. However the extreme weather gear we have been issued is very toasty and I have ventured out for 20 to 30 minutes on three occasions. I'll post more photos and another bit of info next week Love to all.
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The journey to Antarctica
I traveled to Denver on Aug 8th and spent three days there going through orientation and safety training. The evening of Aug 11th approximately 80 of us flew to Los Angeles and at midnight boarded a plane for a 13 hour flight to New Zealand. We landed in Auckland and changed planes and arrived in Christchurch at 2 pm in the afternoon of Friday the 13th. We lost the 12th when we crossed the International date line. My first time in the Southern hemisphere. The sun traverses the northern sky making everything just a little skewed.
We spent two full days and two half days in Christchurch leaving for Antarctica on Monday the 16th in the early afternoon. WE flew on a C-17 and landed on the Ross ice shelf in the dark at just after 6pm. The temperature was about -30. Everything is snow covered and the wind blows almost constantly at about 10 to 15 mph. Everywhere it is either snow or volcanic rock. No plants, no animals yet, no trees, nothing. However it is beautiful and fascinating.
The kitchen is state of the art. Large great equipment and seems to be a terrific staff.Looking forward to a great season.
Will write again in a week or so. Photos follow.