An emergency response drill at Davis station means some colourful action plus tons of great pics including baby seals!

Famous Antarctic quotes

“How can you expect a man who’s warm to understand one who’s cold?” —Alexander Solzhenitsyn

“However poetic your soul, to whatever layers of the atmosphere your feelings soar, if you have no technical education and no real understanding of technology the only thing you are good for in Antarctica is to pull sledges.” —Juhan Smuul, Estonian writer

Emergency response exercise

Last Friday the team engaged in an emergency response exercise involving a vehicle on the sea ice, four slightly injured personnel (three were mannequins and the other was a good actor), and a ‘fuel spill’ (green food dye mixed with water).

The exercise was designed to challenge the emergency response team leader and support crew with a scenario involving multiply safety considerations. Led by Stu, the team included Craig, Corey, Judy, Fire Chief Adam and crew made excellent choices — they removed all the risks before approaching the vehicle, retrieved the passengers, cared for the injured then cleaned up the food dye.

In the field

With the weather warming up, daylight hours increasing and the Aurora Australis closing in on Davis everyone is keen to make the most of what time they have left on station. Eleven ‘over winter’ expeditioners will be returning home once the ship completes resupply operations. They, and those staying on for summer, are making the most of any spare time they have to do a little wildlife spotting.

The Adélie penguins have commenced building nests of pebbles, the Weddell seals have started to pup and we still have the friendly emperor penguins observing us from the sea ice as we go about our daily work duties.

Sights and sounds of Davis station

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