This week at Mawson
26 November 2010 – All on one page
New faces and gear; monitoring Adelie colonies; people around station and volleyball season.
19 November 2010 – All on one page
Preparing a smooth runway, trip to Auster, counting Adelies on Bechervaise, and retrieving a tide gauge.
12 November 2010
The skies are now filled with snow petrels and skuas for the first time since they departed the area at the end of last summer.
12 November 2010
5 November 2010
The race that stops a nation, also stopped the station in more than the usual way. This year, Melbourne Cup came to Antarctica, albeit briefly, as we Mawsonians appeared as part of an interview with Channel 7 on the day. Under the glare of several kilowatts of bright lighting, duk chatted with Bruce McAvaney about the activities for the day while the rest of us milled (and trotted) in the background.
5 November 2010
29 October 2010
The weather at Mawson this week has been as perfect as one could hope for, and so we’ve had field parties out most of the week. Annette, Doc Jim and Geoff got the ball rolling with a trip to Mt Hordern, south of the David Range. One of the highest peaks in the area, Hordern is a reasonably lengthy climb over loose rock before a more technical section at the top. The trio spent the night at Fang hut before tackling the climb the next morning, and returned to station with glowing reports of the trip.
29 October 2010
20 October 2010
Seals are popping out in profusion along the shorelines as we eagerly await the arrival of more cute pups to attract our attention and steal our hearts. Doc Jim and Annette reported an abundance of them closer to Auster, where the chicks have endured the winter and formed their creches in the iceberg amphitheatre that will be home to them for a couple more months yet.
20 October 2010
15 October 2010
This week, the second trip to Ledingham’s Depot was completed. The first trip left to perform the penguin census at nearby Fold Island, while this trip was to perform hut maintenance and replace the aging fuel drums at the site. Conditions for this trip were outstanding; four days of as close to perfect weather as one could hope for at this time of year firmed up the track and ensured a relatively easy going trip.
15 October 2010
8 October 2010
Fold team 1 (Mick, Annette, Ian, Geoff, Doc-Jim & Dan) regaled Fold team 2 (Pete, Maria, Scott, Rob & Ewan) with tall tales some true of their legendary trip (reported last week) somehow failing to frighten them off an attempt of their own. Therefore much of the week was spent preparing equipment and exchanging information and advice on what to, and more importantly what not to do. Training video sequences and practical advice from Ian of how to extract bogged vehicles were very educational.
8 October 2010
1 October 2010
In This Week at Mawson, we have a look at the epic field trip recently completed by a dedicated group of volunteers to survey by photograph the Fold Island emperor penguin colony.
1 October 2010
24 September 2010
Expeditioners travelled to Bechervaise Island to have a look at some malfunctioning penguin monitoring equipment. Following some straight forward troubleshooting instructions, the guys think they found the problem, but discovered the difficulties of low temperature soldering. Soon the island will be teeming with Adelie penguins as their breeding season draws ever closer.
24 September 2010
