As I sit here on a windy blizz day typing this station update, gazing out the double-glazed windows in the Red Shed, it is indeed a time for this electrician to reflect on what has been a summer to remember.
So, I hear you ask, what exactly have the seven Electricians of the 77th ANARE (or the ‘777’) at Casey been up to over the season?
Well, the thing with a good team of electricians is if you don’t notice what we are up to, it means we are doing it well. We don’t build walls like the chippies or pump large volumes of water like the plumbers. Our hard work is not always tangible but it is integral to keeping the station running. And any wonder the place has been running so smoothly – there is a collective 150 years of trade experience among the seven of us sparkies this season!
So, let me elaborate a little more on this team of unsung heroes and our selfless endeavours.
Often, the sparkies are the ones awake at 4 am making their way down to the powerhouse to get the generators back up and running after a blackout – all while the rest of the station were fast asleep in their warm and cosy beds.
We were the team keeping the fridges and freezers cold (I know, can you believe that is actually an issue here in Antarctica?), the shower water warm and the motorised disco balls spinning when it was time for a dance party aka a ‘Rave Cave’ in the Green Store.
Yes, Casey, you’re welcome.
(Almost) all jokes aside however, there has been a lot of hard work and energy invested in the season (pardon the pun), both in terms of maintenance and project work.
The annual shutdown and planned maintenance of the main powerhouse went off without a hitch, along with repairs and upgrades to heat trace on our site service pipelines. There was installation of power, fire detection, some finetuning of the glorious waste water treatment plant, repairs to kitchen equipment and washing machines and plenty of support for aviation, science and resupply of the station. You name it, the sparkies did it, and they did it well.
In between all of this hard work we also managed to fit in trips out to a number of the off-station recreation huts, plenty of skiing the loop in the backyard, riding mountain bikes, dance parties, formal dinners hosted and Friday afternoon BBQs at the workshop. But best of all, in my opinion were all the small but memorable moments here in the Red Shed with more laughs shared than I can poke a stick at. Not that we have any sticks to poke with, because of course, there are no trees in Antarctica.
It really is hard to believe that it’s only been a few short months since we all met and became a team of seven, a team that now feels more like a family.
We’ve already begun to say goodbye to the first of the ‘summerers’ and in a few days' time the last of the summer team will board the final flight back to Australia. Then the torch will well and truly be handed over to the winter team to carry on through the darker (and colder) months.
Never mind the summer of ’69, this was the summer of 77th ANARE, a summer consisting of what may well be the best group of humans the AAD has seen.
Cheers to all the 77th ANARE for a summer to remember.
Holly – Queen of Hertz (aka Cargo Mumma)
Summer: Graham the Electrical Wizard (aka Porridge Pops), Clemo or Lord Clemingon (aka the Orator) & Myself.
Winter: Alex *Quandt* (The guy with the gift of the gab), Andy ‘the boy from Cloncurry’ (aka Beach Daddy), DJ Dylan, Steve the Ralphinator (King of the rowing machine).
