The sweet ride back to NZ

When I left the Pole, people told me that I would most likely get a ride on an Airbus from McMurdo to Christchurch. At first I thought I did not hear right, since I could not believe that an Airbus would be able to land on the ice of the McMurdo runway. But the rumors got more frequent, and when I arrived in McMurdo and checked in my luggage again, the rumors turned into fact: We would ride on an Airbus. If that plane would make it to McMurdo weather wise...

A few hours later we learned that the flight was cancelled because of weather, and during the next two days these news were repeated several times a day. After about two days I actually did not believe that the Airbus really existed. But then we got a date and a time, and really, truly made our way to the airfield. We were just in time to see the Airbus arrive. What a show!

The flight back to NZ was one of the smoothest I had in a long time. We were 18 people on the plane that had at least room for 120. We had four crew members, and two pilots. And since we were only so few, we were allowed to go to the cockpit and take some pictures of the mountains of Victoria Land. Awesome! And the best part: the flight only took 4.5 hours!  :)

 

Sea ice and some clouds.

 

 Some peaks of Victoria Land.

 

 Victoria Land, and brilliant weather!

 

 Victoria Land.

Pressure ridges

Close to Scott Base, the New Zealand Antarctic station, there are pressure ridges. The occur because the ice floes collide with each other and with the shore there. Wikipedia says that "pressure ridges are made up of angular ice blocks of various sizes that pile up on the floes".

When I was getting a ride from the airfield to McMurdo the first time, I saw these interesting ice blocks and desperately wanted to go there to check them out. But on my way to the Pole there was no time. Later I also learned that it is not allowed to go to there all by yourself anyway. Firstly it is dangerous (it is sea ice after all and it sometimes is hard to tell if the ice is strong enough to support the weight of people), and secondly that area "belongs" to Scott Base and therefore everybody from McMurdo has to get permission to go there.

Since I was stuck in McMurdo for two days on the way back to NZ, I tried hard to somehow find a way to go to the pressure ridges during that time. Luckily, I found a recreational tour you could sign up for, and double luckily there was still space left on the tour. So me and one of my colleagues from the Pole decided to join the tour.

We walked in the pressure ridges for about two hours, and it was absolutely incredible. Especially since there were many Weddell seals around which we had to pass really close. That gave us ample opportunity to take close-up seal portraits...  :)

 

Lazy seal.

  

 One more lazy seal.

 "What the hell are you looking at?"

 

Discovery Hut

Got some of the information from Wikipedia again...
"Discovery Hut was built by Robert Falcon Scott during the Discovery Expedition of 1901–1904 in 1902 and is located at Hut Point on Ross Island by McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. The hut is located on Hut Point, about 300m away from McMurdo Base."

I learned that the hut was built by an Australian after a desert hut design: it keeps the cold in nicely.  :)
So when you go in, the temperature inside is very often lower than the temperature outside. You are only allowed inside the hut with a trained hut tour guide. I was lucky that a guy who came to McMurdo from the Pole with me is trained, and had some time to show me around. So it was only the two of us in the hut, and I could take all the time in the world to take pictures and hang out.

Inside the hut there is still furniture, supplies, clothes and things from the times of the Discovery Expedition, and expeditions of later years. Some of the cans still contain food (which you could probably still eat...).

 Discovery Hut from the outside. It is basically a building with a square floor plan. In the background (to the right) you can see the cross of Hut Point.

 

The inside of the Discovery Hut, the first room. You can see all kinds of supplies, and in the front to the right some dead seal. It's blubber was used to heat the stove.

The stove, fired with seal blubber. Used to cook and heat the hut.

Old boxes...

 Supplies.

McMurdo

Ok, I promised some more pictures of my last days in Antarctica. I thought I start with a nice overview over the station McMurdo. Compared to the Pole, McMurdo is HUGE. During the time I was there, there were about 900 people there (with roughly 25% of them being female). After being exposed to about 160 people at the Pole, the masses of people in McMurdo were almost overwhelming.

The whole "town" is way bigger than South Pole. Many different houses, a port, hiking trails, vehicles etc. It almost feels like a mining town rather than an Antarctic station. And somehow to me it felt almost like a let down. So different than the whole atmosphere at the Pole. Close by (just around the corner, basically) is the New Zealand station "Scott Base". So much smaller, and really pretty.

Since I got stuck there for about two days, I had some time to look around, and enjoy some of the entertainment possibilities. On the second day, I hiked up Observation Hill, that is located directly next to McMurdo. A nice hike up, but since I only had borrowed shoes (my own shoes were already checked-in and not accessible for me anymore), the hike down was really not pleasant. At least the view was great that day, as you can see on the pictures!

McMurdo station (or "town") as seen from top of Observation Hill. You can see that it is quite a lot bigger than South Pole station.

Top of Observation Hill. In the background you can see the Ross Ice Shelf (I think), with "White Island" on the left and "Black Island" on the right.

Scott Base, the New Zealand station. Just on the other side of Observation Hill. And really close to pressure ridges which you can see in the background.

Christmas and polar bears

Merry Christmas everyone!

I just had to post this picture before Christmas (although I should really, really finish some work right now...). But what would be the point of posting a Christmas tree AFTER Christmas?!

That is the Christmas tree outside the South Pole station. It is built from all kinds of different machine parts, steel thingies, safety bands, and other interesting things. And yes, there are POLAR BEARS in Antarctica!  :)

Merry Christmas!!

Back in NZ

I made it! All the way back to New Zealand!

With probably the last flight out of McMurdo before Christmas. You can only barely imagine how relieved I was when I was on the plane in McMurdo and we really, actually departed.

Don't get me wrong, staying in Antarctica in whichever place is awesome. And especially if you have good views around and things to do. The thing that drove me crazy was the constant uncertainty IF there would be a plane, and when it would leave. That information changed about five to six times a day, and every time I hoped it would be the last change. And was disappointed then. I could not even sleep in for very long since I had to check at about 5am if the flight was still on or not, and if the departure time changed.

But at least we had a really nice ride back home, when it finally showed up on Sunday early morning: we flew in an Airbus! That took only 4.5 hours to get back to New Zealand, and we were about 18 people on a plane with at least 120 seats. So LOTS of space! And the pilots were nice and let us come to the cockpit to see the incredible views of Victoria Land.

When I got off the plane in Christchurch and finally made it through customs, I was greeted by a good friend with whom I will travel here in NZ now for a while.

I will post some more pictures and stories from my last days in Antarctica around New Years (when I will be back in the reach of an Internet connection). Merry Christmas to everybody! Have a few wonderful days off!

Stuck in McMurdo

I arrived at McMurdo yesterday late afternoon, after getting the flight from the Pole around noontime. I had high hopes that everything would work as planned, me arriving in McMurdo, having some time to see the most important sights (Scott's Hut), and then me leaving today to get to Christchurch.

It was a good plan, and it looked like it would work out. I got a bed (in a dorm, but nobody else is there right now), got dinner, went to the souvenir shop, and then packed my luggage again to do the "bag drag". That means you carry ALL you luggage to a building where they weigh it and put your checked luggage on a palette for the flight you are supposed to leave with. Then you hop on the scale with all the ECW gear and your carry-on luggage, and they record your weight. To make sure that the plane has enough petrol to transport everybody and their luggage.

So after I got rid of most of my luggage again, I wanted to walk over to Scott's Hut to have a look around. I was supposed to be at the passenger pick up place at 3am to get the flight in the morning. However, I met one other Polie who is supposed to fly out to Christchurch on the same flight as me, and we decided to drink some wine instead (instead of me going to Scott's Hut). And while we were sitting in that coffee shop here in McMurdo, drinking our wine, congratulating ourselves that our travel plan would work so well, the barista in the coffee shop tells us that the Airbus we were supposed to leave with, had to turn around to Christchurch. Because of weather issues. Which meant that our flight to Christchurch got cancelled. We heard rumors that there will be a flight with an LC-130 instead, but not all the people from the Airbus flight would be able to get on it. And they would post more details at 11pm. So we waited around until 11pm, and found out then, that we were both NOT scheduled to depart with the LC-130. Which means we are stuck in McMurdo for at least one additional day. Bummer!

Well, that gave me the possibility to sleep in this morning, and walk around McMurdo to take some pictures. Most likely I will wander over to Scott Base (the NZ station close by) in the afternoon, and have a guided tour of nice pressure ridges in the evening. And if everything works out well, me and my colleague from the Pole will be on the Airbus flight tomorrow morning. Passenger pick-up will be 2am then...

The 30 meter tower

Beside the ARO building there is a 30 meter tower where several meteorological instruments are located, either 2 meter, 10 meter or 30 meter above ground.Yesterday afternoon I mentioned to one of my colleagues that I think you would have an excellent view from up there, and he agreed. And offered that I could go up there if I wanted to.

So this morning I did it. The weather was not suitable for Dobson measurements, so I had some time at my disposal. My colleague came with me, and we climbed up many, many narrow stairs with lots of space to look down and out at the side. All the way to the top. Being up there, totally exposed, was pretty scary at the beginning, and I was super careful when I took my camera out of my bag. Didn't want to drop it 30 meters down! But although the weather was not the best, the view from up there was just incredible. You can see the whole station setup, and that there is really, really nothing else around.

 So this is the view. You can see the station, the summer camp behind the station, all kinds of storage containers behind the station, and our foot path leading to ARO. If you look really closely you can see the Ceremonial Pole to the right of the station, and the Geographic Pole right in front of the silvery entrance building on the left side of the station. And of course you can see the halo around the sun. And that there is not much more than the station...

 Here is the proof that I actually did climb all the way up to the top of the tower. And that I did not just send my camera up with my colleague.

This is a close-up of the summer camp. The blue half-round structures are accommodation buildings for people who cannot be put in the main station because of limited space. They are called hypertats. Behind those you can see all kinds of wooden storage containers. And the big building in front (slightly to the right) is where the balloon filling facility is located.

Cosmologists

Last Sunday I went to hear the science talk of the week here at the South Pole. The talk was about the South Pole telescope (SPT), its history, and its scientific purpose. The speaker did a really good job explaining the theory of the Big Bang and how they try to find evidence about it in the microwave background radiation of space.

At the end of his talk, the speaker pointed out that the free SPT T-shirts will arrive in January (darn, I will miss out on that one!), and that there will be a Ladies Night at the telescopes (they have several here) this Friday. First it didn't bother me much that I will miss that event as well, however, later on Sunday evening I saw the announcement below pinned at the wall in the women's bathroom. After reading in detail what the Ladies Night would offer, I have to say,  that I was super amused by the announcement, and at the same time really disappointed that I will miss that! Come on, who can say that they slow danced with a cosmologist at the South Pole?!

Almost on the way back

Well, I just dropped off my bags at the bag drag station here at the Pole. I am scheduled to fly out tomorrow (to McMurdo, and then the day after to Christchurch). It is kind of sad to think that I will have to leave the Pole so soon already. Now, that I am finally adjusted to the altitude, and that I find my way around the station.

Work went well. We compared the two Dobsons and the data looks good. Unfortunately that means that there is no scientific reason for me to stay longer. And personal reasons do not really count here. I asked how big my chances are that I will actually make it off the continent before Christmas (because IF I will get stuck here in Antarctica, I would prefer to be stuck at the Pole, where I know people now, rather than McMurdo), and they told me that this time of the year the weather is normally stable enough that the planes can fly, and if there are no mechanical problems. So when I asked if it would be possible to stay at the Pole for Christmas, they told me that this would not be an option, unfortunately, since the station will be completely occupied. Unless, of course, I am stuck here because the planes can't fly...

So, most likely my time here in Antarctica will be over shortly. I really, really liked it here. Antarctica is a very special place and I am just very happy that I was allowed to come here. If everything works as planned, I will be in NZ shortly before Christmas, and will stay there for some vacation, summer feeling and long showers, until the mid of January.

My way to work

I have to walk about a quarter mile from the station where I sleep and eat (and hang out) to the ARO building where I work. I mentioned before that I basically directly walk past the Geographic Pole, but I thought it would be nice for you to see HOW close I actually walk by... :)

 

I stopped about quarter of the way out to ARO and turned around. You can see the South Pole station, and the path of packed snow where we walk on our way out to ARO.

 Turning 90 degrees to the right from the point I stopped, that's what I see. As I said, the Pole is really, really close to the path! 

Turning another 90 degrees and I can see the path leading to ARO (the blue building). In this picture you can also see the 30m tower where I will (hopefully) climb up tomorrow. 

Inside the station - part 2

Here are some more pictures from the inside of South Pole station.

 This is the Arts and Craft room. Where you can find everything you need to do craft works: sewing machines, knitting needles, paint, wood etc.

 The Greenhouse. People who overwinter grow fresh lettuce in here. During summertime it is way cheaper to fly the fresh vegetables and fruit in from McMurdo (ultimately of course from New Zealand), than growing something here. That's why it is kind of empty. The humidity in this room, however, was a treat! Still way higher than in the rest of the station. And they even have a couch in there...

The mail distribution center where I found my letter yesterday in the little shelf labelled with an "H". To the right you see the entrance of the station store. I think I have been in there every single evening...  :)

 The science lab. Most of the scientists sit here and work. Only sometimes they go out to their instruments and check on them. But, we people from ARO have our own little sience lab in the ARO building, so we DO actually go out every day. 

The entrance to the medical station...

 The hallway to go to the rooms in one of the station wings. There are two hallways per wing, and from each there are rooms located on the right and on the left. 

 My room. Photo taken from the door in direction to the bed.

 My room again. Photo taken from my bed in direction to the door. Note "Big Red", the puffy down jacket to the left, hanging there at my door. The little white stripe is my name tag...

Science at the South Pole

Ok, I have to admit that I got the following short pieces describing the different science project here at the South Pole from the South Pole intranet. They describe in short what experiments go on here, and they do a much better job than I could possibly do...

The area around the South Pole is divided in four main sectors for scientific reasons: the Quiet Sector, the Clean Air Sector, the Dark Sector and the Downwind Sector.

Quiet Sector: "Seismology (measurement of earthquakes anywhere on Earth) and radio detection experiments take place in the Quiet Sector, where radio emissions and vibrations created by people at the Pole are kept to a minimum. The Quiet Sector is grid-southeast of the station.
Because the Pole is at the spin axis of the Earth, it is uniquely situated to measure global seismography and long-period oscillations of the Earth. There are no earthquakes in the area and very few seismic monitoring sites anywhere in the Southern Hemisphere."

Clean Air Sector: "The Clean Air Sector is located grid-northeast of the station. The Atmospheric Research Observatory (ARO) is located within the Clean Air Sector and houses climate research and aeronomy projects. Because winds persistently blow toward the South Pole from this direction, the air has been virtually untouched by biota or pollution for thousands of miles - it is some of the cleanest air on Earth." - That's where I sit right now, and where I do the Dobson measurements every day.

That's the Clean Air Sector. I took the photo from the roof of ARO. You can see that there is absolutely nothing as far as you can see. The only people allowed in that sector are the people working at ARO. And then only if they have to take air samples.

Dark Sector: "The Dark Sector is grid-northwest of the station. This sector is maintained with minimal interference from extraneous sources of light and other electromagnetic radiation. Microwave, infrared, and high-energy neutrino telescopes are located within the Dark Sector, as are the Martin A. Pomerantz Observatory (MAPO), which serves as headquarters for many Dark Sector projects, and the Astronomical Submillimeter Telescope/Remote Observatory (AST/RO)."

These are the telescopes of the Dark Sector. The one to the right (with the silver antenna) has a diameter of about 10 meters.

Downwind Sector: The Downwind Sector is located grid-southwest of the stations. It provides an area for balloon launches, aircraft operations, and other “downwind” activities. That's where the runway for the planes is and where the planes arrive.

Hand washing

One of the things that surprised me most when I arrived here, was the constant reminder to wash or sanitize your hands. Starts in the galley, where you have hand sanitizer dispenser at the walls so that people can use some of it before they tough cutlery, plates or food. Then there is sanitizer in the computer room to use before you start using a computer there. One of the IT guys who connected my laptop to the internal South Pole station network, shook my hands when we got introduced, and then used hand sanitizer right away with the comment "no offense, but better be careful"...

And then there is of course the bathrooms where you have special soap, instructions on the wall on how to wash your hands properly (1. get water on your hands; 2. get soap on your hands; 3. rub your hands together to disperse soap on all possible hand surfaces - about 10 to 15 seconds; 4. rinse your hands well; 5. dry your hands well), and there is even a anti-bacterial hand lotion.

I started to wonder why the hand hygiene was so incredibly important. And I learned that in such a close community like here on station, germs spread fast, and if one person is sick, it is basically only a matter of time until the whole station is sick. And here on the altitude the station is on, it takes very long for the body to cope with sickness. Everything is just so incredibly exhausting.

So with the hand washing, people try to prevent germs to spread, and therefore keep people in working order. As I mentioned before, the South Pole is not really a holiday destination. People are here to work, and keep things running. So half of the station population being sick would not go so well with this approach...

Inside the station

I walked around the station yesterday morning so that I could take some pictures that I could post here. So that you get a feeling for how the inside of the station looks like. Not that I had to walk much... After all, the station is relatively small. ;)

So let's start with the galley (see above). That was Sunday morning before the crowed showed up for brunch. To the right would be the counter where you get food. The three monitors on the ceiling show in a loop all the important information of current day, like how many flights are planned to come in, if they are delayed, what the weather is like, the recreational things going on, the current water and fuel consumption etc.

That is one of the hallways (1st floor), connection the different wings of the station.

The laundry room. Each person is allowed to wash one washing machine load per week. Again, water and waste water restrictions. There is only cold washing available, and if you want to wash different colored things (like light and dark) you are supposed to team up with somebody so that you use on average only one load per person.

The library. Also known as the quiet reading room. Lots and lots of books, and nice chairs and couches to sit on.

 The gym. It is actually big enough to hold a full sized basketball court. But people do not only play basketball there. This is the place for most of the sports activities (soccer, basketball, badminton, Kung Fu, volleyball), and the recreational activities like salsa or swing dancing.

Mail

There is a small post office here at the South Pole. It is a US branch, which means that all mail that is sent has to have only the continental US postage. 32ct for a postcard. Isn't that incredible? You fly way further than New Zealand (which would require international postage), but nevertheless you only pay the US postage price for letters, postcards and parcels.

It is even possible to order stuff on the internet and get it shipped here to the South Pole. A lot of the long-term people here actually do that. You realize after you arrived that you forgot an additional warm sweater, you just order it online and about two to three weeks later (depending on the flights going from Christchurch to McMurdo, and from McMurdo to the South Pole), the ordered sweater arrives. Amazing...

Of course, during winter time when there are no planes flying into Antarctica, the mail for the people in McMurdo and South Pole will pile up in Christchurch until spring and the planes are flying again.

The reason I bring the mail service up right now is that I actually got mail! Here at the South Pole. I did not expect something, after all, I am here at the Pole only for about two weeks, but one of my colleagues told me today that he saw a little parcel in the mailbox for me. So I checked it out when I went back to the station for lunch, and sure enough, there it was. A little parcel from Boulder. Sent by Santa (aka as Linda and Mariah). That really made my day! Linda and Mariah, you are the best!!

Old pole markers

Yesterday at dinner I sat next to the smith who will overwinter this year. He made the pole marker that is

No words needed

South Pole weather and climate

I thought it might be interesting for you to know a little bit more about the weather and climate here. The official South Pole station guide says: “The average annual temperature at the South Pole is -49.5°C (-57.1°F), with a record low temperature of -82.8° C (-117.0°F) in June 1982 and a record high of -12.3°C (+9.9°F) in December 2011. The extremely dry environment limits annual snowfall. However, a relatively constant wind speed of 5-15 knots accounts for the snow drifting common to inland Antarctic stations. The surrounding terrain is virtually flat, except for shallow waves of sastrugi (small snowdrifts).”

We had unusual warm temperatures here at the Pole since a few weeks. The temperatures are around -25°C (roughly -14°F) which is warm enough that I really don’t want to put on my heavy down jacket. I have several layers on when I go outside, long johns, my wind-fly pants, two pairs of socks, a long-sleeved shirt, a fleece, the light red jacket, a hat, my ski goggles, a face mask or a tube scarf, a pair of glove liners (so that I can take the thick gloves off and take pictures with my camera without freezing my fingers off), and a thick pair of gloves. Lately I had either the jacket open, the scarf off or even the gloves off, because it was so warm. Not that I am complaining! At least I don’t freeze then.  :)

The annual precipitation is about 10 inches here (and that value even is a combination of drifted snow and ice and precipitation), which is really not very much. Most of it does not even fall as snow, but as tiny ice crystals. Sometimes, if the temperature drops, you can see ice crystals grow directly on the snow surface, without even falling from the sky. The humidity is not really high here either (roughly 60% on average – which is not much given the fact that it is relatively cold here), which results then in a super, super dry air inside the station, where temperatures are clearly higher and therefore the air would be able to hold more moisture. It can be as low as 1%, and normally does not go above the single digits, which pulls all your curls out of your hair, dry clothes on the line in minutes, and makes your nose bleed after a few days of living here. Even worse than Boulder!

I took some pictures of snow (and the sastrugi mentioned earlier) because, honestly, there is not really much else in the area around the station you could take a picture of… The snow drifts have sometimes cool shapes, and you can clearly see the preferred wind direction. And even tiny ice crystals on the snow surface are visible. I should probably mention that the snow here is so dry, that there is no possibility at all to have a snowball fight, or even of building a snowman. And if you walk through snow beside the most traveled paths, it sounds like you are walking through Styrofoam. Very crunchy and crisp.

House mousing

When I heard the term “house mousing” for the first time, I immediately thought that that meant trying to catch mice in the buildings to keep them off food and other things. But then I realized that here at the Pole, there is no other life form present than humans and bacteria. Where would the mice come from? And where would they live? And they could by far not grow enough fur to survive here…

I then figured out that the term “house mousing” actually refers to community janitorial duties. I found a sticker at the inside of my room door that says that the person living in that particular room is responsible to clean the bathrooms of this wing and this level on Fridays. Every day somebody else living in our wing has that duty, and every day not just one person, but several are assigned.

So today was my bathroom cleaning duty day. I had, of course, never done that before. Well, I have cleaned bathrooms before, but not here on station. And unfortunately I was the only woman assigned for the house mousing duty today, so the whole women’s bathroom was my playing field. Luckily there were cleaning instructions posted on the bathroom wall, with what to do and what cleaning supply to use. Nevertheless, it was kind of tricky to figure out which one of the three spray bottles contained “Clean green”, which one “Windex”, and which one “Bleach”.

Well, I managed, and at least I had a clean shower stall for my after-erging shower then…

A Friday night at the South Pole

It is Friday night here, and you probably wonder what is going on at the South Pole on a Friday night. Well, not much, really. People here work 6 days a week (Monday to Saturday), and have Sunday off. Since it is extremely expensive to have people here at the South Pole (feeding them, housing them, keeping them safe…), everybody who comes here works basically as much as possible. South Pole is definitely not a holiday destination to hang out and relax. Since I will be here only two weeks, I might even work the whole week, just to make sure that I get everything done before I have to leave again. Extending a stay at the Pole is super difficult, since space is limited. The room I am currently living in, is probably already assigned to somebody who will fly in on the plane I am supposed to leave on. So getting things done in time is crucial.

My Friday night was a bit more entertaining than my last nights. I decided that I am officially over the altitude sickness, and that I had enough time to acclimatize. So I went from work to do my “house mousing” chores (more on that later), and then decided to try out the erg in the gym. I only rowed a recreational 4k, since I didn’t want to overdo it right away, but it felt really good to exercise, even though I got out of breath relatively quickly. Effects of the altitude (not so much of my overall fitness level – at least that’s what I am telling myself…). The exercise done, I went to go shopping in the station shop (where I have been every night since Monday – well, what can I say?! I just love shopping…), then had a really refreshing two minute shower, and headed to the dining hall (also known as “galley”) to find steak and mash potatoes on the menu for dinner. The steak was really well cooked, so that was just a nice reward for erging earlier. And since I didn’t have much else to do, I joined a friend in the library where we sat and did some knitting and crocheting. That was my Friday night at the Pole.  :)

Balloon launch

You might think by now, reading through the previous blog entries, that I am here at the South Pole on holiday. You couldn't be farther from the truth! I am actually working here.

To prove that, I thought I post some pictures of the ozonesonde balloon launch we did yesterday. Well, I did not really do much, lend a hand here or there, since Kelli and Ross are perfectly capable of doing a launch by themselves, but I took lots of pictures.  :)
I have just analysed the ozonesonde time series from South Pole last year. And it was just fantastic to be here and experience one of those launches myself. You get a totally different appreciation of long-term measurements that way!

This one shows Kelli handling the gas for the balloon filling.

Here Kelli puts the parachute underneath the balloon. That parachute will slow down the descent of the ozonesonde, after it reached its maximum altitude and the balloon bursts.

This is the balloon filling facility from the outside.

And here is Ross, releasing the whole package, balloon, parachute, and ozonesonde coupled with a radio sonde, into the air.

The air is so clear here that we could see the balloon in the air without help of binoculars at least up to 25 kilometer. That was incredible!