Images of

ANTARCTICA

First Light

Photos © 2002 Seth White

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August 20, 2003: the first direct sun for McMurdoland in about 4 months. Technically, the sun first rose above the horizon on August 19. But the weather that day was pretty bad, and nothing was visible. In fact, I didn't even get up to Arrival Heights that day. The first flight of Winfly was scheduled for the 20th, but the storm had left the runway covered in drifts. So there was a 1-day delay while the crews cleared the strip and I spent a good part of the day at Arrival Heights. Although you couldn't see it from McMurdo, direct sunlight shone on Arrival Heights. I had several hours of work to do at the hut on the 20th, so I invited a few people to come up if they could manage it. Some people from the BFC (Berg Field Center) came up for a bit, and then Joe and Grant stopped by a little later. Joe and Grant are the winter fire technicians, who maintain the fire alarm systems for all buildings on station. So we sat around, drank coffee, and gawked at the sun. I asked Joe to take a picture of me with real, honest-to-god sunlight on my face. Here's that pic.

And here's the same shot of Joe. It was the first winter for both Joe and I, so we were pretty jubilant at being able to see the sun. Grant had been here two winters before, so he wasn't as giddy. But first light is still a real occasion, no matter how long you've been here!
Here's Grant and Joe hanging out in the hut.
Around this time, my camera had started to malfunction pretty severely. My pictures had started getting grainier, and the colors weren't quite right. Then, it began spazzing out whenever I tried to take outdoor pictures (even if the camera was warm). The images were horrible...but it would still take movies alright. I have no idea what was wrong with it. But anyway, the rest of the files on this page are .avi files from the day of first sunlight. This one is a view looking north to west from the window of the hut as the sun was coming into view beneath the layer of low-lying clouds that covered the area.
The sun is getting closer here. With the clouds in the air, there was a wide spectrum of very intense colors.
And finally it arrived....THE SUN!!! Shining directly on my face. Ahhhh. So here's a little clip of the grand event, with some commentary from myself and Joe.
This is my little piece of semi-humorous cinema. Whoa? What's that yellow blob out there on the horizon?
More commentary from yours truly, staring at the sun. It sounds stupid, but Joe and I just stood there chatting and staring at the sun, like we'd never seen it before. There had been a good deal of light for many days now, but seeing the sun itself was sort of final. The winter was now officially over. Yep. The next ~7 weeks are just going to fly by for me.
This is another one of the sun, as it was just starting to set. It wasn't just seeing the sun that was special about this day - the colors were particularly spectacular.
This is the view out over the Ross Sea after the sun had just gone down. It was a weird energy that I felt this day - mostly good, but somewhat melancholy too. The winter was now history, and the Winfly people would be arriving tomorrow.