Images of

ANTARCTICA

The New Station

Photos © 2004 Seth White

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The new station...not quite in all its glory, but getting there. It's supposed to be finished by 2007. Normally, a structure this size wouldn't take as many years to build, but with the ~4 month summer working season, it's slow going. People will be working inside the station over the winter, but the major structural assembly can only really be done when it's 'reasonable' to work outside. The average yearly temperature at Pole is -55 F, so the realistic window for all-day outdoor work is pretty small. But the overall shape and size is pretty much what you see here. This is a view of the dome and new station from ARO.

An interesting design challenge for this building is the fact that every part of it must be small enough to fit inside an LC-130 Hercules...which is the only way stuff can get here.

This is the other side of the building - the windward side. Drifting is a major problem here, and the new station is designed to remain elevated as the snow level gradually builds underneath. The idea is to jack the entire thing up every few years, adding extra lengths of support beams. This is the biggest reason that the dome is doomed - it would eventually get covered in snow like the old pole station and be crushed (the dome is really designed to support its own weight, not that of tons of snow on top). The new station is actually supposed to be modular, in that each of the pods can be jacked up separately. This means that all piping, wiring, etc. must be flexible at the joints to allow for the relative movement. To my eye, however, it seems like there will be problems when the time comes to do this job, since the conduits don't appear to have enough freedom of movement to allow this. The station is moving along pretty well, but there have been some significant issues with the construction. In particular, the drawings showing how major sections of the building should be integrated together were lacking. But I believe most of these problems have been ironed out. Another aspect of this building is the windward side. Last winter, a huge drift formed on the windward side and had to be bulldozed out. In fact, I had noticed a large berm of snow outside of the Jamesway hut area where I'm staying. I learned that this was actually the remnants of the drift, which had been pushed out of the way and downwind of the station. Bulldozers are still pushing this snow around as I sit here typing. To combat this, the station is going to be fitted with an airfoil on this side, with the idea of accelerating the winds under the station which will prevent them from depositing the snow in drifts on this side. You can see how this side of the building is designed, with a little chamfer on the bottom and a notch between the first and second floors. This is where the airfoil will be placed. I think the airfoil design is still being finalized...and I'm pretty curious to see how well it works.

The obligatory picture, with the ceremonial pole in the foreground.

This is the beer can. Inside are a stairway, elevator, and loads of piping and conduits. It's much better looking from the outside than from the inside. The completed station will have a metal siding similar to this.

Another one of the beer can. There are 92 stairs from bottom to top in this thing, and it was several days after I got here before I could walk up them all without stopping. And until this week, there was no door to the ground level from the beer can - just a door-sized cutout in the siding. And the area to the left of the beer can, between it and the dome, was fenced off so you couldn't get around the building and go up the main stairs on the front side. So you had to go down into the dome, through the corridor, and up all 92 stairs. Wanna hear me whine some more? IT'S DAMN COLD HERE! It's January 27, and it's been about -20 F (-40 F with wind) since I got here. This isn't too bad actually, and certainly is no worse than McMurdo in winter...and a heck of a lot less windy. But it's not even close to winter here, in fact it's only a month after the summer solstice. And what's more, I hear it's unseasonably warm right now...it's supposed to be colder than this in January at Pole!

Not much to see inside the beer can...witness this fantastic shot.

At the bottom of the beer can is a corridor leading to various arches and to the dome. Here's an exciting picture of this corridor.

Some parts of the new station are operational - some berthing areas, the galley, mechanical systems, etc. This is what the galley looks like. It's pretty nice, and considering the size of the old galley space under the dome, there is a LOT more room here. Food ain't bad either.

My buddy Joe is working here for the summer on the fire alarm and network systems, and one day he gave me a tour of the construction areas. We're getting off the ice about the same time, and are going pedaling in NZ after the season.

This area will be the comms room, and it has a nice view of the airfield...for obvious reasons.

This will be the science area, and will house numerous instruments and computing facilities. I would imagine a lot of the stuff from Skylab will go in here.

Another construction picture. I'm sure that to the trained eye there are a lot of unique things to be seen in the guts of this building as it's being finished. But for myself, not having much experience with such things, it looks like any generic construction area. In fact, I don't even remember what this area is supposed to be when it's done.

More of the building guts - the mechanical room.

Here's Joe again, with a 7000 gallon water tank for fire suppression.

To top this page off, here is a picture of the big game trophy hanging above the newly-completed ground level entrance to the beer can. Some sick bastards put a rotten-looking dried out pig's head on a piece of wood and stuck it here. This is really gory, so get ready....