Apprent-ICE Blog #16

Since we're living in such a remote location, far away from emergency services and medical staff, a lot of time and effort goes into training for incidents, search and rescue, and medical emergencies.

On Saturday, five Scott base members, myself included, ventured over the hill to McMurdo to play ‘victims’ in a Mass Casualty Incident, a training exercise for the U.S medical response team. We took a bed in the hospital and were all made up to look like a bloody mess with fake cuts and bruises from head to toe, and very realistic acting like we were seriously injured. They then paged the unsuspecting response team, who assessed our conditions, took bloods, and x-rays, but apparently my injuries were untreatable and I died….. fortunately I was feeling better in the evening and attended one of McMurdo's famous dress up parties, this week's theme was tight, bright and sparkly, a great time was had by all!

During the week most of base got out and about to try and see if there are any auroras in the sky. The good thing is that it doesn’t have to be late to be able to see them. I spotted my first aurora after work last Wednesday. I have spotted a few faint auroras this week giving me time to perfect the picture taking process, I've attached a couple of the clearer ones! 

Our HFC project team is flying through the work with the last of the work for down stairs almost complete to hand over to the painters and Gib stoppers when they arrive in a couple weeks.

Today we experienced our first condition one weather storm, with high winds and blowing snow causing visibility less than 30m -  making any outdoor activity too dangerous to continue. It was very exciting to feel the buildings rock and the windows blanketed in snow.

Not long to go now before we pack up and leave this joint. Our flight home is scheduled for the 3rd of June (weather dependent of course). Both of us are looking forward to seeing friends and family after almost five months away!