Hello from McMurdo Base, Antarctica!

We are presently at 77° 50.730 South latitude, the farthest south anyone can travel in the worldby ship. We arrived here yesterday after breaking ice through the channel leading to McMurdo. Thechannel is a narrow stretch of open water and was created by an icebreaker that previously cut through the thick fast ice here for access to the station. McMurdo is home to the United States Antarctic program and currently houses 1100 people during the summer. It is also an active military base. The base is situated next to a historic hut inhabited by Scott and his men in the early 1900’s during an expedition here. The New Zealand (Kiwi) base is also nearby. McMurdo is a strange place for sure. The buildings are built to withstand the strong winds and winter storms and so are not specifically pleasing to the eye. There are many amenities of home here – a store, hospital, dining services, bars, fire department, and even bowling! There are several dorms and laboratories and offices. There is also a post office. Most of the people currently down here spend on average 3-4 weeks here during the Antarctic summer, but a few over-winter, or continue south for the South Pole station (brrrr!).

The whole trip into McMurdo was very exciting for me. One of the mates from the bridge called my stateroom at 6AM to let me know that we were entering the channel. The channel is notoriously occupied by killer whales, or orcas, which feed on the fish, seals and penguins which are plentiful in the open water created by the ice breakers. Almost immediately upon entering the channel, we saw blows from the orcas. Soon, the orcas were everywhere. The channel can be quite narrow and it was easy to get a good look at these beautiful creatures. The orcas typically maintain family units known as pods and indeed I saw males (with their larger dorsal fins), females, juveniles and even a baby! As the orcas drew near, Adelie penguins could be seen fleeing the water en masse from these dangerous predators. Weddell seals could also be seen on the fast ice. As we watched one group of orcas, we were surprised by a large minke whale, which surfaced from under the ice alongside our boat!It was incredible.

As we drew closer toward McMurdo, our ship spent some time breaking through the ice and re-establishing the channel. Orcas could still be spotted swimming through the large chunks of ice and spy-hopping (poking their heads out of the water) to look for the next available breathing hole in the ice. What a wonderful experience.



Once we got to McMurdo, we headed out to the store to stock up on souvenirs and chocolate! Then I had a chance to head over to the science building to look for my friends who I met on my last cruise in the Pacific and who are here now studying pteropods at McMurdo. It was great to see them again, and even cooler to have friends here at the bottom of the world. We exchanged crew and picked up a new scientific party for the second leg of the cruise, which will began soon as we make our way from the dock.

It’s a nice stopping point, as the cruise is half-way through, and we now have half our experiments under our belts. This is certainly a trip that I will not soon forget.