Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 12/01/2010 - 10:14
Forums
IceCube: In-ice Antarctic Telescope 2010

Ms Shirey,

I hope you are having fun at the South Pole!

I was wondering about the following:

  1. How long did it take to travel from the US to the South POle?

  2. How low do temperatures reach at the base camp?

  3. What has been the best part of your trip so far?

Thanks,

K. Clark Blue & Gray Staff

Sat, 12/04/2010 - 10:49

Katey Shirey

1. How long did it take to travel from the US to the South Pole?It took me four days to get all the way to the South Pole. The first 28 hours of travel was just to get to Christchurch, New Zealand. The next day I tried on and checked out all of my Extreme Cold Weather gear (ECWs). The third day I flew to McMurdo station on the edge of Antarctica's Ross Ice Shelf. Then the fourth day I flew to the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Research Station.
2. How low do temperatures reach at the base camp?
There's no base camp here because everything is flat. We're on a flat glacier here at the South Pole. We're at 9,300 feet of elevation which is almost all ice. The land underneath is at sea level, and there's about 50 m of water between the land and ice.
At the south pole in the winter (which is 6 months from now) the temperature is pretty steady around −58 °C (−72 °F). This is because the sun never comes up. The record low is -82.8° C (-117.0° F) in June 1982. Right now the temperature is -34.9 °C -30.8 °F and pretty constant too. It'll rise through January reaching a pretty steady −25.9 °C (−15 °F). The record high at the South Pole is -13.6° C (+7.5° F) in December 1978.
3. What has been the best part of your trip so far?
There have been lots of best parts of my trip! I like seeing the Physics come alive in IceCube. I like experiencing the cold and being here at the South Pole. I've really liked meeting the various people here and becoming part of the Pole community. It's been an amazing trip.