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| On Dec. 7, Cornell senior J.D. Menezes spent time observing and photographing Adelie and Emperor penguins at Antarctica's Cape Royds, about two hours from McMurdo Station. Jean Pennycook |
Jaidev "J.D." Menezes, a senior at Cornell's School of Hotel Administration from Toronto, is at McMurdo Station in Antarctica from October 2003 to March 2004. He is one of five North American students selected for the first Polar Internship Program, which is conducted by the U.S. Antarctic Program (USAP), coordinated by the National Science Foundation) and Raytheon Polar Services Co. He and his fellow interns perform a range of tasks to support scientific research at McMurdo, which was built by the United States in 1955-56 and now is part of an international effort to understand Antarctica's global environmental role.
Written in December, this is the first of two reports by Menezes on his experiences. The second will appear in the Jan. 22 issue of the Chronicle.
By Jaidev "J.D." Menezes '04
McMurdo Station, which is operated by the United States, is the largest research facility in Antarctica. MacTown, as it is popularly called, provides logistical and operational assistance to all science and science support activities on the Antarctic continent. Research includes marine and terrestrial biology, biomedicine, geology and geophysics, glaciology and glacial geology, meteorology, aeronomy and upper-atmospheric physics.
I first heard about USAP's Polar Internship Program at McMurdo on InterviewTrak in December 2002 and immediately thought: "Wow! This is an opportunity of a lifetime." After applying and being interviewed, I found out I had been selected in mid-March 2003. I hadn't expected it and was honored and excited, but going meant missing my senior year, friends and Ithaca. I finally decided I simply could not turn down the chance to live and work in Antarctica.
During the summer, I received informational packages about the program, McMurdo Station and what to bring and not bring. I was allowed a maximum of 75 pounds, including the extreme cold weather (ECW) gear I'd be issued, which didn't seem like much, considering I'd be there for five months. I probably packed and unpacked my one big suitcase about eight times. The experience taught me about choices and how little one really needs.
On Oct. 2 I left Toronto for Los Angeles, where I met up with a large contingent heading to Antarctica. Most of us took a 16-hour Qantas flight across the International Date Line, reaching Auckland, New Zealand, Oct. 4. We then caught a 45-minute flight to Christchurch, New Zealand, our departure point for McMurdo, 2,415 miles south.
The next day, I was issued two orange duffel bags with my ECW clothing -- a bewildering array of footwear, underwear, headwear, jackets, parkas, Carharrt overalls, eyewear, "bunny boots" and other unidentifiable items.
Then, ushered inside a windowless room with posters of icescapes, I sat in silence among strangers waiting for the last arrivals for the flight, while a man ticked off names on a clipboard. At the time I knew no one, and I remember feeling very alone, in a strange country bound for an even stranger continent.
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| The McMurdo Station sign in "MacTown," Antarctica. Jaidev Menezes |
Boarding a U.S. Air Force C-140 aircraft, we ended up flying three "boomerang" eight-hour trips to Antarctica and back over three days, because poor weather prevented us from landing safely at McMurdo's blue sea-ice runway. We were only about an hour away from McMurdo on all three trips when we had to turn around. It was tiring and frustrating. As you can imagine, it's not easy getting to "the Ice."
When we finally landed, my first views of Antarctica were absolutely breathtaking, and the view from my dormitory room window at Mammoth Mountain Inn, next to the NSF chalet, also turned out to be spectacular. In addition to Observation Hill, the helo-pad and runway, I can see the trans-Antarctic mountain ranges, Royal Society range and Mount Discovery.
Early on in October I was fortunate to catch about 15 minutes of "sunset," when the sun dipped behind Mt. Discovery, turning the sky a deep orange-pink. I learned that the next sunset wouldn't be until late February. Simply put, for the area of the world 66.5 degrees south of the equator, the austral summer, from most of October through February, is one long day, and the winter, from most of March through September, is one long night. During the interims between the two seasons, there are weeks of sunrises and sunsets.
Tucked in a hollow between a spur and an arc of hills on the ice-streaked volcanic rock of Ross Island, McMurdo Station has grown from an outpost of a few buildings in the mid-1950s to a complex logistics staging facility of more than 80 structures. It includes a harbor, an outlying airfield (Williams Field) with landing strips on sea ice and shelf ice, and a helicopter pad. It looks like a small Alaskan mining town, with above-ground heating, water, sewer, telephone and power lines.
I am working in Environmental Planning and Management, which consists of three key units -- Waste Management, where I am spending most of my time, the Environmental Department and Hazardous Waste, where I probably will work a week each.
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| J.D. Menezes poses at the memorial cross on Antarctica's Observation Hill commemorating the deaths of explorer Robert Scott and his party. Brittany Sparks |
Typically, I work about a 10-hour day, from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., Monday through Saturday. The long workweek took getting used to, especially since much of it is physical and involves moving around heavy containers and driving forklifts.
I also spend about three hours working outside, no matter what the weather is. My first week, the temperature was around minus 45 degrees Celsius (minus 49 Fahrenheit), and although I was wearing my balaclava, my upper cheeks were exposed and got badly windburned.
In this extreme cold there is no natural decay or decomposition. This pristine environment presents a marvelous opportunity to study the impact of humans. With about 950 people here in the summer and about 200 in the winter, we must ensure that every bit of waste is collected, sorted, compacted and shipped off the continent at the end of the season.
As part of the internship, I am working on a project for Raytheon and Cornell, a long-distance collaboration under Professor Joe Regenstein in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, involving writing up a detailed waste analysis here. Later, I'll be working on another project, with School of Hotel Administration marketing Professor Robert Kwortnik.
(supplied by J.D. Menezes)
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