What do you know, I actually waited OVER a month between updates this time! 

Well I'll start out by saying happy pi day to everyone reading this. It's March 14th, and winter has definitely started to show itself here at McMurdo. The transition period between summer and winter crews on station has began to subside and the fresh faces are beginning to settle into their schedules and routines. The annual cargo vessels have unloaded and disembarked, heading back north with a years worth of garbage and old decommissioned equipment. On their return journeys back to Port Hueneme, California, they will make a few stops to unload the garbage and start staging for next years voyage. 

Life on station has been quieting down nicely. The vast majority of the summer employees have headed home, and we are down to a population of 348 as of writing this. There are a few more flights scheduled over the next few days to get the last of the summer folks off station before winter season officially starts, and travel to and from the continent becomes extremely limited. To my knowledge, after March 19th, there will only be one flight in April, and one in May. After that, it's complete isolation until August when WinFly begins and the very first of the critical workers will start showing up to get things ready for summer, which will begin all over again in October. 

I must admit, the station has become rather peaceful with the drop in population, and I find myself thriving in the quiet. The other nice thing about this time of year is we are getting long and gorgeous sunrises and sunsets that are coinciding very nicely with my short walks to and from work. I am doing my best to soak up every minute of the sunshine and nicer days because in not too much longer the sun will stop rising completely until mid August. 

We were recently met with our first taste of winter in the form of an early season storm which brought high winds and a bit of new snow. During the brief periods of lighter winds, the storm was wonderful to admire. There is something so tranquil about new snow falling, right up until a 35 knot gust of wind blows freezing ice and sand right into your face. Ha. We managed to only get to a -35ish degree windchill during our two day squall, so by Antarctica standards, a pretty mild storm. From what I have gathered, this kind of storm is actually fairly atypical for this time of year. The really nasty weather is more likely to occur later in the winter, but it was a nice taste of what to expect here in the coming months. The worst part is having to walk from the dorm buildings to the galley for food, or to the gym. If the storms get bad enough, or last long enough, as part of the SAR team I will be required to set up rope lines and ferry brave souls to and from each building. From what I understand, this does not happen very often, but it is something that our team trained on and got ready for earlier this month.

Work has been nothing short of just that. Work. On the bright side, switching over to my new position of lead operator has allowed me to buckle down and dial in our treatment plant. Our other operator and myself have really dialed in our chemical dosages and processes, increased our system sampling schedules, and really dug into optimizing how our plant runs. It's been rewarding for me because not only is this the kind of work I am much more used to doing, but I am definitely felling like we are making a difference, and I will l00% be able to walk away from here knowing that I left this plant in a better place than when I showed up. Now, will my changes and be implemented after I leave? I can only hope so. 

However, I won't have to wait too long to find out, as I have signed a primary contract to return to my position in the water treatment plant for the winter 2026 season. While nothing is ever set in stone, with this contract signed, I officially have another spot here on the ice waiting for me come February of next year. Woo! If nothing else, it's nice having a plan in place.

With that, here are a few pictures:

This one is of me bundling up from the wind.

This one is a crude explanation of where the gym and galley are from my dorm. It's not a long walk, but it is a cold one!

These last two I will leave you all with are of a sunrise and a sunset looking southwest across the Ross Sea at the same mountain. These pictures weren't taken all that far apart, and it goes to show how fast the sea starts to freeze now that the temps are dropping.

I hope everyone is doing well!

Until next post,

Matt