Dispatches from Antarctica: Part 1

Science Editor Caitlin Saks and Digital Associate Producer Arlo Perez are in Antarctica for the next month reporting about science research in Antarctica as a part of NOVA’s “Polar Extremes” project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Joining them is Zac Fink, field director and director of photography. Caitlin is writing home frequently and tweeting about her adventures (@caitlin_saks)—here’s her first dispatch:Our 12-hour international flight from San Francisco to Auckland was on a packed-to-capacity wide body plane. I slept fairly well—maybe about six interrupted hours spread out over the whole flight. By the end, I couldn’t feel my toes, my curly hair was straight, and <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/a-litmus-test-for-bad-breath/">my breath smelled</a> like something from another planet. But I was decently well rested for our 5:30 a.m. arrival in New Zealand.
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We gathered all 600+ pounds of gear, made our way through customs, re-checked all 600+ pounds to Christchurch, and then proceeded directly to <a href="/wgbh/nova/article/coffee-may-extend-your-lifebut-theres-a-but/">caffeine</a>. Zac, Arlo, and I took an immediate liking to New Zealand because there is a coffee shop every 20 feet. In case they don’t have it at <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/geo/opp/support/mcmurdo.jsp">McMurdo Station</a>—the United States Antarctic research center to which we’re headed—Zac and Arlo have been collecting Sugar In The Raw® for me at every coffee shop. Now I have sugar spilling out of every pocket of my backpack.We were awake for the flight to Christchurch and used that time to get a bit of footage, and to start playing with the Go Pros that we brought along. When we landed, we were greeted at baggage claim by Elaine Hood, our Antarctic “implementer,” who has been holding my hand through the entire planning process. She came with at least three other people from the Christchurch office of the <a href="https://www.usap.gov/">United States Antarctic Program</a> (USAP), three big carts, and a big truck. After lugging equipment around for I-can’t-count-how-many-hours, the small army of helpers was delightful.By this point we had been <a href="https://www.livescience.com/59369-science-jet-lag-surprising-findings.html">traveling for 24 hours</a>. I couldn’t have possibly done that math at the time, but I’m writing this after having had a chance to sleep. From the Christchurch airport, we walked to the USAP Clothing Distribution Center, right next to the airport. It’s called the CDC, but it’s not the Centers for Disease Control.
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This place was amazing. It is like the largest, most organized closet in the world. Massive racks run the length of one room with every kind of cold weather gear you can imagine. Jackets for all variety of cold weather activity, from deep-field science work to construction in McMurdo.
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<figcaption>NOVA science editor Caitlin Saks dons her United States Antarctic Program jacket and shows off her name tag.
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We came a day early—arriving on a Friday, a workday—so that we could get most of our camera gear on a pallet for the flight to McMurdo while people were still in the office. But this had the added benefit of giving us a few hours to have free run of the place. Nathan “Haggis” Harkness, who runs the operations, gave us a tour. I felt like a kid in a candy shop. Arlo and I tried on big jackets and boots. We got to try on these massive gloves that have furry backs to wipe your nose (Haggis promised they were very clean now). And this wasn’t even all of the gear. In the next warehouse room over, row after row after row of boxes (think Raiders of the Lost Ark) contained even more gear waiting in reserve for when the “closet” needed restocking. All of this gear will come back to the CDC at the end of the season. Haggis said it takes them FOUR MONTHS to do all the laundry.Everyone at CDC was wonderfully accommodating. The ground-based support is run by New Zealand—this is part of the <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/geo/opp/antarct/anttrty.jsp">international cooperation agreement</a> for research in Antarctica. New Zealand runs the ground operations, and the U.S. provides air support for getting to the ice.
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<figcaption>NOVA producer Arlo Perez dons his United States Antarctic Program jacket and shows off his name tag.
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After romping around the CDC for three hours (there was a coffee break in there, too, of course), we went across the street to the hotel and had some much-needed down time. Iron-Man-Arlo went for a run. I peeled off all my clothes, brushed my teeth three times, and texted my husband to let him know I was alive and well.Then, about an hour later, Elaine picked us up to take us into Christchurch for dinner. We met up with another artist traveling to the ice—Caitlin Scarano, a poet, who has a really wonderful first name. Also joining us were Mike Lucibella, in the communications office, and Kelly Swanson, the recreations director. Over Kiwi Thai food, they told us tales from the ice. One of the group warned that the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgZa9oZDN5g">24 hours of daylight</a> will make us stupid—people lose the ability to recall words. I’m not sure how scientifically accurate that assertion is. Kelly told us what sorts of recreational activities she plans—like Halloween, which was just rescheduled for early November. “You can do that?” I asked. “We can do anything down there,” she replied.I was so exhausted by this point that I can’t recall all the wonders that we heard over dinner. I had this feeling of information overload in my brain. So many new, interesting ideas—they couldn’t all fit in my cranium! I have a hunch that I might have to get used to that feeling…the next month is going to be filled with similarly mind-warping encounters. Hopefully I won’t actually forget how to use words to describe them.
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After dinner, Elaine gave a quick tour of downtown Christchurch, which was destroyed during a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/earthquakes-strike-new-zealand/2011/06/13/AGyD6jTH_gallery.html?utm_term=.2102dd0b7996">6.2 earthquake</a> that struck in 2011. It is still a city in recovery, but has a vibrant street scene with lots of interesting arts installations. The cathedral in the center of town still sits in ruins—which is kind of a shock to see in person. Seven years later, in this developed nation, in the center of town, this beautiful building is still in shambles.After that, it was bedtime. It took about 20 seconds from when my head hit the pillow to fall asleep. Today we have some time to adjust and digest everything we learned yesterday, and to sort out our plan for the next couple days. Most importantly, we are going to take a bit of time to take care of ourselves ahead of what is surely going to be quite a ride.

Members of the NOVA team are headed to Antarctica to report on science research at the bottom of the Earth. Here&#x27;s their first dispatch.

NOVA's senior editor, Caitlin Saks, looks out into the Antarctic frigid landscape. Photo credit: Arlo Perez

Dispatches from Antarctica: A Windy, Alien Terrain

October 22, 2018 (written October 27):Nothing could have prepared me for the moment the C-17 door opened into the Antarctic winds. It had been warm and toasty where we sat inside the plane's cargo hold. Then the aircraft came to a stop, the door creaked open, and Antarctic air blasted in. You could see it diffusing from the doorway through the entire cargo hold. In a matter of seconds, the whole space plummeted to minus 10 Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit). Every breath was <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJKwMT1uz-c">immediately visible</a>.
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My first glimpse of the continent was out the back door of the plane. Past the stacks of <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-2/">gear and equipment</a>, I could see a white expanse with a purple mountain painted in the backdrop. It did not look real. The military gear framing the surreal landscape looked like something out of a science fiction film.
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<figcaption>A first glimpse of the continent | Photo credit: Arlo Perez
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When we got off the plane, it was windy. The sun was low in the sky, with thin clouds veiling its intensity, illuminating the icy purple-ish mountains that surrounded us—this was the first surprise. I expected to see nothing but white, but instead, I found myself in a far more dynamic, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-environment/2018/10/22/listen-eerie-song-antarctica-melting/?noredirect=on&amp;utm_term=.49f583e97674">alien terrain</a>. To say it was like a photo would not do it justice, because a photo looks more real. This was like a painting. It was like I was walking through a painting of another planet.
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We boarded a Delta—a monstrous snow vehicle that hearkens back to another era, and that the <a href="https://www.usap.gov/">Antarctic Program</a> seems to use like a bus. We were warned not to turn on the radiator—it would asphyxiate us. And we were asked to buckle up using ancient seat buckle hardware. I sat in the far back, next to the door, and as we lurched into motion and trundled off on the 45-minute drive to <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/geo/opp/support/mcmurdo.jsp">McMurdo Station</a>, snow slowly drifted in through the cracks and covered my leg. The breath of about ten people quickly frosted all the windows, shrouding any view of the outside and adding to the mystique of the place. Not until we reached McMurdo Station would I catch another glimpse of the landscape, but the interior of the vehicle was enough to feast my eyes on. I examined the stickers that decorated the Delta’s interior—stamps left by past visitors, as if to say “I too made it to this furthest end of the Earth.”Soon, I would discover just what wonders they found here.Science Editor Caitlin Saks and Digital Associate Producer Arlo Perez are in Antarctica for the next month reporting about science research in Antarctica as a part of NOVA’s “Polar Extremes” project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Joining them is Zac Fink, field director and director of photography. Caitlin is writing home frequently and tweeting about her adventures (@caitlin_saks).
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As the C-17 plane door opened, NOVA’s science editor looked upon what looked like a painting of a faraway planet.

Arlo, a newborn Weddell seal pup, rests within an icy seal rookery with his mother. Photo credit: Arlo Perez | This image was taken under the authority of NMFS MMPA Permit No. 21158- 01

Dispatches from Antarctica: Pupping Season for Weddell Seals

October 20, 2018:This is what I texted home to my husband when I got back from the field today:One of the most stunning, unforgettable, magical experiences of my entire life.It has taken a long time to get here. About <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-1/">a week of travel to Antarctica</a>. And then once in Antarctica, another week of tedious training. I say “tedious” not because the training itself was boring—actually, it was quite helpful and, in some cases, even fun. But tedious because it has felt like we haven’t even really started our project yet. I’ve been watching the days whiz by without our being out in Antarctica filming, which is what we need to do.But then, there was today.
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We aimed to leave around noon, but actually got out of town around 2 pm—which was a marked improvement in how far behind schedule we have been running. We hopped on snowmobiles and headed out to <a href="https://geographic.org/geographic_names/antname.php?uni=1362&amp;fid=antgeo_102">Big Razorback Island</a>, a little over 10 miles away from McMurdo Station. It’s a 45-minute ride, which of course took us two hours because we had to stop to take pictures; that’s how we roll.Big Razorback is a ridge of land poking up through the sea ice. Most would imagine that land means safe-haven. But here, land means cracks. The ice that is attached to the dry terrain is strained and warped as tides rise and fall, and as the sea ice flows. As the ice is stretched and compressed, cracks form. While hazardous to the humans who have no rightful place in this landscape, the cracks provide a lifeline for another mammal: seals. Specifically, <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/w/weddell-seal/">Weddell seals</a>.We were heading out to meet Jay Rotella and his team of seal researchers. They set up a charming little outpost on the leeward side of the island: four small huts housing eight people. A fleet of snow mobiles were parked outside. And a colony of seals speckled what I thought of as the “back yard.” I have seen seals before back in the states. My impression was that they are sort of like lazy beach slugs, so my expectations were not all that high.But what we beheld took my breath away.It is pupping season for these Weddell seals, and within just a few seconds of our entering their area, we started spotting babies. They were just days old, puppy eyed and snuggling with their moms. At the first mom/pup pair we reached, we stood transfixed for minutes just watching. I couldn’t help but coo at the pup as if he were a newborn child… encouraging him to find his mom’s milk. We watched him flop around, struggling to find a nipple, and then finally succeed. On a diet of fatty milk, this baby would grow from the size of a second grader to the size of a professional football player in about a month!
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Off by the sea ice cracks, we caught a few males yapping at each other, fighting for territory. Another male was resting in the water with just his nose floating in the air to breath. Not far away, we came across another mom and pup. <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Bp0S8wZht4b/">This pup</a> was a few weeks older, and we watched as mom slipped into the water and then called for her baby. The young pup wasn’t ready to go swimming yet, and so threw a tantrum. Mom called back to him trying to coax him in. It went on for over 30 minutes… but the pup would have none of it. After a while, they seemed to reach a stalemate, as mom kept swimming, and the pup laid despondent on the ice.We went in to the Rotella’s camp huts for dinner; burgers, beans, and fries were on the menu. The Rotella seal team is tightly knit. You can sense it in their demeanor as they banter and laugh together. They share the responsibilities of cooking and cleaning… and, of course, of doing the research. But most of all you can see it in their eyes when they talk with each other over dinner. There is a deep-seated mutual respect all around, from the youngest student to the seasoned veterans.It was, frankly, inspiring.We are a small film crew. It is just three of us, and we are all doing everything. (Well… I guess I let the guys do a bit more of the heavy lifting). It’s kind of crazy, and at times very intense. Arlo or I usually try to avoid being on camera together, so we can support Zac behind the camera. In our first week of being a team, we’ve rapidly learned how to work with each other. At times it has been a challenge, as we learned each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and how to work constructively with both. And I think I’m actually starting to feel the same strands of kinship form that I saw in the Rotella team. It is a bond forged of necessity, when you are with the same people day in and day out, all day long. You have no choice but to become dependent. Just like that mom and her seal pup.After dinner, we went back outside to do a bit more filming and discovered that a new pup was born while we ate dinner. Mom and pup were still bonding, forging those essential tendrils of kinship… so we didn’t get too close. This was the miracle of life in its purest form, and it was not our place to disturb that.I would have never guessed when I woke up that morning that I was going to experience something so profoundly fundamental to being a living creature on this Earth. Something so raw, so real. This is not a human experience, this is a living experience—this is what it means to be alive on planet Earth. It is not easy for me to put it into words, but it felt powerful—a feeling not in my mind, but in my soul. And… I am not just talking about seeing the seals in their natural habitat, living, giving birth.
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I am also talking about how I witnessed and experienced how we humans pull together in a way that is just awe-inspiring.We left the Rotella team around midnight – characteristically behind schedule. We drove off into the eternal sunset of the midnight October Antarctic sky. I was so proud. Not only did we witness some of the most miraculous natural wonders that this planet has to offer, but as a team, we jelled. We were working. We succeeded. It felt so good.This reporting was conducted under the authority of NMFS MMP A Permit No. 21158- 01

The NOVA team in Antarctica visits Big Razorback Island, where a colony of playful seals give them an unforgettable experience.

Krista Myers, a field technician working in Antarctica's Dry Valleys, prepares a warm lunch of peanut butter sriracha ramen in the Camp Bonney hut. | Photo credit: Arlo Perez

Dispatches from Antarctica: Camp Bonney

Antarctica is a continent that has time and again <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-new-reality/">defied my expectations</a>. I didn’t expect to find a quiet lake retreat here... but that is where I found myself. To my ear, Lake Bonney sounds like it belongs somewhere in the Midwest—not in Antarctica. “Lake” anything, in fact, doesn’t sound like it belongs in Antarctica… especially in a region called “The Dry Valleys.”It is a little-known bit of Antarctic geography: Antarctica has lakes and ice-free “dry” mountains just a 45-minute helicopter ride away from McMurdo Station. The lake surfaces are frozen over with a thick layer of ice in winter, but they thaw around the edges in the summer, allowing for liquid running water and streams.
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The Dry Valleys are a no-man’s land for megafauna. Remains of seals and penguins that lost their way can be spotted throughout, mummified by the cold. Early Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott described the landscape as a “valley of the dead.” But to scientists today, it is anything but. It is here that they have discovered a microbial wonderworld of exotic lifeforms uniquely adapted to the harsh Antarctic conditions. But still, to the naked eye, it is barren and lifeless, and otherworldly. Think Mars… this is about the closest analogue to Mars that exists on Earth.Our trip to the Dry Valleys was perhaps the most anticipated part of the whole Antarctica trip for me— for personal reasons. I wanted to cold weather camp in Antarctica. Throughout the Dry Valleys, the US Antarctic Program establishes several small camp sites with huts. Scientists come to these and set up their tents in the vicinity, but each site has a heated hut with a kitchen, an outhouse, and in some cases, an employee who manages the camp by doing much of the cooking, cleaning, and maintenance. So… more like glamping.When we landed, I was taken aback by the beauty of the place. I expected desolate and barren, which had until this point conflicted in my mind with the concept of “beauty.” But here, dramatic mountains jut up above the clouds, framing a narrow valley – much narrower than the impression I had from pictures. (Antarctica creates a problem with scale… it is hard to understand the relative size of things.) And here we were, at a small 10-person camp on the shores of a lake—a real lake—surrounded by dramatic peaks poking through the clouds, and capped by glacial ice. Not a bad place to have to work. The scientists we met here would agree.
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<figcaption>Camp Bonney sits on the shore of the frozen Lake Bonnie in Antarctica's Taylor Valley. | Photo credit: Arlo Perez
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The pace of life is slower here. McMurdo is a metropolis compared to Lake Bonney. Lots of people, lots of walking to get anywhere, lots of complicated rules and systems required of any society. Here, it was just ten people, living together and united by a common passion for studying the place. And the lab was right outside the door. Dinner and breakfast were eaten communally. Everyone pitched in with the chores. And we stayed up late into the night playing music, card tricks, and talking about anything and everything—and that is after a 12-hour workday out in the cold. It was during a late-night conversation that we were initiated into the camp by getting our radio call sign nick-names, based on our initials. Arlo is “Apple Pie.” Zac is “Zoom Focus.” And my name is “Can’t Sleep,” because everyone now knows that I have been having a really hard time sleeping for more than a few hours each night (because of the constant daylight, I think).If you can imagine a lakeside camping retreat with a tight group of friends… that is what this felt like to me, Zac, and Arlo. Despite the new nickname, I got the best nights of sleep of the entire trip out in my tent at Camp Bonney. My sleeping bag was heavy and cozy, and I went to bed hugging a water bottle of warm water, my “warm buddy.” It felt like vacation.
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But it wasn’t vacation. Our team came here to explore one of the most perplexing formations in the Dry Valleys: Blood Falls. At the far end of Lake Bonney is the Taylor Glacier. On the face of the glacier where it meets the lake is a striking deep red stain. It looks like a waterfall of blood, hence the name. What happened here?After our first night at Camp Bonney, we set out with Peter Doran, Jill Mikucki, and their respective research teams to investigate. Peter studies lake and stream flows—his team was setting up a camera to monitor Blood Falls year-round to try and understand when and why it flows. Arlo helped them set up the camera, while I worked with Jill taking samples of the water. Jill is a microbiologist who is investigating the unique lifeforms that live in the Blood Falls and Lake Bonney waters.We lucked out on our trip to the falls. “Falls” is actually a misnomer—they are not constantly flowing. In fact—flow is the exception, not the norm. But today they were flowing. Jill and I gingerly entered the Blood Falls protected area (it requires a permit to enter, as it is a sensitive ecosystem). While there, we heard the trickle of water… but it was well below freezing, water should not be melting and flowing here. Yet, it didn’t take long to find the steady stream of water. Jill’s salinity meter said the water was three times the salinity of seawater—that’s super salty. This explains why it was flowing. Salt lowers the freezing point of water, meaning it can flow when it is colder than the normal 32 degrees F.The unusually high salinity also hints at the source of this exotic feature: it isn’t melted glacier water! Other measurements have corroborated that this water actually comes from much deeper. Blood Falls is tapping a reservoir of groundwater—not glacial melt. This water is iron rich, and when it reaches the surface, that iron oxidizes, staining the ice with rust, and giving the falls its striking bloody color. The Dry Valleys—far from being dry—are underlain by a vast reservoir of ground water. Blood Falls is not merely a dazzling visual feature, it is a window into a hidden Antarctic underworld. Some scientists describe this underworld as a “Dark Eden,” a hidden realm where water is unexpectedly flowing, and unusual biology is thriving.
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This is why Peter and Jill are so eager to learn more about it. This is a new, unexplored realm of our own planet. If we can learn about groundwater that has been cut off from the Earth’s atmosphere for thousands of years, under the harshest continent on Earth, what else might we discover? Exotic new microbial species? Or perhaps clues to what we might find under similar formations on Mars?Once again, Antarctica has belied my expectations. The tranquil lake retreat is the gateway to a new frontier.Science Editor Caitlin Saks and Digital Associate Producer Arlo Perez are in Antarctica for the next month reporting about science research in Antarctica as a part of NOVA’s “Polar Extremes” project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Joining them is Zac Fink, field director and director of photography.

The NOVA team explores one of the most perplexing formations in the Antarctica Dry Valleys: Blood Falls.

Dispatches from Antarctica: A New Reality

October 28, 2018:At breakfast one morning last week, a scientist who works out on the sea ice told me something startling: “Everyone here fails.”This isn’t what I expected.It sounds trite, but it is true: <a href="https://www.nsf.gov/geo/opp/support/mcmurdo.jsp">McMurdo</a> really does feel like what I’d imagine an <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/4420/martian-landscape-antarctica">outpost on Mars</a> to be. But not for the reasons you might think—it’s not because the landscape around me is so spectacularly alien, but rather it is that the personal experience is so far removed from anything I’d known in my ordinary life. It really feels like a whole new world, and I’m having to learn how to operate and be in this new reality.
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It has been exactly one week since Arlo, Zac, and I landed in Antarctica, and it has been among the most personally challenging—and rewarding—weeks of my life. I have been forced to look inward and trust myself, to become self-reliant and also trusting of my team members—two people whom I hardly knew when we set out. I’ve also learned how to light a camp stove, change a spark plug, and drive a snowmobile.When you get to McMurdo, your life is turned upside down. It’s impossible to maintain the habits from home that define you. First, there are very immediate and obvious adaptations that must be made. <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/aarontilley/2016/01/19/antarctica-gets-a-cellular-network-for-the-internet-of-things/#792eeb7077a6">Internet is painfully slow</a>, only in limited locations, and smart phones are relegated to being expensive alarm clocks. Every system I have for keeping track of things: to-do lists, names, numbers, maps, calendars, ideas… it all usually goes in my phone. I’ve had to trade that in for a little green notebook that is standard issue to everyone that comes on station. It is affectionately referred to as a “green brain.” You keep it on you at all times and record notes. If you lose it, you panic and start asking around “I’ve lost my brain! Has anyone seen my brain?” To communicate with people, you can’t text them… but you page them. Yes – a pager. For those millennials who don’t know what that is, it’s sort of like how they texted in the 90s. And then, at meal times, people don’t check their phones—they talk to each other, sometimes for hours on end.
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Then there is the matter of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/antarctica-live/video/2013/dec/05/how-to-dress-antarctica-live-video">dressing yourself</a>. Sounds simple, right? Nope. There are gradations of cold that I didn’t know existed: the kind of cold you feel when you are just running from one building to the next—that’s COLD, but tolerable. Then the kind of cold when you are outside for a while, but still on station—that’s FREEZING. Then, there is the kind of cold you feel when you are out on the sea ice, when the winds are blowing—that’s REALLY FREAKIN’ FREEZING. And then… there is inside—and that’s WARM. They’ve invented a whole new category of gear to deal with the really freakin’ freezing zone, but the trouble comes when you need to stop for lunch in the warm zone before heading out to the freakin’ freezing zone—then the warm zone transforms into a SWELTERING zone. I spent the first week on station being either too hot (i.e., drenched in sweat) or too cold, and I mean toes tingling, numb and shivering. Figuring out what outfit will get you through the day comfortably is a challenge.
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But the cold and the lack of internet isn’t why the experience is transformative—that’s just a little disorienting distraction. It is a new routine to be figured out. What is really transformative is that the continent makes the agenda, and you must adapt. The weather is <a href="https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2018/10/antarctica-storms-strand-scientists-in-new-zealand-delay-significant-work.html">relentlessly unpredictable</a>, and weather dictates everything. In certain conditions, the weather mandates that you can’t even leave the building you are in. The environment is treacherous—laden with hidden dangers like cracks in the sea ice and extreme cold. With mother nature in charge, you are forced to be flexible, and self-reliant. You must learn to live with whatever is thrown at you, to trust yourself in extreme situations, and make the best of it. Adapt on the fly. Re-invent the project as you go. I can’t call home to make a new plan. I have to make the right decision in the moment, and have only my teammates to consult with. My own survival, and our project, is entirely our shoulders.Over the past week, I have been learning skills for operating in this extreme environment. Now I know how to pitch a tent if we get stuck in a storm, how to find cracks in sea ice and check if they are safe to cross, how to identify the early signs of hypothermia, how to read the skies for approaching weather, how to use radios to communicate with McMurdo operations, how to work a GPS unit, how to drive a snowmobile… and yes, how to dress myself for the cold. The <a href="https://www.usap.gov/">U.S. Antarctic Program</a> does an admirable job of training those who have never been here to operate safely in the environment. A week’s worth of training has been frustrating because of the delay it means for our project… but satisfying in the confidence that it has inspired for us to be self-sufficient.I have been thrust into the same situation as the scientists who come down here for research. Starting two years ago, when I worked with NOVA to assemble an NSF grant proposal for this project, I’ve had to put on the same hat as the scientists—figuratively, and now that I am here, literally. Every step of the way, I am tracing their experience, from planning the logistics to setting up a lab space (more of a camera workshop for us). Though my project is a media project, it still has deliverables, a deadline… a lot to accomplish in little time, and the Antarctic continent apparently does not know how to read my production schedule, for she has her own plans. This is the same experience that the scientists here have—they have goals to accomplish, they are working with finicky, expensive equipment that they’re nervous will not perform. And they, too, are beholden to the whims of the winds.
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I came here as NOVA’s science editor and the producer of a YouTube series, “To learn what it is like to live and work and do science at the bottom of the world.” That’s the tagline. I had planned in meticulous detail how I was going to follow scientists to discover what they are studying, and how they do their work—the process of science. What I didn’t realize was that here, the process of doing science in Antarctica is a highly personal, transformative experience. It is an experience in which you must disconnect from the rest of the world and rely on your own skills and intuition—and on the team that you have brought with you—to accomplish a goal that is quite possibly unattainable... but you will nevertheless make the best of it.Science Editor Caitlin Saks and Digital Associate Producer Arlo Perez are in Antarctica for the next month reporting about science research in Antarctica as a part of NOVA’s “Polar Extremes” project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Joining them is Zac Fink, field director and director of photography. Caitlin is writing home frequently and tweeting about her adventures (@caitlin_saks).

Unpredictable weather and old-school internet create out of the ordinary conditions for living and research.

Dispatches from Antarctica: Forever Changed by the Ice

November 21, 2018:It’s 1:15 am and I am sitting in the Christchurch airport hotel lobby, just next door to the <a href="https://nz.usembassy.gov/embassy-consulates/wellington/united-states-antarctic-program/">U.S. Antarctic Terminal</a>. My stomach feels weird and I can’t sleep.Coming back from <a href="https://www.livescience.com/21677-antarctica-facts.html">Antarctica</a> is just as disorienting <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-1/">as going</a>.Our last week in Antarctica was, in a word, fabulous. While the first week was full of frustrations about not getting out in the field to collect footage, the <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/antarctica-mt-erebus/">last week</a> was one big, intense, adventure-filled day after another, with no break. Day, after day, after day. It was thrilling and adrenaline-pumping, and exhausting. Lake Bonney to Ice Caves, to Mount Erebus, to near the sea ice edge in search of penguins. We didn’t stop for a breath.Until Monday.
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Saturday was our last day filming. Sunday was a harried day of packing hundreds of pounds of gear; returning tents, sleds, snow mobile helmets, pagers and radios; cleaning our rooms and office; doing our laundry. And of course, the gift shop—had to take an hour there. Yes, it has a gift shop! At 8:30 pm, we had to deliver all of our checked bags, including all the camera gear, to one particular building to be put on a pallet and loaded onto the following day’s <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-2/">C-17</a>.And then Monday… there was some leftover cleaning and returning of items. But mostly, we were done.Done.Our pace dropped from 100 mph to about 5. After a month of sleep deprivation, my body finally felt compelled to snooze whenever and wherever possible. I took no fewer than five naps: head on the desk, laying down under the desk, on the ride to the airfield, and on the plane to New Zealand, twice. It is like someone turned off all the breaker switches. How does the human body know when it can relax? Arlo and Zac found it amusing to photograph me in my various napping states.
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<figcaption>The whole NOVA team, from left: Arlo Perez, Caitlin Saks, and Zac Fink
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As someone who is fascinated by science, I feel like I performed a science experiment on my own body over the last month. As soon as I landed in Antarctica, <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/01/07/259418586/think-youre-cold-and-hungry-try-eating-in-antarctica">my appetite increased dramatically</a>. A combination of the cold and the activity—which included wearing about 10-15 pounds of extra warmth everywhere—seemed to increase my metabolism. I ate voraciously… three meals a day, plus midnight pizza. And dessert to boot. I was actually kind of surprised with myself… but I was hungry. Then, my sleep. It didn’t matter when I went to sleep, I could not sleep more than 6.5 hours. Some nights, it was 4. A few nights, it was only 2. The eternal daylight made the passage of time slip by unnoticed, and I’d find myself in the office at 11 pm. But still, I wouldn’t be able to sleep late, and my cognitive functioning seemed unaffected for the most part. On just a couple days, I would nap in the office. It was like I was living in a different mode of being human – totally different from my home life. With a lot more pizza, sugar, and activity, and a lot less sleep and email.
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And then coming back. As soon as my body knew I was heading north, it was nap time… every hour. My head kind of throbbed with dreariness. When we landed in Christchurch at 10:30 pm, it was dark and raining hard. That’s weird. Walking from the airport to the Clothing Distribution Center to return our gear, we could smell the thick aroma of earth. Everything was very wet and alive. I met my husband at the Clothing Distribution Center and his first remark was that I looked sunburnt and gaunt (but “good,” haha)—which I am not sure I entirely agree with, but then again, I have lost all sense of perspective.The next morning in Christchurch was occupied by getting Zac, Arlo, and all of our stuff through customs and checked into a flight back to the states. I’d be spending a few more days in New Zealand resting before heading to the World Congress of Science &amp; Factual Producers in Australia. I am grateful for the time off—and I need it. I didn’t realize until I stopped how fast I was going. Now that I am back from the Ice and liberated from the hundreds of pounds of stuff to schlep… my appetite has dropped to nearly zero and my stomach has been upset. Such an odd night-and-day contrast. But… apparently, my body still hasn’t quite figured out how to sleep.They say that <a href="https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/health/a25396472/antarctica-scientists-psychological-hibernation/">Antarctica changes you</a>. It is hard to describe how and why, but having been there for a month, I would have to agree. It takes you so far out of your normal operating procedures—your daily activities, diet, sleep schedule, social support system—that you are forced to rediscover yourself. Who are you if you change everything about how you are living? Do you trust yourself? Can you come to trust your new colleagues? How do you deal with a whole new set of societal rules on how to behave? How do you deal with challenge? With failure? How do you adapt to rapidly changing conditions, and reinvent your project to meet new realities?And then… there are <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/antarctica-ice-sheet-tectonic-satellite-environment-kiel-university-research-study-a8653706.html">the natural environs</a>. How does your perspective change on the Earth when you have viscerally experienced what it is like to live where no humans should be able to survive? It is a stark, inhospitable, but dazzling landscape everywhere you look.
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It is going to take some time for me to figure out the answers. I think I need to spend some more time in the real world to discern what is a permanent change, and what was situational. But it is an experience that will not soon be forgotten… particularly because it was so extremely, ridiculously well documented!The Polar Extremes: Antarctica YouTube series is scheduled to be released in mid-late 2019. Stay tuned!Science Editor Caitlin Saks and Digital Associate Producer Arlo Perez are in Antarctica for the next month reporting about science research in Antarctica as a part of NOVA’s “Polar Extremes” project, which is funded by the National Science Foundation. Joining them is Zac Fink, field director and director of photography.

Coming back from Earth’s southernmost continent is just as disorienting <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-1/">as going</a> there.

This is the gateway to Antarctica—a passenger terminal to the bottom of the world. Photo credit: Arlo Perez

Dispatches from Antarctica: Part 2

We’re on a <a href="https://www.boeing.com/defense/c-17-globemaster-iii/">C-17</a> now, heading south. It’s a cavernous airplane and they seated us right in the middle. Pipes and wires and nobs of all sorts line the walls. What is all this stuff? Behind my seat is a brand-new monster snow vehicle. The plane’s cabin—if you can call it a cabin—is loud and it’s hard to talk. And it’s warm. I had always heard these flights are cold. We definitely aren’t cold! Most people are sleeping. A few are reading.After our <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/dispatches-antarctica-part-1/">exhilarating first day in Christchurch</a>, we all crashed. The following day, Saturday, was quieter and gave us a chance to recuperate. We went into the city to pick up some final supplies: a water bottle (I lost mine in Auckland), sunglasses for Arlo, and the like. And we wandered around the city. It’s a cool city, but <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/02/22/world/0223-ZEALAND.html">the 2011 Earthquake</a> rendered it a shell of its former self. The cathedral in the center of town is in ruins. Abandoned buildings and empty lots are scattered throughout the city, and construction fencing is ubiquitous. Still, in the cracks left by the earthquake there has grown a quirky and vibrant art scene. What the city has lost in historic buildings that once defined it, it has gained in street art, pop-up food trucks, and unusual architecture that fuses the old with the new.
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<figcaption>The cathedral in the center of Christchurch, New Zealand is in ruins; still, pop-up food trucks and street art help infuse the old with the new. Photo credit: Arlo Perez
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It was good that we had the day to rest, because Sunday was a busy day. Aside from some orientation, which took a while and was not particularly exciting, we went to the <a href="https://www.usap.gov/">Clothing Distribution Center</a> (CDC) and were officially issued our Extreme Cold Weather (ECW) gear. Friday was a sneak peek, but this was the real deal. I tried on a whole bunch of different fleeces and boots and insulated pants and jackets. The first jacket I put on, “Big Red,” was too large—it felt like a tent. The second one fit well, but was shorter and I was afraid it wouldn’t be warm enough. I agonized for about an hour over this decision, much to Arlo and Zac’s bemusement. I went with the one that fit better but might not have been as warm.Then it was back to the hotel for final preparations before “the ice,” as Antarctica is called. We won’t have a good internet connection once we get to the ice, so this was our last chance to downloaded documents, music, and videos. Arlo and I posted photos and sent out some updates. We tried to catch up with emails and take care of any other outstanding communications. So, there was lots to do. Soon, we’d be going back to 1990s-era internet speeds. As millennials, we find this is terrifying.We were told to report to the passenger terminal for the U.S. Antarctic Program at 4:45 the next morning. The passenger terminal is not only the portal for American Antarctic scientists, but also for New Zealand and Italian scientists. Antarctica is a continent that no country owns, and on which no military actions can be conducted. Fifty countries, including the United States, recognize the <a href="https://www.ats.aq/e/ats.htm">Antarctic Treaty</a>, which preserves the continent for the peaceful conduct of research. That is why the National Science Foundation is in charge of United States operations. And, with this treaty, <a href="https://phys.org/news/2018-10-country-antarctica-science.html">nations have agreed</a> to support each other in the operational logistics of conducting the research. The U.S., for its part, helps other nations with flights to the ice. New Zealand helps with ground operation logistics in Christchurch.
In the wee hours of the morning, a little fairy slipped a piece of paper under my hotel room door saying the flight was delayed, and that we should report at 8 a.m. Too bad I was already up and ready to go! Thus began the waiting game. I texted with Mom. The boys and I went to our favorite coffee spot, The Coffee Club. I particularly like the name of it because Arlo, Zac, and I are a coffee club, all with a mutual respect and understanding for the need to have a good cup of caffeine every morning. Around 7 a.m., we got another slip of paper under the door: delayed until 10 a.m. This was in all likelihood a weather delay, and at breakfast, we met with some U.S. Air Force guys (they operate the planes) who confirmed it. Our chances of getting to the ice today were starting to look slim.But then we got a confirmation: Get there at 10 a.m. We did. I was running late because I had a minor jacket panic and decided that I had made the wrong decision yesterday. Fortunately, Haggis and the friendly folks at the CDC were happy to let me swap my jacket one last time. I can only imagine how Arlo and Zac were making fun of me in the hall.We put on all of our cold weather gear—it was sweltering—and stood on a big scale with all our gear and our carry-on. They weighed our bags. And we waited some more. It was kind of just like a regular airport terminal, x-ray machine and all, except our boarding passes were plastic tags that they reuse. Also everyone is in oversized puffy clothing. We boarded buses out to our aircraft, grabbed bagged lunches as we climbed aboard, and found our seats.<a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/107846223/antarctica-nz-scientists-due-to-fly-south-after-weather-causes-twoweek-delay">Because the weather is iffy</a>, we might have to “boomerang” back to Christchurch if we can’t land. The C-17 has enough fuel to fly the five-ish hours to Antarctica, circle for 45 minutes waiting for weather to clear, and then to return to Christchurch if it isn’t safe to land. That’s an 11-hour flight and we’d end up back in the airport hotel, having coffee at The Coffee Club the next morning. It would be a big bummer. We even had to pack a “boomerang bag” with anything that we’d need for a couple days in Christchurch, because if we do boomerang, we wouldn’t get our checked luggage back.The U.S. Air Force team running the plane has been incredibly nice, and allowed Zac, Arlo, and me to go up to the cockpit to check it out. Multiple times. This is a particular treat because C-17s don’t have windows. And as we climbed the ladder to the cockpit, we glimpsed our first bit of ice. It wasn’t anything like I was expecting. I had always imagined that the ice started more abruptly—open ocean, and then ice. But starting at around 800 miles away from the continent, what we beheld was more like kaleidoscopic swirls, as if a mirage. As we flew on, the patterned ice gave way to more <a href="https://www.livescience.com/63875-weird-square-iceberg-antarctica.html">geometric shapes</a>, and became more solid. And then, we spotted stunning ice-covered mountains that the pilots said they couldn’t identify on the charts yet.
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This truly is uncharted territory. The last great wilderness on Earth. Arlo and I were awestruck. Dumbfounded. Overpowered by the majesty of the continent unfolding before us. We can’t wait to start exploring it.The pilots said that the weather conditions were right on the borderline of being safe enough to land. We gave them some Polar Extremes stickers, and pleaded with them not to boomerang.At the time I’m writing this, we still haven’t landed. Gosh, I hope we get there today.

Members of the NOVA team are headed to Antarctica to report on science research at the bottom of the Earth. Here&#x27;s their second dispatch.

Caitlin Saks

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