Blogs

Last night at dinner we asked our self what technological advances that makes it possible for us to travel to Earth's most inhospitable and isolated continent? Sure, there have been polar expeditions for over a hundred years now, but you do not need to go too far back in the literature to realise that it was made under completely different risks and sacrifices. Its somewhere around where the images changes from color to black and white so see how the conditions and the changes but must have felt both fear and anxiety. There is more than one story about the expedition That Were left on the ice, not just one, but two long winters more than planned.

Learning from our success using both the cars and snowmobiles to access sites during the fieldwork in Tottanfjella, it was decided to make a speedy return journey to Milorgfjella with the snowmobiles. This would hopefully allow us to visit the high elevation, summit sites we were unable to access during the first visit

Every expedition needs a great leader and we are lucky that we have Henrik Törnberg in that role. Henrik was involved right from the start in helping us with the overall planning and organisation of the MAGIC-DML fieldwork, running up to our current deployment in January-February 2017. He also has day-to-day responsibility for the planning and safety of the expedition while we are here in the field in Antarctica.

Henrik Hedelin is the expeditions Medical Doctor. He usually works as an orthopaedic surgeon in the Queen Silvia Children´s Hospital in Gothenburg and the last 10 years he has been specialising in Mountain and wilderness medicine. As a doctor in Gothenburg he operates on children with broken legs and arms.

On 30 January we set out in sunny weather on our second major expedition to explore the southern reaches of Heimefrontfjella – specifically the clusters of nunataks, mountains protruding above the ice surface, known as Tottanfjella. We made good time to the fuel depot, arriving about 8 hours after departing Wasa.

On the latest trip out we were camped on the ice sheet at about 1500 metres above sea level and we had night-time temperatures well below -20 C so some of us have taken to using two sleeping bags, one inside the other, to keep warm. We also have a small toilet tent, pitched at a discreet distance from the other tents…

Det finns mycket teknisk utrustning på en polarforskningsstation. På Wasa finns sju snöskotrar, fyra bandvagnar, två terrängbilar, två dieselgeneratorer, vattensystem med snösmältare, gasolsystem, elsystem med solpaneler samt en mängd annan teknisk utrustning och byggnader som måste hållas i funktionsdugligt skick.

The field team once sent us a message along the way to their new camp site. The way to Heimefrontfjella and the depot at Steinnabben went really fast thanks to the good weather. They refueled there, hooked on the trailer and started the snowmobiles...

On January 21st we headed out for our first major fieldwork in Milorgfjella (pronounced "Mee-lorg-feeyella") about 240 km South-southeast, of the research station Wasa. We set out early in the morning with our two trusty cars packed to the gills with fieldwork equipment, food, camping gear, and the many bits and pieces that are needed for remote fieldwork in Antarctica.

Neil Glasser, Nat Lifton, Ola Fredin and Jenny Newall is our four researchers during this expedition. If they didn't need go to Antarctica and look for rocks, this expedtion would not have happened.

Still happy from yesterday's the field trip to Svea. After just a few hours of sleep we put the work clothes on and its time to prepare and pack for the next field trip.

Before the others had time to wake up all rolled all of the house elf (Pär, Stefan and Karin) down the hill in the blue cars and we set out on this trip to Svea. This was the most practical solution, this way the field team have the time to focus on planning for the next trip and take the opportunity to rest a little.

After sometime Consideration, we came to the decision to make a trip to our second research station Svea. The aim was to deploy a depot with two scooters, fuel and a car trailer for the next field expedition. We hope that this will give the scientist a better possibility to get to where they want.

The days have continued in the same spirit at the station. In the kitchen we have produced lunchboxes for future expeditions. In the yard we have parked the MARA-hut on its new location behind the generator container and secured it with wires. The sun is warm during the days and it makes the gas work quite well, therefore we will postpone the gas installation in the hut until it gets colder.

Lights in the dashboard of the tracked vehicle 15 are on. They indicate That it hasent been to the workshop for a while. The handbook says "if a fault occurs, repair it". We literally follow that advice. Errors occur and we fix. Continuously.

I dag började arbetsdagen med att byta flaggstångslinor. De fyra flaggstängerna har blivit gamla blivit slitna av väder och vind. Även linorna har blivit utmattade och börjat slacka, och därmed även börjat smattra mer och mer. Något man visst bara lägger märke till när man krupit ner under täcket och det är tyst i huset. Men att då tassa ut i pyjamasen för att spänna upp linorna igen är inte något som frestat, istället har man satt i öronproppar och lagt kudden över huvudet. Men så igår kväll blev de ihågkomna när vi ännu ytterkläderna var på.

And now we are only three person left. Again. We have just sent off the team with all researchers and and four of our logicians. The alarm clock rang at four forty and at six we had freshly baked bread for them to bring as lunch packages. The last tour was mainly a test to get the chance to get to know the cars, camping gear, research equipment and communication equipment. But this field expedition will be a bigger one.

The MAGIC-DML team have been out on their first major trip from Wasa. We have been to a small nunatak called Fossilryggen about 50km across the ice from Wasa.

Calle are our mountain guide here in Antarctica, It's his job to monitor our operations and make sure that we're not exposed to any risks. When Calle is not on a polar expedition he is working as safety manager on high-altitude job sites and as a mountain guide with focus on skiing in Scandinavia.

Karin really plays a key role in the expedition – she makes sure we eat great food three times a day. It requires a lot of knowledge and planning to create a functional food plan for an Antarctic expedition. We are eleven persons who eat three times a day for two months. Overall, we are spending around 300 person-days at Wasa plus around 250 person-days in our field camp. This means 1,650 meals to be planned, prepared and cooked.