FROZEN EYELASHES - thursday 18 october

Weather: -10.c, wind chill -34.c

It's meant to snow tomorrow! yeah that's what im talking about. Apparently a big storm is heading our way. I haven't seen it snow here yet so i'm pretty excited. So all you southerly facing Wellington folk - carry a woolly hat with you over the next couple of days.
Work was a blast today, speaking of blasts.... they had one here today. They placed explosives all around one of the fuel tanks covered in snow to clear it. Sounded pretty intelligent to me.
But all was "sweet as". I'm teaching my american buddies to talk kiwi.

We did a lot of training today and i got to learn the ropes of dispatch. I even answered an incoming off continent phone call to which the caller sounded extremely confused... "now did i just call mcmurdo or scott base"
Vanessa (my ambo sister) you would be proud. I spiked an I.V bag today, hooked up some EKG leads to the monitor and took the blood pressure and vitals of just about all the boys at station. I even measured my own blood/oxygen level on the pulse oximeter.

Top gun was the movie of choice tonight in our down time (Goldie i did think of you).

The shots are of the hike I did yesterday. The monster mountain is Erebus. It's the mother of mcmurdo. She’s the southern most active volcano, and is constantly puffing. She sits a massive 3,800 metres.

A real beauty.

The frozen eyelash shot is a must down here. It's incredible how quick they can freeze up. It's a rather surreal feeling. This is keish, he works for the recreational department.

Wicked.

SCRUB THOSE POTS - wednesday 17 october

Weather: -12.c, wind chill -34.c

Yet another pearler day in paradise.

I woke up to a funky tune playing over the p.a at the firehouse this morning. Last week we had a cracker of a song which lyrics were "i wish i could be in antarctica'

Off duty today so off to the gym i headed to play Lance Armstrong, and ride the bike for an hour. They have a bunch of super flash stationary bikes here called spinners, they look just like road bikes. I felt like i was in zee "tour de antarctica"

I grabbed an early lunch today, then Chris (firefighter) and i jumped into the kitchen and volunteered to lend a hand. The D.A's (dinning assistants) work SUPER hard here in such an unrespected job. We were on dish washing duty, 1200 mouths creates a lot of dishes! that's the best work out ever.....Lance if you're listening.....

Scott, heath, zach and i are heading out hiking at 3pm, doing a loop track which passes one of scott's huts. Then after dinner a bunch of us are hitting the bowling alley. yes you did hear right! Antarctica has it's own bowling alley. It's full of character and there's even a dude at the end of the alley who's job it is to re-stack the pins. He's called a pinsetter. Retro style. I like it.

CHEESEBURGER -tuesday 16 october

Weather: -11.c, wind chill -24.c

Volleyball in neg -28.c anyone?

They breed them tough down here.

So a bunch of us gathered together to knock a ball around for a couple of hours last night, actually i can't kid no more, we were in a heated gymnasium! but it was a blast.

Back on shift again this morning at 7.45am. I'm on engine one today, the big burly yellow machine. I love riding on these american beasts.

The day has flown by with all the training, building inspections, hydrant testing, and most importantly eating a real american cheeseburger for lunch.

Now for some housekeeping. Our shift system here runs 24hrs on 24 off, with shift change at 7.45am each day. I have what they call a kelly day once every fortnight giving me 3 consecutive days off (that's on fridays). At station one, situated in Mctown are two engines (yellow fire trucks), two abulances, and what they call a tanker which holds an unbelievable 3700 gallons of water, a rescue vehicle and a "scat" passenger people mover. Down on station 2 which is located on the sea ice runway, we have 3 rescue 550 vehicles on mat tracks, and one mighty big beast called R1 which has an agent capacity of 1000 gallons. She has personality.

Sweet as.

CHIEF TRANSLATER- monday 15 october

Weather: -20, wind chill -38.c

A very confused american buddy of mine looks my way and whispers....."Now what did he just say you'll" as we sat around listening to a debrief from a New Zealand firefighter at Scott base.

Now us kiwi folk and the americans may speak the same language but boy are the variances in vocabulary hilarious!

Today we had a training exercise over at Scott Base. The kiwi folk had set up a mass casualty drill, and McMurdo fire department was one of the response crews. There was an explosion causing fire and 10 people were unaccounted for. So in goes the brave kiwi "volunteer" crew and mcmurdo's fire crew to save the day.
Great job done by all. The medal is in the mail.

Whilst in amongst the pitch darkness accidentally knocking off tins of baked beans whilst searching for victims, i yell to my New Yorker Lieutenant,
" Yo Mike can you get your torch out" to which i received the reply "come again?" "your torch" "you want a what?" "your torch so we can see" it fell silent, then came a polite but loud "what the hell is a torch"

Note to brain, if you're in a dark environment with an american firefighter ask for a flashlight!

It was a great exercise. The kiwi firefighters did incredibly well. They are made up from domestic staff, carpenters, scientists etc.. and are only given an intensive weeks training in Christchurch before heading out here.

"Kaipai" fellow kiwis, and "great job" fellow americans!

ROOKIE - sunday 14 october

Weather: -10.c, -30 wind chill

Sunday morning sleep in, then off to a church service at 11am. The chapel here is called "chapel of the snows" and it sits super cute in a prime viewing spot out to the ice field.

At noon my shift started. We spent the day training, and ran an exercise drill out of 155 (the dorm i'm staying in). It was a great day and i learnt some new things. The terminology is VERY different here for all the firefighting equipment and even more confusing (this is for the kiwi firefighters) is that in america the male connection of the hose or "attack line" fights the fire whereas back home it's the female - meaning that the connections are all different at the hydrant etc... have to be one step ahead of the game for that one!
Here's a couple more;
(kiwi) dividing breeching (usa) gated Y
(kiwi) collective (usa) simease
(kiwi) hose (usa) attack line
(kiwi) tools (usa) irons
(kiwi) outlets (usa) discharge
(kiwi) truck (usa) engine
and then of course we work on the metric system! phew my brains getting a hammering! i feel like a rookie again! I heard a few laughs the first time i jumped out the truck to be a guide for a guy reversing, i did wonder why he wasn't looking at me out the side mirror. I thought "man this guy's good" then realised i was on the officers/passengers side of the truck! i forgot the driver is on the left here!

Actually i had driver training the other day out on the ice runway, there were 3 vehicles in action, two coming towards me, i noticed they had stopped as seemed to be laughing inside the vehicle. Then i realised i was driving down the left hand side of the road. "crazy kiwi"

DINNER AT SCOTT BASE - 13 saturday october

Weather: -13.c, wind chill -30.c

Two of my american firey mates Dave and Heath, and I ran over to Scott Base today. It was -23.c out today and i tell you what, it's only 3km from McMurdo to Scott but it felt like i was running a marathon! The cold air absolutely whips your lungs, but i loved it! I'll definietely get into that more, especially as the weather will be warming up soon.

I met up with a bunch of folk at Scott base that i'd met the other day. They invited us in for a cup of tea to warm up, what a blast sitting down enjoying a milo (i really miss milo!) in their fire lite lounge which over-looks the pressure ridges of the ice field.

We had a couple of speights in the bar, and were invited to stay for dinner. Yum Yum and more YUM, i'd been told that if you ever get an invite to dinner at Scott base, you NEVER EVER turn it down - and now i see why. Don't get me wrong, dinner at Mctown is awesome - but they are feeding 1100 mouths so the food can be a little bland, plus it has been in storage here for awhile. Whilst at Scott, only having 40ish people at the moment, it's all super fresh! fresh tomatoes, lettuce, avagardo (and i'm not even a great fan of avagardo at home but man did it taste good).

Fantastic!

That night we hit gallagers, which many of the kiwi's came over for. Four bands were playing - made up of d.a's, scientist, ganitors, firey's - all sorts of McTown residents. It was packed! it was like walking into a busy bar on courtney place back home. AWESOME!

TOUCHING A C-17 - friday 12 october

Well fortunately i've been given a kelly day today. Every two weeks you have a day off where the rest of your shift mates go to work, thus giving you 3 consecutive days off.

Except i got called back in because we were short staffed. No worries, i get every second day off anyway! I had a blast. I was stationed out at the ice runway and managed to get a video of a c-17 taking off right from the hold short line (right up on the runway) it felt like i could touch it! i was that close - hopefully i can get it up on this blog!

After dinner i was cleared off duty and a bunch of guys from A shift grabbed me and took me to gallagers, which is one of the pubs here. It was nice to catch up with A shift as working 24hrs on 24 off we don't get to hang out too often.