I think I told you about the Skua bird. It is one of the rare non-human life forms here. They are aggressive scavengers. Just like the seals and the penquins, they have no fear of humans. They seem to know that it's against the law here to intimidate them, let alone harm them. Like Yellowstone Park
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| They look small here, but they're at least size of a small duck. |
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| No Kidding! |
Well, I've always suspected that being "skua'd" was largely a camp legend, since I had never seen it happen. But while I was staying away from the the general population with my case of the "crud," I asked my partner, the good Father Kevin, to dish up a plate for me so I could carry it across to the dorm. Well you know what happened--I was skua'd! I had my parka hood partially up, but I noticed something very large coming down at my head from the right side. I looked up to see these enormous wings flapping right above my head, and a big set of tallons reaching down for my food. I knew right away what it was, and decided I wasn't going down without a fight. If challeged by the law, I would claim self-defense. As quick as I could, I pulled the tray down to my left, and was trying to figure out if I could hold it with the left hand and put my right fist into that birds chest. But, before I could do that, the skua swooped on down to the ground and walked casually away as if no crime had been committed. Fortunately I escaped with my food, and no charges were filed; but the skua got away scott-free.
I wonder how communications get out from such an isolated place. All satellite?
ReplyDeleteJohn---What great lessons you are giving us!! I think that we knew very little about Antarctica and we are learning so much. Thank you for the time you take to keep us up-dated. Keep as warm as possible (It has been COLD here) and God bless your work there.---Harold & Judy Spilde
ReplyDeleteYes Wayne,
ReplyDeleteI think it's all satellite. We're not supposed to do things like Skype, because it uses too much band width, but we do have pretty high speed internet. Through some kind of wizardry, we can make local phone calls from here to Denver; and then we use a calling card from there. It's pretty rare to find a place on earth anymore where you can't communicate.
They even have fairly good GPS here now, though it costs a lot to put those satellites up. The 109th Airlift Wing that makes most of the flights from here to the pole uses GPS, but as a backup, they are the only ones who carry navigators with equipment to navigate by the sun. Imagine navigating in a place where, not only do the longitudinal lines get closer and cloer together, but the magnetic declination is somewhere around 170 degrees off. That is, when your compass says South, you are going almost North, and vice versa. If you look for the magnetic pole on a globe, you'll find it somewhere off in the Southern Sea, I think.
Herold and Judy,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment. We are having pretty nice weather here when the wind doesn't blow. We sure can't complain when we hear what it's doing in Montana. By the way, there's a whole group of researchers here from Montana State. They were glad to hear that the Cat's beat the Griz this year.