Building WAIS Divide Field Camp

Polar Chief - carpenter's warming tent

Just got back from WAIS Divide where I had a great time. It took two weeks of delays to get there, but we finally arrived. We were lucky in that day was sunny and beautiful so it made it aesy to put up our tents. The weather quickly changed by the next day to be colder and much windier. The temperatures ranged between 5 degrees farenheit to -4 degrees farenheit. There was a really good group of carpenters there and we put everything up fairly quickly. It took a little over a week to get the town set up. There was a galley mod and tent, a rec/wash room mod and tent, a coms (communication) tent, a science tent, a medical tent, the KBA tent (KBA stands for Ken Borak Air. They are out of Calgary, Canada and fly the small planes for us in Antarctica.), There were also two Jamesway tents used for sleeping. The Jamesways are circa 1951 military tents. This may be the only place in the world that still uses them. They are slowly being phased out.

Science RAC Tent

Galley RAC Tent - floors

KBA Polar Haven & Medical RAC Tent

Moving the galley modular from the winter berm to town

Jamesway pieces

Galley RAC tent handstand

Galley RAC tent with Hercules C-17 in the background

Galley RAC tent just before the yellow "blankets" were put on

Galley RAC tent group photo