Dale Andersen's Field Reports

Dale Andersen’s Astrobiology Antarctic Status Report: 30 October 2022: The Traverse From Novo Station To Lake Untersee

By Keith Cowing
Press Release
Dale Andersen
November 2, 2022
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Dale Andersen’s Astrobiology Antarctic Status Report: 30 October 2022: The Traverse From Novo Station To Lake Untersee
The Traverse
Dale Andersen

Sun, 30 Oct 2022 4:19 PM

Keith

Thanks for the update! Hope it is calming down now, but doubt it. We completed building the large traverse sleds today and the Prinoth Everest tracked vehicle hooked up the cabin sled (one member will ride inside there), with the cargo sled, and our sea-container so they are set to go now.

We will arise at 5:30 am for breakfast, get hot water into thermoses, make some lunch and at 7am we will hit the icy road to Untersee via snowmobile. The Prinoth Everest and sleds will start out about two hours later.

It normally takes us about 51/2 to 6 hrs to make the traverse but that is dependendent on weather (which seems ok right now, tomorrow may be cloudy with 20-25 knot winds), and the condition of the surface we traverse – blue-ice that has no snow is bumpy and slower, a nice snowpack is easier and faster. We will see a mix of both, but hopefully we see more snow than ice.

All for now, I will send tracking to you so you can follow along or see the route later, and will drop a note once we settle in at the lake.

Cheers,
Dale

Keith’s Update: here are the images from Dale’s traverse from Novo Station to the Lake Untersee Base camp site.

Astrobiology

Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Station Payload manager/space biologist, Away Teams, Journalist, Lapsed climber, Synaesthete, Na’Vi-Jedi-Freman-Buddhist-mix, ASL, Devon Island and Everest Base Camp veteran, (he/him) 🖖🏻