1 October, 1998

We arrived at the Antarctic center to dress for the flight at 6:15 am and were told that the flight would be dalayed and to report backe at 8:15 am, so went for a coffee and roll. A man whose job on the ice is air traffic control said that the road to the runway nor the runway itself had been cleared off. The "winter-over" crew is not very large so I'm sure that those at McMurdo are working aroun the clock so that they can go home! The winds were reported to be over 40 knots (~48 mph) although the temperature has been decent (-8 C ~ 18 F). The next message regarding our flight was to report back in at 9:20 am, so to pass the time we went for a walk- it was tiresome to "hang around" the airport terminal area and felt good to get some exercise and fresh air. Upon returning at 9:20, we were directed to dress out and then went through the ritual of checking our carry-on bag with the X-ray machine and our person with the metal detector. We were again bused to the runway and boarded the plane. We were in the air by 11:00 am. The crew annouinced that this flight would be an hour by hour thing... in fact we waited at the runway to check the 10:00 am satellite picture before having us board. The mood of the passengers was a bit subdued today, people were tired and just wanted to get to McMurdo! Once again as it was announced that we were nearing descent, but just a few minutes later we were told that it was impossible to land- the winds on the runway were 45 knots (54 mph). It was interesting to find out later that most of the day it had been beautiful at McMurdo. Some of our research group had arrived early and were watching for the plane, and said that just as we were heading in there was an increase in winds!! Well, everyone on the plane was extremely disappointed! We did not arrive in ChristChurch until 8:00 pm and will have to try again tomorrow! C heck-in is scheduled f