3 September, 2003

Snowstorm

We are at condition 1, the highest, it is severe weather. The winds are blowing at 45 mph, the wind chill has dipped to minus 70 or so. The building is shaking, powdery snow is sneaking through the bay door. Staying outside is not a wise idea, it is easy to get frostbite in short order. I can only imagine the misery the early explorers felt in conditions worse than this. Needless to say, we are not launching our balloon. It is too bad as the upper atmosphere has now circumnavigated the South Pole, we would be sampling the same air that we sampled five days ago. So today we sit and wait until the weather improves. I took a short walk, I had hoped to find the greenhouse but I could not see it.

The daily weather post. 1 is severe, 3 is normal.

That's me in Big Red.

You can build a snow fort with hard pack snow like this, but otherwise forget about snowmen because it is all powder.

All doors leading outside look like this. They are freezer doors in reverse.