On the ride home

Sitting on the plane in King Salmon. This 737-200 is about 1/2 cargo and 1/2 people....

Interesting to note: I can see a King-Salmon wireless network from the airplane! That is just another sign of how connected the world is. Right now, the sun is about to set, and the sky and colors are absolutely beautiful... well, if it weren't for the fact that almost everything is brown, it would be.

Weather in Adak: Rain, wind. surprise.

Also of note, someone cruised the Adak class website and found my volcano sounds. It's great to get feedback...

Visiting class

Adak time is rushing past! I didn't sleep too well last night, tossing and turning without much comfort or warmth. I was listening to my music all night on headphones, but feel like I had a grand total of maybe 2 hrs. Oh well.

This morning, I fixed a quick breakfast burrito, and then marched on over to the school with Jess, Michelle, Tina, and Ed. Jessica gave the preliminary talk on Volcanoes and volcano monitoring. I chimed in, as did Michelle and Tina. Then, I talked a little about earthquakes (Apparently, according to Tina, I have excellent body language when I convey the idea of wave motion ?!?) and played some volcano sounds. It was about this point that I learned the school has an internet connection, which I proceeded to take great advantage of.

I showed some photos of the station installation, and then Guy showed up with an old, dug-up seismometer which he hooked to his computer and gave a demonstration. I was impressed with how well Guy explains this stuff to the children. By the end of the two hour session, we had the children in 3-4 groups and were answering questions and demonstrating stuff.

It turns out that both the helicopter (Bill & Anthony) and the Maid left today, with only Cyrus stopping by to say G'bye.

I spent the afternoon checking email and deleting spam. Had a talk with a couple locals, including the husband of Blue (The lower-grade teacher) who set up the wireless connection, and Allan, a very talkative guy. I was saved from the conversation by Pizza for dinner (being carried out by Jess & Tina). At home, a quick call from Katie, a half-game of scrabble, and then a couple movies : "Crash" and "The life and death of Peter Cellars"

Looking forward to getting home, though.

spitting in the wind

Friggin' windy today. Today was spent making the CD for Gerry, and starting the video for Eich, as well as packing up for the coming trip.

Early evening, we explored the White Alice station, along with the 60+kt winds. Also, we explored some of the old ghost town, which was just begging for further exploration with a flashlight. The town is better stripped than the FWS office, but the sudden emptiness is a bit spooky.

Evening brought about a great enchilada dinner, cooked by the ladies. Then, a bit of heavy getting-ready for an upcoming chat with the school children of Adak (tomorrow 10-12)

BackinAdak

We've been at dock for an hour. I've been spending my time with the final packing. No one is rushing to get off the boat, except perhaps Anthony and Josh.

organizing

Today, I mostly spent organizing photos to return to Gerry. We're staying in the bunkhouse, a safe-haven for FWS people.

From Easternmost point in the US to the Westernmost in a wink

Hard to believe it's done. We're currently in the pass, heading back to Adak and points beyond. The day started with a trip up the hill on the 4-wheeler, where Jess and I were to help Cy and John with the final breakdown of camp. For lunch, I'd packed a couple slices of pizza (George cooked it last night... mmm) and a soda. Of course, the soda was crushed and soaked my pizza...

Anyway, we helped break down tents and set up sling loads as well as started the great bonfire used for burning all the trash in camp. Then, before we knew it, it was 4pm and we were leaving the bay.

Today, I finally got to watch dolphins playing in the wake of the boat. They stayed a bit astern, though a couple times they came within maybe 20 feet of the boat. This was around sunset, and lasted probably 5 minutes... I didn't bother to collect my camera and take a shot, instead I just watched... their smooth movements and blows brought to mind sentient waves, rather than sea creatures.

Prepping to pull out

Forecast is looking terrible. Today, it is foggy out, but the bay is like cellophane. Tuesday, there's supposed to be a really large blow -- 55mph or so. Not the time to be at sea, so we'd very much like to be in Adak before then.

Today, Jerry and Max went up the hill to help Cyrus and John with the camp stuff. Meanwhile, I stayed with everyone else on the boat and cleaned out the storage hatch. Ed cleaned out the lab, as did Tina.

Eventually, the helicopter came with two loads of stuff from camp. I, with much help from Michelle, stuffed just about everything, excluding action packers and geophysical stuff into the hold below (starboard side). The stuff there includes two bikes, cement stuff, GPS units, john's weather port, batteries, and misc large boxes from camp. All the action packers are still topside, awaiting their final packing.

A couple scrabble games ensued, as did a screening of "You only live twice"; thus far, my least favorite bond movie.

Finishing up Little Sitkin

Today was a day of lounging, mostly. The morning was taken up with discussions of yesterday and such. First thing on the agenda was to see if Anthony could fix the helicopter. Thank goodness, he did.

Next, the helicopter flew Guy to LS to finish work on the stations. He finished SE, then NW, but didn't get a chance to work on SA. Now, we have 4 working, even though NW can't work without the repeater.

The boat was going to meet them, but the water was too rough. We went just outside the harbor, got tossed around a little, and dropped fishing lines. We all caught something, with me catching a pacific cod -- it only took as long as dropping the line to catch it!

First thing tomorrow, the Papa Pilgrim will be removed from semi.. Then, Guy will fly out with Tina.

On my own

How it all ends with a whisper!
I had a hard time sleeping last night. I was a little preoccupied with having everything I needed; also, I was overheating in my room. When I finally awoke at 7:40, I ate breakfast, and then raced around making final adjustments to the stuff I was bringing along.

Overnight, the helicopter got its 100hr once-over, thanks to Anthony and his little helper, Josh. They worked on it on the shore of Kiska harbor by lamplight.

I left with my survival pack, a tub for mixing cement, tools that Ed had packed for me, water, a pick, and yesterday's sandwich. We flew from the boat (still parked in the harbor) and had an uneventful flight to the volcano. We circled the crater a bit, so I took a bunch of photos. All in all, it was a pretty foggy day, so I ended up at LSNW instead of either of the other sites (LSKO, or LSPA).

First, though, I stopped on shore to remove cement from all the huts. I also grabbed a Hoe. I piled cement in the chopper with me, and then proceeded to the site. I was under the impression that we'd get to the shovels that were at LSPA. Wrong. The terrain I was digging in was heavily rocky, along with lots of soil. It would have been very beneficial to have that shovel! Instead, I was groping around with the hoe, and using my hands.

Bill showed up with the hut before I had fully prepared the site, and so we left the hut a bit askew, as I continued to chip away at the area with my meager tools. By the time I had finally placed the hut, Bill showed up with a shovel. Next, I drilled holes for the J-bolts and cemented down the hut. While given 5 bags, I used 4 1/2 bags of concrete, since two bags of cement were all but solid rocks.

Afterwards, I started digging a hole for the seismometer -- no luck. Too shallow rocks. Then I started a second hole.
As I nearly finished this one, Guy showed up (with Bill, of course) with the batteries, and news that I was going to be flown to the boat. Something was wrong with the helicopter's electrical system, so our mission has been scrubbed.

With that and a "hook up the batteries", he was off.

With a little radio help from guy, I got the batteries all connected. The air cells were activated and wired in series. The gel cells were wired parallel in threes, with the middle batteries connecting to the power switcher.

I could hear a little chatter. Apparently, guy was up somewhere in the fog and was slowly making his way down to the helicopter. Eventually, the helicopter just came to get me, and went back for guy, who was still off in the fog. I jumped out and hiked up to guy to give him a hand, and vroom! We were off to the boat.

Right now, there is a hut sitting on the beach that has no weight in it. Just air-cells and a solar panel. oh, and an antenna, hut kit, and seismometer cable. It won't likely be there when we return in 2-3 years.

Bill has flown with Ed back to the dock at Amchitka. We'll be spending the night there -- in Constantine harbor, again. The weather is supposed to be really crappy. soon. A storm with 55kt winds and high seas will be here on, I think it was Sunday. We need to be gone before that. And so... the great western Aleutian field excursion has just come to a grinding halt. 4 huts are in the ground on LS, which is amazing, considering that we didn't expect ANY. Two seismometers, I believe, are working there. All 6 at Semi are up and running. All together, pretty successful. Despite the weather.

commuters

Today was also a bit frustrating. Tina and Michelle headed out to the island with the morning flight. The rest of us took the boat over. Once somewhere near LS, Guy and Ed flew out to go finish their sites. Then, Max and 6 batteries went out to the beach. Next, Me and 6 batteries.

We dropped off the batteries, and then Bill took me up to LSPA, where I was to prep the hut. With me, I brought the 3D seismometer, the electronics, and a little water.

By this time, it was already something like 2, and the boat wanted to leave by 4:30. Well, the weather wasn't looking promising, so my hut was scrubbed for the day. I did wander around a little, decided it was a nice site, then hopped back in the copter for a trip back to the boat.

Tomorrow morning, I'll be on the first helicopter out with Jessica. If all goes well, I'll do LSPA. If it goes even better, then I'll do LSKO (which is on top of a hill, and usually inaccessible). If it doesn't look good at either of those two sites, I'm going to find and dig out LSNW, which Guy has spotted today.

The weather was still pretty darn nice, and for that I am very grateful... even if I didn't personally get anything done today.