November 17, 1975: Monday

Got up at 08:00, or just before. Felt miserable. Sneezing, coughing, runny nose, sore throat. Nothing terrible. Yesterday I developed a pain in my Eustachian tube. I guess it’s my Eustachian tube because when I yawn, my ear hurts. It’s the kind of pain I remember having had before, but can’t remember when, like a well-known face with no name. It only tingles occasionally, now. At least I’m not sick sick.

Cal pulls 590 up to the plug-in by the generator, gets out, and the cord is too short. I’m glad I’m not the only one that does that.

Helo coming out at nine so Dr. Treves was on the radio at eight. He gave us helo scheduling information. And we told him that Jerry could come out today to do a temperature measurement. He went off to arrange things.

It appears that his flight is going to take someone from this place out to Wright and Victoria Valley to help reduce the DFA levels in the old holes. Cal says he’ll go, unless I want to go.

I make no answer.

“If you want to go, go ahead.”

“Let’s wait until Dr. Treves gets here and we can talk about it when we know what the situation is.”

A little later, from Cal, “You know, they will be bailing out the hole, so if you still have problems lifting things…”

I didn’t say anything. I would like to go, I want to go, but it’s my shift and I think a helo ride would only give me a headache today.

And then we’re talking about it to Jim and Li’l Steve and Murray. They all want rocks. Cal says he’ll bring some back, but he’s not sure who’s going. “Talk to Sam, if he’s going. If you do go, be sure to bring back some dike rocks from the other side of the lake.”

Well, that settles it. So when Dr. Treves asked who was going to go, I say, “Cal.” I’ll go next time. Anyway my camera has black and white film in it.

So they leave after bringing Leon home. At nine o’clock Mac Center says that Little Sam should be standing by at 9:45 for radio contact.

That’s interesting.

The helo got here about 9:30. At 9:45 Kathy came up and wanted to know if Dr. Treves was there. She had a message from Hamish about using dirty DFA at Marble Point.

That’s interesting, too.

There’s some trouble with the drill rig. It keeps getting stuck in the hole and they’re just at the verge of snapping off the rod. So they shut down to wait for Jerry to come measure the bottom temperature. If it’s frozen, sea water will melt the core and it will collapse to sand. They’ll use DFA, instead, as a circulating fluid.

In the meantime, I read Penmarric. It’s a great book. I wonder what Marilyn really thought about it. I sit around and drink some of Jim Meehan’s cordial, three gallons of Wyler’s lemonade, cherry flavor, and gin. For my cold, you know.

Jerry gets here. The temperature of the sand at the bottom is -1.087º Celsius. That’s between the freezing point of sea water and fresh water. Our conclusion - it’s permafrost if the water in the core is fresh. It’s not frozen if the water in the core is salt water. Jack must assume that it’s not frozen because they’re is no evidence in either direction, which is a conclusion.

Dr. Nakai thinks that salinity can be judged by the pH of the water in the core. That’s logistically hard. We don’t have any pH paper here and to get some out here would take at least a day.

So I make a decision. I know that Cal will be unhappy about what I do.

I called Mac Center and ask them to ring the Earth Science Lab and have Kathy or Howard come up on the radio in twenty minutes.

Dr. Treves is back and I talk to him. I feel very foolish. I’m making a request which may be absurd and at the same time sounding urgent. He wants to know if we have an pH paper out here. To tell the truth, I’d forgotten to look. So I said negative, and prayed that it was true. Oh, if we had some I’d be in trouble, causing a stir over nothing (typical me). I looked afterwards and we didn’t.

So I tell them to go ahead and try to do the experiment, taking the pH of any water they can get out of the core by heating, and comparing it with the pH in the sea water we have in the wash sample bags. If it’s basic, then it’s salt water and the core is not frozen.

Dr. Treves suggests that the results would be more significant if we used the core that was from the present zone of trouble, which is still out here.

Well, the helo is back to pick up Jerry. I rush around, trying to get the core on board his flight, for eventual return to town. And as I drive back from the rig with the core, the helo takes off.

Dr. Treves says it’s O.K. They’ll try to advance our resupply run from tomorrow to tonight. All this hassle to get the core home. I don’t know if I acted right. Is the pH of the core important enough for a special helo flight? Is it important enough to make a special call to Mac Center?

Well, we got a message anyway. Peter wants to compensate our depth readings for tidal changes. I’m supposed to find out what the tides were for each time a core was taken.

I explain to Dr. Treves the difficulty involved, that the time of coring is sketchy and tide measurements are sporadic. I’ll do my best.

Martin shows me how he measures the tide. It’s from a blue collar down to the top of the very outside casing, which is anchored on the bottom. The collar moves with the ice. The distance from the rig floor to the outside casing gives us some sort of depth compensation. Peter’s going to have to set a standard height and figure from there. Cal thinks it’s a waste of time.

At six we learn that Dr. Treves and Peter will bring out the resupply about 8:30 p.m. I tell him we’ve worked out a system to record tides while cores are being taken. The only trouble is that we’ll have to get wet. Cal doesn’t mind about that.

So I go about gathering two sets of data and combining them. At 7:30 a helo, coming from the Valleys, stopped. It’s the same one that took off while I was driving the core to it. He had come back to pick up the core, etc.

After a quick conference, we send Martin and Mike home with them (Mr. Gordon) and waited to put the core on the other helo, if it comes out, now.

Jack says that the Times reporter got stuck at the South Pole. There’s a lot of joking going on about all the signs that were repainted. Sort of like hide and seek. This morning I asked Cal if the reporter would come out on a regular resupply. He hoped so, maybe with Van Reeth. Li’l Steve was rummaging through a cardboard box. He said, “Maybe the guy would like to buy a souvenir T-shirt.” He held up a freshly painted Antarctic Oil Exploration Company T-shirt.

The helo came out with lots of supplies and went home with wash samples and core. We explained our tide measuring and data. Dr. Treves and Jack think the core is salt water. Cal, Peter, and Dr. Nakai think it’s fresh water. I guess my idea about the analysis being done is good. They’re going to do it with a salinity machine, not pH paper.

Well, the reporter will be out tomorrow. Sign repainting is now progressing. Dave Bresnehan is behind all this, probably in the best interest of job security.

Got a letter from Marilyn. Things are going to be difficult when answering her, not to confuse her and Joy. But it will be fun. I enjoy conversing with her over 12,000 miles.