Martin's Antarctic Visit  
January 2004  

We were allowed just a few hours of helicopter time to reach some ice coring sites that were too distant from McMurdo Station for us to visit using snowmachines. As you can see, we had yet more good weather on that day: apart from the clear blue sky and intense sunshine, it was -3°C and the wind was calm.

On such brilliant days, Mount Erebus is a commanding presence. It is a roughly 12,000' active volcano, with a lava lake in the crater and often a plume of gas pouring out at the summit. It is named after HMS Erebus, one of the ships of an expedition to this region led by Sir John Ross in the mid-19th Century. One of the other ships was HMS Terror, and Mount Terror (an extinct volcano) can be seen at the right of the picture.

The helicopter is a civilian version of the military "Huey" helicopter, operated by Petroleum Helicopters International of Louisiana. I flew in U.S.Navy Hueys when I worked at McMurdo Station in the early 1990s. I don't particularly like flying in helicopters, but they do allow you to travel further afield and see you field study area from a different perspective.

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