Riding In The Kress

Yesterday, when I got off the A-319 Airbus, there were two vehicles ahead of me. Ivan the Terrabus; an old, sometimes trustworthy friend which was full of people, and The Kress Vehicle. It turns out that Ivan was full of folks that were headed north to Christchurch. I would be taking my first trip on the Kress.


I first wrote about the Kress a couple of years ago when it was delivered via the cargo vessel. It's actually a pretty impressive vehicle.


Inside, it seats 59 passengers and feels like a movie theatre. The ride was one of the smoothest I've had from any of the runways here. I was even able to have the ability to have a nice conversation with a past fellow winterover I hadn't seen in many years. Count me as a big fan of the Kress!

BBC-EMS

After several years of being re-supplied by the
cargo vessel American Tern, we have a different
ship visiting McMurdo this season. It's the
BBC-EMS. It's a much newer ship than the Tern.
This photo was actually taken while it was in
the St. Clair River in Michigan, meaning it has
spent some time in the Great Lakes! Who knows?
Maybe it's been to the Port of Indiana, nearby
where I grew up!

Onload

Now that Offload has finished for another year,
the process of Onload has begun. This involves
loading up the vessel with everything that is no
longer useful here at McMurdo. In most cases,
this involves placing cans (milvans...ie.shipping
containers) back onto the boat full of yummy stuff
such as recycled trash (including all of our leftovers),
equipment that no longer works, cardboard, etc. All
under the guise of Retro. This process usually takes
as long, if not longer than unloading the ship.
Unfortunately, I spoke too quickly a few days ago
about everything running smoothly. There's a small
hole in the side of the boat and divers are going to
have to repair it before it heads underway. This will
delay things by at least a day.

Last Days for Mail

There is now less than a week to mail packages
and boxes off the Ice for the season. I was
fairly smart this year and mailed the couple of
things I had to send early. Literally 50 people
will be lined up out the door next week to
mail boxes of things home. They've even offered
to have people send things home on the Cargo
Vessel this year as an option to get things
out of here. However, there won't be any price
break and it will have to sit on a boat for over
a month. Plus...it still has to be ready to mail
by February 4th. Doesn't sound like much of a
deal to me.