THE DRY VALLEYS →
The Dry Valleys are a unique geologic feature within Victoria Land, west of McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. They are one of the world's most extreme deserts. Glaciers have carved deep valleys that receive very little moisture and are subject to katabatic winds. The area was unknown to humans until the Robert Scott expedition of 1903. He referred to it as "a valley of death."
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ANDRILL →
When Richard Levy asked me if I knew anything about multimedia, I had a very limited perspective of how my answer would shape the future of my life.
I thought back on that moment when I was curled up on the McMurdo Ice Shelf, in a yellow Scott tent, wondering if it was bad that my toes had been numb for the last 5 hours. It was 40 degrees below zero, I had a cold, and was in a claustrophobic panic next to three other women with the only escape being a small tubed canvas hole on the other side of the tent. My bladder was full.
Let's just say I wasn't a natural for Antarctic field work.
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BYRD SURFACE CAMP →
So just how do you prepare yourself for camping out in the middle of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet?
With about 25 and a half million cubic kilometers of ice separating you from the rest of the world, it can be hard to know what to pack for an extended stay at 80° South.
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POLENET →
How much ice is there in the world?
Good grief, what a question.
The polar world is a woven fabric of interconnected research and exploration sparked by questions such as this. Because it is void of the permanence of any normal, settled population, the polar community tends to criss-cross the globe, offering a bit of randomness to life's path. My experience with the Antarctic Geologic Drilling (ANDRILL) program ultimately led me to work with another group of polar researchers called the Polar Earth Observing Network (POLENET).
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