Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Bars in Antarctica

drinksdigest.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 87 posts

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#71

Post by etrautmann »

etrautmann wrote: post #70
elif wrote: post #36

This is a surprising characterization of alcohol use at mcmurdo, and seems PR-focused. I hiked with a guy after he finished up a season working on the base, and here is what I recall of how he described it: Everyone is so bored that alcohol is the default entertainment, crown royal is virtually the only choice for daily drinking, and drinking is rationed to keep the problem down.

I spent five weeks doing robotics research at McMurdo in 2010. At least then, there were there separate bars, no limits to alcohol consumption, and regular parties. I didn't get the sense that it was a big problem - seemed like a medium-heavy drinking culture that was quite a few notches less problematic than most college campuses.

Reading the rest of the replies here, I may have missed some of the more problematic sides of the drinking culture there - though it wasn't apparent to me.

Side note - for much of the summer it feels like day-drinking since it never gets dark over the summer.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#72

Post by etrautmann »

11235813213455 wrote: post #14

I feel like the CO2 footprint for living there must be super high

Yes - though since much of the science that's performed there is focused on climate, it may be a worthwhile tradeoff. Much like the carbon invested to fly world leaders around - small relative to its global importance.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#73

Post by notpushkin »

Reason077 wrote: post #41
elif wrote: post #36

This is a surprising characterization of alcohol use at mcmurdo, and seems PR-focused. I hiked with a guy after he finished up a season working on the base, and here is what I recall of how he described it: Everyone is so bored that alcohol is the default entertainment, crown royal is virtually the only choice for daily drinking, and drinking is rationed to keep the problem down.

> "Everyone is so bored that alcohol is the default entertainment" Sounds just like winter in the UK to me.

Sounds just like winter in Russia to me. :^)

(Pretty much everywhere else I've been, too. Perhaps something's wrong with my lifestyle.)

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#74

Post by thomasfl »

Norway has an airport and a tax free shop in Antartica. The commercial airliners from Boeing and Airbus lands on the ice. Many nations has stopped using the Russian airport in Antarctica. This has increased the traffic in Norway’s Troll airport lately.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#75

Post by codetrotter »

moron4hire wrote: post #4

With the banning of homebrew at the station being rationalized as a safety issue, do they have actual instances where someone got drunk on homebrew and froze to death outside? Because that seems pretty far-fetched. I've never been so drunk that I didn't notice sub-zero temperature.

> I've never been so drunk that I didn't notice sub-zero temperature.

I once laid down outside on my way home in a drunk state at winter.

It wasn’t that I didn’t notice the cold, or that I didn’t know of the danger. It was me in my drunk state thinking “I’ll just lay down for a little while to rest and then I’ll get up and walk the rest of the way home.”

Thankfully, almost as soon as I laid down someone who was driving past me saw me laying down, stopped, and insisted that they drive me home.

Probably the same kind of thinking which I experienced is what happens to some of the people that freeze to death while drunk.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#76

Post by bill38 »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #20
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot of safety concerns, but not exactly the same level of danger. I suspect the biggest danger, is passing out, and dying of exposure. That also happens here, in New York. Every winter sees a few corpseicles.

Drunk people freezing to death on the street is common everywhere, even in Europe. One of my friends last winter, walked back home super drunk and passed out on the street. Instead of being happy he didn't freeze to death, he was angry some people called the ambulance for him that took him to the hospital, and got a €600 bill for it.

Indeed, it can happen during ski holiday: https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2009/dec/09/ski-holiday-d...

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#78

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

michpoch wrote: post #42
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drunk people freezing to death on the street is common everywhere, even in Europe. One of my friends last winter, walked back home super drunk and passed out on the street. Instead of being happy he didn't freeze to death, he was angry some people called the ambulance for him that took him to the hospital, and got a €600 bill for it.

I'd guess that the €600 was not for the ambulance itself, but for a place where they put them to get sober afterwards. I am not sure what's the common term for such place in English, Wikipedia is suggesting "Drunk tank": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunk_tank Police takes you there if you're too drunk to be on your own, it's paid (and pretty expensive).

>I'd guess that the €600 was not for the ambulance itself, but for a place where they put them to get sober afterwards.

No, it was for the ambulance ride. The socialized public insurance doesn't cover your drunk night out alcohol abuse.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#79

Post by ChuckNorris89 »

Reason077 wrote: post #41
elif wrote: post #36

This is a surprising characterization of alcohol use at mcmurdo, and seems PR-focused. I hiked with a guy after he finished up a season working on the base, and here is what I recall of how he described it: Everyone is so bored that alcohol is the default entertainment, crown royal is virtually the only choice for daily drinking, and drinking is rationed to keep the problem down.

> "Everyone is so bored that alcohol is the default entertainment" Sounds just like winter in the UK to me.

Funny, alcohol seemed like the year-round UK entertainment to may limited experience there.

Re: Bars in Antarctica

#80

Post by reddyalready »

eldaisfish wrote: post #63
feet wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the rate per capita? How does that rate compare to other places?

Be careful before relying on data, particularly data for crimes like rape. Incidents are often not reported and going solely off data, one would conclude that regions like India and sub saharan africa are safer for women than places like Sweden and the USA.

> conclude that regions like India and sub saharan africa are safer for women than places like Sweden and the USA.

Do you have a reliable source for concluding either way? I ask because I've seen conflicting information about per capita statistics (pointing to India and Sub-Saharan Africa indeed being safer) and arguments that the incidences are orders of magnitude higher than reported.

Post reply on HN