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United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

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Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#31

Post by cryzinger »

foobarbecue wrote: post #11

The version of this that we had when I worked on Erebus (2009-2017) was more fun. It had a section about crossing crevasses with combinations of sleds and snomobiles and tracked vehicles, crevasse rescue etc. In the middle of otherwise serious text it said "to recover from this situation, you might elect to [something], or possibly [something else]. Either way, a change of underwear is recommended." If people want I…

I like how the very first pages for this one are related to emergency procedures. Gotta put the critical stuff front and center!

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#32

Post by sans_souse »

foobarbecue wrote: post #11

The version of this that we had when I worked on Erebus (2009-2017) was more fun. It had a section about crossing crevasses with combinations of sleds and snomobiles and tracked vehicles, crevasse rescue etc. In the middle of otherwise serious text it said "to recover from this situation, you might elect to [something], or possibly [something else]. Either way, a change of underwear is recommended." If people want I…

So wait.. does that mean they no longer recommend a change of underwear in such cases?

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#33

Post by iainctduncan »

Shameless plug: People into this sort of thing might be into my partner's book coming out in April. It's a beautifully written blend of science writing (penguin biology), memoir, and terrifying asides from the heroic age of Antarctic exploration. Her accounts of the wackiness of living and working out of McMurdo are really fun to read, and include all the orientation and training for which this manual was written (though she was there in 2003). And the history stuff is just hair raising.

One of my favourite lines: "There are many ways to die in Antarctica."

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/796661/where-the-ear...

(That's the Canadian publisher link, but it's coming out at the same time in the US, UK, Germany, Australia, and Russia as well, and is on all the major book things as preorder).

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#36

Post by darknavi »

foobarbecue wrote: post #14
darknavi wrote: post #7

I find it neat that even in a climate as hostile as the Antarctic humans still make an effort to recycle. > Field Camp Hut Etiquette > Sort and pack all trash and recycled materials and take them back to McMurdo Station for proper disposal.

Oh man if you had any idea how much work goes into waste sorting & disposal there. In McMurdo every trash station has trash cans for ~10 different categories. I was always calling up the waste department to ask about classification. We would get bored and argue about the classification of juice boxes for "fun". I worked on Erebus and all of our pee & poop got helicoptered out in buckets. Food waste was shipped all th…

Very fun insight, thanks for sharing your story!

I assume things like Starlink have made the station a lot less "boring", which might depreciate some of the "off-grid" novelty of being there.

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#37

Post by Xss3 »

cryzinger wrote: post #31
foobarbecue wrote: post #11

The version of this that we had when I worked on Erebus (2009-2017) was more fun. It had a section about crossing crevasses with combinations of sleds and snomobiles and tracked vehicles, crevasse rescue etc. In the middle of otherwise serious text it said "to recover from this situation, you might elect to [something], or possibly [something else]. Either way, a change of underwear is recommended." If people want I…

I like how the very first pages for this one are related to emergency procedures. Gotta put the critical stuff front and center!

Good UX for emergency situations is underrated.

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#38

Post by Xss3 »

netsharc wrote: post #20
smlavine wrote: post #2

Related: a cool blog from a year or two ago from a participant in this program: https://brr.fyi

Reading the post about how a lot of tech breaks because of the slow internet https://brr.fyi/posts/engineering-for-slow-internet makes me think "Kids these days" (stupid kid coders who can't take into consideration slow or latency-filled connections) and want to take a bat into the "open space" where these dumb devs are siting around...

Am a young dev but it shocks me how few of my fellow developers actually consider tech from the ground up.

Most just say 'x has y, we can use that', even when x does a thousand other things and we only want y.

They completely skip the design phase of Y because they have X.

If you design something with actual minimal requirements, ignoring frameworks and language choices, you may end up using X to do Y, but youll at least know what your system should be doing under the hood.

The thought of designing something from scratch seems to be an alien concept these days.

Re: United States Antarctic Program Field Manual (2024) [pdf]

#39

Post by foobarbecue »

mmooss wrote: post #17
foobarbecue wrote: post #11

The version of this that we had when I worked on Erebus (2009-2017) was more fun. It had a section about crossing crevasses with combinations of sleds and snomobiles and tracked vehicles, crevasse rescue etc. In the middle of otherwise serious text it said "to recover from this situation, you might elect to [something], or possibly [something else]. Either way, a change of underwear is recommended." If people want I…

Essential reading for field operations is §3.2f Field-Camp Liquor Rations . Also, fwiw, it's the 6th edition dated February 2001 (per Acknowledgments).

When I was there, McMurdo had strict limits on how much booze you could buy at the store, but no limits on how much you could drink at the bars, and there were limits on what you could order for your field camp but it was quite high -- 2.5 beers / day plus spirits on top of that if I remember correctly.
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