Cape Shirreff Phase I

What does it take to do construction in a scientifically protected area in Antarctica? How do you build when your only “heavy” equipment is an ATV?

To just see the two main buildings, finished, glimmering in the sun, and appreciate their beauty and functionality without knowing what happened behind the scenes to make that happen is not fully appreciating just how special and impressive they are. Here is a glimpse into our daily lives building these beauties:

It all started with the early season team; 3 construction crew members and 5 scientists together hand offloading the 89,000 lbs of cargo, carried from the ship to the beach at Cape Shirreff by zodiac boats 307 times. Every day, until every single piece of building material and all supplies for the season were on the beach, and then driven up to, and again hand off-loaded in camp. Camp consisted of the old structures that the scientists were still living and working out of, a tent city that the construction crew would utilize for sleeping, tool storage, and drying their gear, and another old structure where one extraordinarily talented and chef would prepare brilliant meals for the hungry crew.

The difficult and slow work of camp put-in takes weeks; those in camp during this time prepared all of these temporary structures and staged food, materials, and tools, in anticipation of the coming build season: five weeks of relentless work with 13 construction crew members and 2 camp staff to complete the buildings before the boat comes to take away all but 3 workers, who will complete the circle by adding final touches and assisting the scientists in closing their camp in the late season.

Each day begins with the chef awaking at would be dawn if the sun ever sank below the horizon, and starting the very resource intensive process of making coffee in the beloved ramshackle hut we call “Little Chile”, an old Chilean science structure that has not been inhabited for years that was kindly lent to us for these few weeks. Next in comes the “old man coffee club” of early risers on the crew who simply cannot sleep in and happen to be well, a bunch of old men…followed closely by the camp manager, yours truly, already starting to check off camp chore tasks for the day. The rest of the construction crew rolls in just as the delicious meal is being served and depending on the day, the table can be completely silent sans the sound of forks scraping empty plates, or as raucous as the scene of seals on the beach next door.

After little or lots of chatter, a plan for the day is doled out and the crew is off to work while the camp staff turns over the kitchen. Then begins the epic tornado of activity that descends on camp during the non-sleeping hours of life here. A mix of construction, camp, cooking, and science tasks somehow all get accomplished throughout the Cape Shirreff Day despite the myriad of wrenches that are thrown into almost any would be simple endeavor. In construction camp world this might mean a group of penguins walking onto the site in the exact place you want to measure for foundations, the ATV trailer breaks as it brings up a load of SIP panels for the floor and now we are using hand carts while it is being very creatively fixed, or there is no sour cream left so a new recipe is born with the random ingredients on hand to save taco night…every day is something different, and the only thing guaranteed at Cape Shirreff is that you will not be bored.

Lunchtime is less of a dedicated break mid-day and more of a painfully wrenching hunger that pulls you back to Little Chile like a magnet after a few hours of laboring outside. The need for food here is like gravity, a constant inescapable force pushing you to put calories in your hard-working cold body. Lunch is a time to stuff your maw while connecting with your co-workers; the teams checking in with one another. All good? Continue cruising through tasks for the afternoon. Things not going well? Brainstorm adjustments to plans and start the process of solving those problems. Soon enough everyone is out the door again and the process repeats, before you know it dinner is being served and you are so hungry and tired you can either not speak at all or not shut up about it. Post dinner a rotating team stays to help with camp chores to close the kitchen for the day, and the rest of the crew relaxes in the hour or two of free time you have before eyelids start to involuntarily collapse and you have minutes to get in your tent before sleep hits you like a train.

You never so much as have an extra ounce of energy to announce complaints about having zero access to showers, toilets, or running water of any kind…opening a fresh pair of socks you found buried in your bag, using your “*pee bottle” in your tent without spilling on your sleeping bag, or catching the outhouse on a day with fresh buckets, become the joys of your hygiene routine.

And so it goes, day after day, a beautiful cycle of hard work with intermittent soul and body filling meals and deep sleeps in dirty tents to a backdrop of the Drake Passage, wildlife, and ice. At first it may seem like the fast pace of the daily grind here is completely juxtaposed to the tranquil setting, but when you get in the groove of construction camp life and observe the patterns of the other creatures around, I think they fit together quite nicely. As it turns out, everyone here is always up to something. Whether it is the animals hunting, raising their young, saving energy for their next big move, plants frantically photosynthesizing while they can, the tides lapping at some grounded ice on the beach until it disappears, or the sun twirling around a tight circle above our heads—this place is in motion. There is a buzz of energy throughout this ecosystem that us human workers latch onto and carry throughout our routines. We carefully and quickly piece together these buildings to the natural rhythm of life here, as all the local lifeforms know, this window of productivity is a season, and soon the sun’s circle will grow and fall to the horizon to mark a new season of stillness; this is the pressure that keeps all the beings progressing onward in their various quests.

For 28 consecutive days, we persevered tirelessly to construct these new scientific structures, which now embody the essence of this place’s beauty and harbor the energy infused by the numerous devoted hands that have contributed to every aspect of this project.

Check out what our client’s at NOAA AMLR created to tell the amazing story of Phase I of this project!