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Planetary News: Mars (2005)The Planetary Society's Mars Analog Blog:
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Credit: Troy Hudson |
June 1: Touchdown…or at least a field goal.
Antofagasta airport, 1:00pm
It's the weekend and things have slowed down a little bit. I was able to enjoy a garden party with some friends out near the Van Nuys airport this afternoon, but I was running around a bit this morning to get everything done.
International travel with a scientific field expedition always comes with a few surprises.
The last two days have been relatively uneventful -- there’s not too much one can do when you’ve bought and packed everything you can and a lot of the stores are closed for Sunday or Memorial Day. But that all changed Thursday morning.
For all of you following along at home, I beg you to indulge my travel log experiences for another few paragraphs. Since I haven’t actually gotten to the desert research station yet, there’s not a lot of interesting science to report.
So. 8am Tuesday morning and my phone rings. It’s a good thing, too, because I’d apparently forgotten to set my alarm clock to wake me up at 7. It was one of my Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) colleagues, calling in a bit of a frenzy. There was some concern about them getting all 18 pieces of luggage on the flight with only three of them going on the same plane. So, I said I would contact him when I got to the airport, since we were leaving around about the same time despite our using entirely different carriers (I on LAN Chile, they on American).
After a few last minute runs to my office, a trip to the postal store to send off a poorly timed eBay auction item, and lovely send-off breakfast with my friend Dan (well, Dan’s company was wonderful, the restaurant’s service and food was entirely unimpressive), I arrived at the airport and gave them a call. All seemed well, they didn’t need me after all, and they’d see my in Chile. Cool.
International check-in at LAX is a bit different these days. Before even going to the ticket counter, you stand in line with your checked baggage to let in get scanned. This line takes about an hour, especially with flight attendants getting priority. Then, they walk your bags over to your airline ticket counter (you’re not allowed to touch them) where you proceed to check in normally and your bags are put on the conveyor belt to baggage processing. All well and good -- I get this all completed by about 12:15 and I’m standing in line for the carry-on baggage security check-in when my phone rings. It’s the JPL folk. Apparently (full details to follow) they were misinformed somewhere down the line and they would not be able to take all their baggage with them. I had to come take four bags through to check on my flight.
This was going to be difficult. Not to mention annoying. Fortunately, the American terminal was right next to the international terminal, so the walk to get the bags and bring them back wasn’t long. But then I had to stand in that interminable hour-long line again to get two 50-gallon action-packer carry-alls, one extraordinarily heavy computer case, and a tripod tube scanned and cleared. But my flight was due to board in 45 minutes. This was going to be close.
Antafogasta airport
Credit: Troy Hudson |
I’d told the JPL folk that there was a possibility that I’d miss my flight, but they had their own problems to deal with. Not much they could have done about it anyway. So, I stood in line and practiced patience. I also read all the way through Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (great books, like candy). Amazingly, the baggage screening, additional check in, payment of the excess baggage charge ($240), and passenger security screening got me to the gate at 1:50…20 minutes before departure, but with no time to hit the concession stand for a traveling snack.
The flight to Santiago was generally uneventful. I sat most of the way next to one of 25 handsome Mormon missionaries on their way to Buenos Aries, all dressed smartly in their suits with their nametags. Had a bit of conversation with Elder Riley during mealtimes, but most of the flight was spent sleeping.
...
Arrive, Santiago. Prepare for Customs. All 5 checked bags had to be claimed and cleared through customs before re-checking them and heading for Antofagasta. According to my flight schedule, I only had about an hour to do this. Amazingly (or not, since it was something like 5:00 in the morning) there was no line at immigration or customs, and after some language-barrier gesticulations and an opening of two of the carry-alls, I was cleared and taken up to check in for my second flight. Through security screening again and there I was at the gate, with not a moment to spare for concessions or currency exchange.
Not that the currency exchange mattered much -- there appear to be absolutely no services here at the Antofagasta airport. I’ve been sitting here for about 2.5 hours now, .listening to Enigma and Other Soft Pop Hits of the mid-1990’s on a twenty five minute loop. Help!
When I first arrived, I looked around for anyone who looked like they were with NASA or JPL, or took more than casual notice of a Caucasian male toting four obvious boxes of scientific equipment, but no such luck. Chris had said that someone named Lauren would be in Antofagasta when I got here, but I guess he and I should have made contact beforehand…he may not have known my itinerary and apparently I was the only one on this flight.
Frank, Peter, and others will be arriving on their flight in about 15 minutes. Since this airport has only one baggage claim, I’m sure to spot them. Then we can go get some lunch!
The flight into Santiago was at night, and I was seated in the middle of the plane anyhow. But upon takeoff, I had a brief glimpse of sunrise over the Andean Cordillera as we headed north towards the Notre Grande. It was spectacular! I can’t wait to get closer to those mountains again. With the frequent morning fog, it’s unlikely I’ll see such a sunrise from the ground while I’m here…but maybe we’ll get a few nights when the fog doesn’t roll in.
Upon arriving in Antofagasta, my first impression was…dirt. The medians between runways and taxiways, the terrain surrounding the terminal, even the ‘landscaping’ patches around the baggage claim / passenger pick-up areas were all dirt or gravel. Uniform earth-tone brown. No plants, or cacti. Across the street from the airport, there is some landscaping, some palm trees and conifers, but in the distance I can see a hillside as devoid of plants as the mountains around the Mojave desert in California. Maybe they just chose to put the airport in a particularly dry, flat area and haven’t spent any money on real landscaping.
But it certainly heightens the impression that one is getting closer to Mars. Even the airport has this particular metal and glass architecture which, were I not walking around outside in shirtsleeves, wouldn’t take much more than a thin piece of red acetate over my sunglasses to convince me that it was some sort of Martian settlement.
Time to sign off, conserve battery power, and wait for the next plane to land.
Current Mood: Bored Current Music: In Your Eyes – Soft Pop Hits of the mid-90’s, 25-minute loop.
Antofagasta Airport 3:00pm
Upon review of the game, it looks like it was a touchdown after all.
Around about 1:30, when Frank’s plane hadn’t showed up when I thought it was supposed to, a friendly face appeared. It was Lauren. He apparently did know that I arrived at 9:45, but he was running around like the proverbial newly-headless chicken getting things ready and couldn’t make the diversion to the airport. We made our introductions and shortly thereafter a plane full of people from the Bay Area arrived.
Apparently, Frank, Peter, and Alison were held up in customs in Santiago and missed their connecting plane to Santiago. So, as everyone else loads up their personal stuff and takes off, Lauren asked me if I could stick around with the heavy luggage until 4pm, when Frank et al. were due to arrive. No problem, now that I’ve been fed. Just kick back with a book (like I’ve been doing all morning) and settle in. Much more comfortably this time, since I know I’m in the right place and that people know about me being here.
The mass of luggage I’m sitting here with has grown by at least a factor of three. The airport people must think I’m a nut. It’s nothing compared to what we’ll have when all the JPLers finally get here.
Current Mood: Relieved
Current Music: Walkin’ on Sunshine, Katrina and the Waves, still in the loop.
Yungay 8:00pm
What a day this has been.
Frank et al. arrived around 4:40 looking as if someone had grated sandpaper over their nerves. Sure enough, this is about what happened. The hold up in customs lasted about 4 hours. I guess that’ll happen when you travel with $270,000 worth of equipment and don’t declare anything. In order to prove that they were bringing it all back, customs confiscated the packing list (which we must have to get back into the US) and will cross-check everything when we go back through. It’s all signed off on Frank’s passport, but he’s not going back at the same time as Peter, and that’s gonna create a problem. We may have to ship 5 boxes back and somehow convince customs that we’ve done so. But for now, for one week, we don’t need to worry about that because we got it all here.
The growing pile of luggage at the airport
Credit: Troy Hudson |
The flatbed truck ready to take luggage to yunguay station
Credit: Troy Hudson |
We spent some time running errands around Santiago with Lauren this evening, and stopped at a McDonalds for dinner. I tend to shun McD’s when I’m in the US, and I’m not really afraid of local food. But it was quick and convenient. The Chileans take their food seriously and slowly, and 4 people sitting down at a restaurant will be there for a minimum of an hour and a half. Interestingly, the beef, fries, bun, and everything all tasted a lot better than what I remember in the States. Peter told me his chicken sandwich tasted a lot less processed, too. Interesting.
When we finally left for Yungay (which the Chileans apparently pronounce JYUM-boy rather than young-GUY) it was dark, so I didn’t get to see too much of the countryside. As I am told, though, there’s really not all that much to see.
Arriving at the station, there were lots of people milling about setting up tents and unloading what gear they had. I helped two people erect their tents and claimed a spot in one of them, eager for a night’s rest in a horizontal, non-mobile position. (I left my tent back home, having been told that most people sleep in the station. While a lot of people do do this, there’s not all that much room.)
Current Mood: Calm
Current Music: The gentle purr of gas generators
Yungay 9:50pm
How many Rocket Scientists does it take…
…to repair a gas generator.
A small part of the research troup
Credit: Troy Hudson |
The hall of the station
Credit: Troy Hudson |
The back of the station
Credit: Troy Hudson |
Tent city
Credit: Troy Hudson |
I’ve been meeting many of the people who are here, though I’m still not sure what a lot of them do or where they come from. I’ve bonded with two guys named Brad and Clay.
We were trying to figure out why a generator we were using to recharge our laptops had died. The conclusion was reached that it was out of gas, and the refill can was empty. So, we scampered around for about half an hour or forty-five minutes trying to find a way to siphon gas out of the tanks of one of the trucks. For most of this time, Brad was in the somewhat reluctant hero position, having been de-facto elected to be the one to suck the gas out and possibly get a mouthful of octane. But after Fred told us that he had some hand-pump siphons for exactly this purpose, somewhere in the 20 boxes of luggage, I did a hurried search and managed to locate one.
Saved? Well, sort of. After several false starts, we managed to get the siphon working. I had to hold the gas tank guard open with a pair of scissors, Clay had run to find an empty 3 liter soda bottle that we could tilt so it’s mouth was lower than the level of gas in the tank, and Brad handled the pumping action (via manos, sans oris). The tube was only 3/8 of an inch in diameter, so it took about five minutes to fill up the bottle. Triumphantly, we poured it into the waiting generator, which overflowed after about half a cup had gone in.
What the heck? Closer inspection revealed that the choke had been left on and the generator had flooded. A flip of a switch, pull of the starter cord, and voila…a working generator. So, how many rocket scientists does it take to repair a gas generator? Apparently, none.
Current Mood: Embarrassed
Current Music: The revived purr of gas generators
[ what is this? ]