The Nexus Colony (4 page)

The plane continued to climb in altitude until Grimes could see by the altimeter on the instrument panel that they were up at about six hundred feet. As the plane made one more bank, the ski tracks came into view across the flat, unending surface of the glacier. Grimes unbuckled his belt—which wasn’t doing much good anyway—and peered out the window at the field below. To him the ski tracks looked okay, but he was glad it wasn’t him who was going to make the decision.

Daniels looked over at his co-pilot, who said, “Looks all right to me. What d’ya think?”

“Felt okay.” Daniels replied placidly. “Seemed pretty solid.” Then turning around to Grimes, he asked, “What do you think, doc? Give her a try?”

“You’re asking me?” Grimes responded, surprised, not really sure if they were kidding or not. He’d never been asked before by a pilot for his opinion about a ski drag.

“Well, as long as you say it’s all right, doc,” the pilot said, “we’ll take her in.” Then he put the plane into a steep bank to circle around for the landing.

Grimes still didn’t know whether they were yanking his chain or not. Thinking it had to be a joke, he opted to say nothing. Wouldn’t have mattered one way or another, because they were obviously taking this plane down regardless.

The co-pilot pointed to Grimes’ seatbelt. He buckled up quickly. The aircraft leveled off again as the pilot re-oriented his landing approach and backed off on the throttles again. The plane dropped in altitude, and as the ground rapidly came up to meet them, Grimes held tightly to the undercarriage of the seat and hoped these crazy sons-of-bitches really only
were
kidding about the safety of the landing site.

But the thump didn’t come this time. Instead, the touchdown was as smooth as silk, and the next thing he knew he heard the
whoosh
of the engines as the four powerful turbo-prop engines hit reverse thrusters. Grimes felt the plane begin to slow, the vibration start again, and suddenly the machine started a freestyle skid across the glacier at a speed faster than any downhill ski racer ever dreamed about achieving. The ride got a little bumpy, but for some reason not nearly as much as when they dragged through the ice the first time. The only thing Grimes could figure out was that Daniels had set the machine right back down in the tracks he had made before.
A pretty good piece of piloting
, Grimes thought. This guy was good. Grimes was glad he had kept his mouth shut and hadn’t made a fool of himself to give these flyboys more cannon fodder to talk about back at McMurdo.

When the reverse thrust effect of the engines had slowed the plane down to a speed lower than their effectiveness, the pilot pulled the throttles back to idle speed. Unlike landing an aircraft conventionally on a solid runway where a pilot could utilize the brakes, you were now literally in an uncontrolled skid across the ice. The only thing to slow you down and stop you now was whatever friction was created between the bottoms of the skis and the ice itself.

The great bulk of the transport propelled the LC-130 along the surface of the glacier. Its momentum carried the plane for what Grimes thought was a long time. Too long. The only thought that suddenly came into his head was whether the damn thing was going to stop before it reached the end of the ski tracks. Then all of a sudden, it did. Grimes looked out the window. There was probably less than fifty yards of ski tracks remaining.

“Not bad” he heard the co-pilot comment. “No cigar today. Thought you were going to make it, though.” The pilot shrugged indifferently. Once again, Grimes didn’t know if they were pulling his chain again or not. But at least one thing was for sure. They were down safely on the Mulock Glacier. Now the trek
really
began.

If one tended to underestimate the effects of the cold, even when cocooned in the modern technology of polar clothing, the initial shock brought one back to reality. The first instant one was exposed to the blast of frigid air, one gained a rather abrupt awareness of what humility was all about. The bay inside the cargo plane was already cold despite the fact that the heaters had been going full blast. But when the loadmaster opened the hydraulic cargo ramp, it was as if the transport had opened its jaws like a giant beast, gulping in an enormous volume of the frigid Antarctic air.

The temperature of the air must have instantaneously dropped fifty degrees as the icy air was sucked into the belly of the LC-130, and everyone’s lungs pumped out long streamers of white breath that seemed to hang like clouds for several seconds. Despite being wrapped in the finest polar outfits that man could manufacture, the cold somehow still seemed to penetrate like tiny needles prickling the skin, just subtle enough to create a constant awareness of its presence. Grimes remembered talking to one of the space shuttle astronauts not so long ago about how cold it was in space. The coldness was so intense that even in the heated spacesuits, you could feel the iciness. It kept you constantly aware of your own mortality, the man had told him. It was the same as Grimes always felt when he first stepped into the Antarctic environment.
Suit don’t fail me now.

Grimes knew as well as any polar explorer that you had to maintain a minimal body temperature, because if it dropped below a certain level, you’d probably not be able to get it back up. If they couldn’t get you out, you’d die of exposure. Any signs of hypothermia and you were a candidate for immediate evacuation. On any of the expeditions, the communication link was paramount.

Aside from the extreme cold, the day was not as harsh as they had expected, having anticipated worse conditions from the air turbulence they had experienced at altitude above the glacier. Surprisingly, the wind, at least for the moment, wasn’t blowing too strong. It was only coming down off the glacier at a few knots, to their advantage when setting up camp.

The two loadmasters were already outside on the ice, having loosened all the straps holding the ski sleds and the four snowmobiles. Mike Ruger, the lead mountaineer, and his partner – a last minute replacement and a guy Ruger didn’t particularly like to work with – had started and mounted the first two machines. In another minute they were down the ramp and out onto the ice heading slowly off to the right where Ruger had already reconnoitered for their camp site. Ruger had it down to a science, and within the next hour the camp would be set up and ready for the next several weeks’ activities. About twenty minutes later, all four snowmobiles and ski sleds were unloaded and out of the way of the LC-130, which still sat idling in place. From two hundred yards away, the aircraft looked out of place against the backdrop of this unbelievable wilderness.

While Ruger’s partner conducted setting up camp with Grimes and the other five scientists, Ruger held his final debriefing with the crew. Then he headed back to the camp as the LC-130 revved its engines, surging forward to begin its 180 degree turnabout in the small radius that had already been checked out for hidden crevasses. The ski attached to the front wheel easily guided the massive bulk of the aircraft as it slid effortlessly on the crust of the frozen surface. It was always impressive to see how deftly these Navy LC-130 pilots maneuvered the bulky machine back into the path of the ski trail.

The engines roared, and the backwash from the powerful turbo-props sent what little powdery snow was there into the air like a big puffy cloud, and the wind instantly carried it away in swirls. The aircraft lumbered slowly at first, then picked up considerable speed until finally it lifted like a great bird rising off the surface of the glacier. It was an awesome sight as the silver machine contrasted against the subtle blue sky, heading back to McMurdo. It would be five weeks before they saw the plane again.

Almost immediately upon lift off, Mike Ruger was zipping along the ski track following behind the plane. Once at the end of the track—which had been the beginning when the plane landed—Ruger drove a brightly colored pole into the ice off to the side of the ski tracks to mark the end of the runway. Five weeks from now, barring any major storm, the pole would be the landing marker for the incoming pilot. When the plane arrived and circled in a holding pattern awaiting confirmation that the runway was still safe, Ruger would make one last run down the tracks to make sure no crevasses had opened in the five week interval. Then he’d light a flare next to the pole. Even if the pole had somehow been knocked down by the winds, Ruger had the distance marked off as a back-up. It was always possible for a hidden crevasse to be just a few yards beyond the end of the ski track. You took no chances out here on
The Ice
, no matter how insignificant it seemed.

As the days and weeks passed, the camp location Ruger had chosen proved to be logistically ideal, as the team of researchers were able to fan out in all directions without much of a hassle. The twelve foot tall pyramidal teepees—called Scott tents after the famous Antarctic explorer—stood out on the glacial plain as the only evidence of human habitation. Two men each lived in a tent, and in spite of the perpetual below zero temperatures, the team lived in moderate comfort. Not like back home at McMurdo, but acceptable considering the elements they were facing in the best interests of science.

The winds were interminable in Antarctica. Here in this region they were called
katabatic winds
, howling winds that came down off the glacier slopes sometimes with such intensity that you began to think the Scott tents weren’t going to hold up. Katabatic winds were gravity-induced by the ice itself. The air became super-cooled far inland high up in elevation on the polar plateau, and as it rolled unimpeded down toward the oceans, it met with the relatively warmer air currents coming in off the water. The effect often caused dense fog and localized blizzards. The winds were everything. They dictated all human activity. For the past month, the katabatic winds had been mostly cooperative.

Morning wasn’t much different than midnight or mid afternoon. The sun still hovered low on the horizon like a surreal painting hung against the backdrop of a crystalline landscape. Hilliard Grimes poked his head outside the tent. It was about six forty five a.m., and thankfully he felt rather rested this morning, probably because the last twelve hours had been relatively calm, the katabatic winds giving them a short period of minimal activity. It was always difficult to get any sleep when the winds were howling so loud that you thought at any minute you were going to be swept away into oblivion.

For two days they had remained confined to the tents, as the winds were blowing at a steady 25 to 30 knots, making conditions too severe to go out into the field. There was plenty to do inside, though. There were always new specimens that needed cataloguing and initial analysis. They had lucked out for the past month, the weather cooperating almost daily. Then yesterday morning they went back out on the ice and were hit suddenly by a katabatic wind that sneaked up on them. It blew the ice and snow crystals around so intensely that everyone knew they had been lucky to get back to camp without anyone getting lost in the blizzard. Thank God for the brightly colored orange and black Scott tents that stood out against the whiteness of the landscape. And thank God even more for Mike Ruger’s incredible sense of direction. By the time they got back they were totally exhausted. Then the winds died down again, and they had spent the last ten hours sleeping in a relative calm weather hiatus.

It might have been still, but the frigid air stung Grimes’ face nonetheless, and the air circulating through the tangled mesh of his beard felt like it had instantly frozen all the follicles of his skin. A shiver went down his spine, and he quickly withdrew back into the relative warmth of the tent. Dr. Tracey, his tent mate, had just turned up the burners of both camp stoves to get some more heat circulating.

“How’s it look?” his partner asked. The look on his face said it all. Cabin fever. In a tent.

“Superb,” Grimes replied. “But I said that yesterday, didn’t I?”

“Might as well get it in.”

“Might as well,” Grimes agreed, taking the cup of hot coffee handed to him.

The zipper of the tent opened and Mike Ruger entered.

“Coffee, Mike?” they offered.

“No thanks. Just had one,” he replied. “We a
go
, Hilly?”

“Yeah. What d’ya think? Look okay?”

“I’d say so,” Ruger said, nodding his head. “You want to try that area at the base of the western slope?”

“Yeah,” Grimes replied. “But I still think the rest of them are wrong about the ice flow up there.”
But what the hell, we might as well try it. We don’t have hardly anything worthwhile to show for this whole trip so far.

“All right,” Ruger responded. “I’ll call McMurdo and inform them.”

Each morning Field Team Ruger would make contact with McMurdo Station to report their status and their itinerary for the day. It was important to do that in case something went awry and they had to send out search planes looking for you.

By seven thirty all four of the snowmobiles were revving loudly across the ice field, breaking the relative silence of the glacial plain. Led by Ruger, alone in the lead snowmobile – Ruger’s partner had stayed behind to effect some needed repairs on some gear—the team headed due west across the glacier toward the area where one of Grimes’ colleagues had theorized that there should be some debris fields. The specimens would later turn out to be scarce. What they were going to find there in the next few days, however, would overshadow any significance of meteorites.

Along the gently rising slopes of the glacier, the
sastrugi
painted the landscape in subtle patterns. Sastrugi were deep ruts carved into the layers of snow by the winds blowing down the slopes off the plateau. They were like sculptures etched away on the surface of the land, and they were always changing their appearance according to the whim of the katabatic winds. You had to be careful, because it was easy to drive a snowmobile into a sastrugi or even tumble into one while walking around the field looking for specimens. They were beautiful, but like everything else in this land, you learned to respect the natural order of things.