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Antarctic conservation blog

This blog describes what it's like to spend time in Antarctica conserving artefacts from the explorer's hut left behind by Captain Robert Falcon Scott in 1911 when he journeyed to the South Pole.

It is being written by members of the 2009-10 conservation summer team, Fran and Lucy, with contributions from Nicola and Georgina who are conserving artefacts at the Canterbury Museum in Christchurch, New Zealand. Previous entries were written by the summer and winter conservation teams from 2006 onwards, who have now left Scott Base.

Cooking on blubber

Fran, Thursday 28 January 2010

Temperature: -1°C
Wind speed: 0-5 knots
Temp with wind chill: -2°C

Lucy and I are currently onsite at Captain Scott’s 1910 expedition base at Cape Evans where we are working alongside conservation carpenters Gord, Gene and Martin and programme manager Al.

A large part of this season’s work programme is carrying out structural repairs to the stables and latrine area which have been previously damaged due to extreme snow loading.

Captain Scott’s 1910 base at Cape Evans. The stables and latrine area are in the foreground. © Antarctic Heritage Trust

This has meant emptying the space of all objects to allow unrestricted access to floors, walls and roof. One of the larger objects needing temporary removal was a small stove which would have been fuelled by seal blubber and used by Captain Oates and the others to cook mash for the ponies and pemmican for the dogs.

The stove in use in the stables around 1911 © Scott Polar Research Institute

The stove was resting on the top of a fire-pit; an area distinguished by the arrangement of house bricks into a low wall, and containing a heap of scoria (small pebbles of volcanic rock which surrounds the area), ash, stove parts and associated material. This again had to be carefully deconstructed and moved - a simple enough task until you add ice into the equation!

The stove itself was relatively straightforward to lift out, but the stove base and other parts were firmly welded into frozen scoria. With the aid of melting hoses this was thawed, and Lucy was able to excavate the buried sections.

Fran looking glam in her conservation gear © Antarctic Heritage Trust

I then had the task of conserving the parts. Both the stove and its base were in poor condition. It would seem that corrosion had already set in while the stove was still in use, meaning that each time the metal was heated, the corrosion crust got harder. Rust usually forms in layers that are relatively easy to scrape away from the surface, but the resulting deterioration in this instance was a corrosion formation more deeply penetrated, like barnacles on a rock.

As I was chipping away at some collected debris in the recessed trough at the bottom of the vessel, I noticed a distinct colour variation. I presumed I had found some droplets of metal ore, and therefore evidence of metalwork being done on the stove. I was somewhat embarrassed when I explained my ‘find’ to project manager Al, who picked up a piece of scoria from the ground and proceeded to scrub at it, producing the same gold colour! I had previously had no idea that the volcanic stones had metallic properties.

Up close and personal - Fran working on the stove © Antarctic Heritage Trust

Conserving the stove base was a whole other story! The hardened corrosion and subsequent uneven surface was much the same; the problem here was blubber! Seal blubber had obviously been used as fuel and the whole lower section was caked in encrusted fat. There was even a house brick wedged between the front two legs, held fast by the built up blubber. This meant that the conservation needed to be done as quickly as possible, as the thermal hoses and summer sun were melting the external layers of blubber, turning it into a runny gooey mess with the consistency of tar, (and not the most pleasant smell either!).

Once treated the stove base proved to be a real gem. The iron legs are highly decorative with scrolled casting and claw feet that couldn’t be seen previously under the compacted blubber layers. The standard of the craftsmanship of such a utilitarian object as a stove base being yet another example of the quality of many of the items the explorers brought with them.

Posted in Antarctica, Cape Evans, Conservation

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Wacky races

Fran, Thursday 21 January 2010

Temperature: -2°C
Wind: 0 knots
Temperature with wind chill: - 2°C
Conditions: White-out clouds with no wind

While we were still at Scott Base I had the opportunity to get a skidoo licence, and after some training, I was let loose on the open roads. At first I was a little hesitant on the throttle; the bike seat is sheltered by nothing more than a plastic windscreen so the feeling of being exposed and of the wind gusting past your face certainly makes you very aware of the speed you are travelling. To start with I was driving with all the pace and style of a granny behind the wheel of a motorised electric shopping scooter!

Franny the Stig on the grid! © Antarctic Heritage Trust

After an hour or so I finally relaxed into the feel of the machine and felt confident to really put some welly into it - and it was amazing!! The route that we had taken took us into the foot-slopes of Mount Erebus, to a spot known as ‘Room with a View’. It’s quite a steep hill with lots of undulating ground which means you get some great ‘air’ as you bounce over the bumps. Riding at 50km per hour on the snow equivalent of a BMX track was the most incredible adrenaline rush.

Room with a View was sadly devoid of a view as we had climbed too far into the low cloud sitting on top of the hill, but a little lower down the scenery was spectacular. We also took a drive out to Pegasus to see the wreckage of a US Navy aircraft that came down many years ago, and it is now a local landmark.

The wreckage of a US navy aircraft © Antarctic Heritage Trust

Just when you think you’ve experienced the best of Antarctica, another unique opportunity comes your way. This was one more incredible day for storage in the memory-bank!

Posted in Antarctica, Scott Base, Social life

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Food glorious food

Lucy, Monday 18 January 2010

Temperature:1° C
Windspeed: 1-5 knots
Hazy sunshine

Out in the cold wilds of Antarctica I find the urge to eat chocolate and other sugary food quite impossible to resist. As my friends at home would testify, even when I’m in normal surroundings I have quite a sweet tooth. I was disappointed to discover that it is not cold enough now that summer has arrived in Antarctica, to make homemade ice cream outside in the snow.

As sea ice travel is now banned for the summer we can expect fewer visitors and hence fewer deliveries of all the lovely fresh treats which our wonderful friends at Scott Base have been so generously providing us with. I expect I will develop cravings for all the foods which I miss and cannot bake out in the field.

We certainly won’t go short, however – we have a big store of food out at Captain Scott’s base at Cape Evans which will be more than enough for our next 5 weeks out in the field. Fortunately we are doing such a lot of hard physical work in cold temperatures that our bodies are working pretty hard and using more calories than usual to stay warm. I seem to be able to eat a huge amount of food without putting on any weight.

The polar explorers often complained on their trips that they were always hungry. This of course was because they had to ration out the food to ensure the weight of the sledges was kept to a minimum.

While working inside Captain Scott’s hut at Cape Evans I have been surprised to see well-preserved packets and ration bags containing the sledging rations of chocolate, milk powder and suchlike. They also had whole pats of butter and some quite exotic foods such as olives, tinned asparagus, huge Dutch cheeses, anchovies, potted meats, dates and raisins as well as a vast range of herbs and spices and even curry powder.

A century-old provision sack of cocoa from Captain Scott’s 1910-13 expedition, currently being conserved by the conservation team © Antarctic Heritage Trust

Like us, the polar explorers had little or no fresh food, but they did have fresh or frozen seal and penguin meat and eggs. Along with the abundance of tinned and dried food in the hut, they actually lived remarkably comfortably at Cape Evans.

The hub of Captain Scott’s base at Cape Evans - the boardroom table where the men ate and planned their expeditions © Antarctic Heritage Trust

Posted in Cape Evans, Climate & weather, Polar exploration, Social life

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Sleeping on sledging trips

Nicola, Friday 15 January 2010

Working on the tent associated with Shackleton’s 1914-17 Trans Antarctic Expedition last week inspired me to read accounts of the sledging trips with a particular interest in the kit that was taken. Once the tent was up the most vital pieces of equipment were the Primus stove for cooking and the Norwegian fur sleeping bags.

In the laboratory this week we have a one man sleeping bag made from sections of hide with the thick fur on the inside.

Under the microscope Paul Scofield, Curator of Vertebrate Zoology at Canterbury Museum, identified the fur as reindeer, used because its hollow hairs have good insulating properties. Whilst smooth fur from the flanks was used on the inside of the bag, two outside flaps were cut from the softer more woolly belly. These would have been folded across the chest and secured with wooden toggles.

The bag is in good condition despite being well used, patched and repaired. The skin is still soft and there is only minor shedding of hairs. But it’s filled the lab with that distinct seal blubber smell of the historic huts.

The state of their sleeping bags was a frequent topic in the men’s sledging diaries. Whilst the fur could be warm and comfortable, the bags became miserable at extremely low temperatures.

Sealed in their sleeping bags at night their breath condensed and froze onto the fur lining. Ice accumulated over weeks so it became an unpleasant experience in the evening to thaw a way in. After one sledging journey the weight of the sleeping bags had increased four times from their usual 10lbs. Relief only came on sunny days when the bags could be turned inside out to rid them of ice and allow them to dry.

So perhaps it’s easy to understand why Apsley Cherry-Garrard, in his account of a winter sledging trip, talked of the ‘blissful moment of getting out of your bag…’

Posted in Climate & weather, Conservation, Polar exploration, Scott, Shackleton

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Were the early polar explorers green?

Fran, Monday 11 January 2010

Temperature: -7°C
Wind: 2 knots

Given we try to be as environmentally sustainable as we can when camping out in the field it does make you wonder what the early polar explorers did with their waste, as they all spent considerable periods of time resident in their respective huts, and the produce that they brought with them all had an extraordinary amount of packaging (which was very typical for the era).

Here at Sir Ernest Shackleton’s base at Cape Royds, many fragments from the original supplies and equipment have been found in the surrounding area.

But it’s very hard to make assumptions as to whether these have ended up here accidentally or whether they were deliberately thrown away. Some of the more interesting objects at the site today are things that were pulled out from Pony Lake (a small expanse of water in front of the hut) including a sea dredge and the wooden wheel from a motor vehicle.

The wooden wheel from one of the 1st motor cars on the continent, the Arrol Johnston, which now sits in the stables area of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s base © Antarctic Heritage Trust

We know from the early polar explorers’ diaries it was common practice for the explorers to put their rubbish down tide cracks (these often form where the sea ice butts up against shorelines, glaciers or icebergs) where it would be swept out in the next tide.

This would have been an acceptable practice at the time but it’s great to know that there are now strict guidelines and environmental protocols in place today.