Photo album: "Begining of winterover"

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We arrived, the last dozen of the winter party of the seventeenth expedition in Adélie Land, only at the end of summertime because there was so many people on the base, there was no places left to accommodate us. During summer a scientific campaign to study the ionosphere (between altitudes of 100 and 300 km) took place, with the launch of three rockets. The ideal conditions for this experiment were met only a few days before our arrival. 
If you wish to watch the film of that campaign, click on the link:
Terre Adélie Année Spatiale n°1, in the page: MY LINKS
The film (in French language) allows, too, to visit the base as it was in 1967. 
We arrived, therefore, only on March 4th and, as the Thala Dan's Captain was afraid of a fast weather deterioration, the ship sailed back as soon as the next day, on March 5th. The three of our team, responsible of the instrumentation for ionosphere monitoring, being arrived together on March 4th, the only transfer of instructions we could get was a rapid visit of our installations during the night with the responsible of the precedent year, plus a stack of hand written notes he left for our attention.

Let us begin to discover the base. Cable ducts, the monorail used to evacuate into the sea the waste of the kitchen. - The ecological era had not reached us yet . A few years later, the monorail will disappear and nothing will be thrown into the sea, any longer. -

On the left: The " Fillod " metallic building, housing the radio station and the bedrooms for the expedition members.

The radome of the radar used to track the weather balloons launched by the meteorologists.

The 73-meter antenna of the ionosphere sounder. This apparatus works like a radar and send radio wave pulses vertically. The frequency of the wave varies from 250 kHz to 20 MHz. The pulses are thrown back by the different layers of the ionosphere, according to the wave frequency, allowing thus to measure their altitude.

Ionosphere data are recorded on 35-millimeter film. It is necessary to go periodically to the shelter, near the antenna, to replace the film. The recorded film must, then, be developed in the photo lab. We remote control the sounder operation from the "Labo 2", at the other extremity of the island, where are the main buildings of the base.

Ice and rock near the antenna.

Last Adelie penguins still on Pétrels island.

They are adult penguins that have to complete their moult before being able to leave. The chicks born this year are already gone and they will not come back before a few years, when they are ready to reproduce.

Adelie penguins come to the islands to reproduce, during Antarctic summer. Before the beginning of winter they leave to open sea, in order to remain on the pack border where they are able to feed.

The not yet completed moult can give them a rather comical "hair cut".

This one seems ready to leave but, maybe, it is waiting for its pals in order not to leave alone?

An Antarctic skua, its colour makes it blend with the rocks behind.

The garage and carpentry building. It has been used, as well, as a dormitory during the last summer party. It is also there we spent our first night.

We are really in winter now, the temperature goes down to -20 Celsius degrees and the sea is frozen. All the birds (Adelie penguins and skuas) are gone.

Like in African (and other) deserts, we can see mirages some days. We sight, floating above the horizon, icebergs normally not visible. This phenomenon is provoked by the light refraction on air layers of different temperatures.

Then, some day, newcomers appear. They are emperor penguins. They arrive walking, in small groups, then in long columns.

When the ice surface is too soft or when they want to go faster, they slide on their belly propelling themselves forwards with their feet and their winglets (which are not used to fly but rather as fins when they are in the water).

This emperor seems to be resting awhile, after tens (or hundreds?) of kilometres covered, now it has nearly reached its destination.

Altogether there are thousands of emperor penguins arriving to Pointe Géologie archipelago to mate and reproduce during the Antarctic winter.

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