Thursday 4 December 2007
by Thomas MulcaireSANAE Base, 71 deg 40' 25.66940 S 02 deg 50' 30.411805 W, 862.38m above sea level
After three straight days of snow flowing like a river underneath us the storm passed and we saw blue sky and the horizon line for the first time since Monday. We made hay whilst the sun shone. Franz and I met immediately to discuss bringing our container to the helipad so that we could unpack the Groundhog unit from its container and begin mounting the power systems and weather instruments. The Groundhog container had been pulled to SANAE from the ice shelf at RSA Bukta on New Year's Eve in the last Challenger convoy to leave E-base before the storm hit but we had been unable to move it from the depot point to the base this week. Having been pulled 150km from the ice shelf to SANAE in 12 hours the containers had to be left outside at the depot 500m from the cargo doors for four days due to the ferocity of the storm and the near zero visibility which made it impossible for any of us to venture out of the base more than 4 or 5 metres without being attached to a rope. Within an hour of speaking to Franz our container (no.58) had been put on a sled and dragged up the gradual slope of Vesleskaervet to the helipad where it was hoisted by the cargo crane and slung across onto the helipad. The logistical personnel at the base are experienced and efficient and know the importance of making the most of the weather windows when they come around. As soon as the container was on the helipad I went out with Franz and Leon du Plessis (the science coordinator) to assess how to move the Groundhog into the base and where to put it. Franz assigned us an area at the back of the helicopter hangar close to the diesel generators. It is a bit noisy but it's a good space in all other respects. It is close to the metal and carpentry workshops where we have access to the tools and workbenches and there is enough room for us to lay out and assemble our power system (wind turbines and photovoltaic panels) and the weather station instruments.
After lunch, the spirit of collaboration that exists at the base kicked in and our science colleagues (Zama Magogotya, Remmy Musumpuka, Chantel Steyn, Struan Cockroft and Leon) and Shiraan Watson and Godfrey Magagula from SANAP joined us on the helipad to pull the Groundhog out of its container and move it into the hangar. The Groundhog is no piglet at over 250kg and 2m high and is a solid unit except for the removable door, so all hands were needed to move it across the deck in the freshening 15 knot winds. Johan van Altena and the whole of Bobby de Beer's crew at Sets and Devices had done a really good job constructing the unit and packing it securely for the trip south. It arrived in immaculate condition after a 4500km rolling journey across the Southern Ocean and a 150km haul across compacted snow, blue ice, sastruggis and crevasses to SANAE. The impact that the unit withstood during the sled haul over the ice is roughly equivalent to dropping a wooden crate from a height of 1m every 20 seconds.
The visual effect of the piece, when it was being wheeled through the cargo doors into the base and standing as it is now quietly in the corner of the hangar is exactly what I wanted, something between a scientific tool, a prop in a film set and a minimalist-conceptual object. I am blessed to have someone as generous and thorough as Bobby who I can turn to for advice and support whenever I decide to execute a complex sculptural project. He intuitively understands the ideas behind each work and the way it should be translated into form. He is an art patron in the highest (altruistic) sense, nurturing and encouraging ideas and impossible plans, sponsoring the production costs of the work and donating any materials that he has direct access to, all without expecting any kind of return or ever claiming ownership over any part of the work. Without him I don't think I would have been able to produce Angela Ferreira's Zip Zap Circus School project on the Cape Town foreshore, Joseph Kpobly and I would not have realized our reading room project at the South African National Gallery, and the Groundhog would not be in Antarctica.
Tonight before dinner Amanda and I shot some sequences of the snow flowing over the rocks and ice around the base. The snow, when blown by the wind, looks like the smoke of a veld fire and at other times it looks like fingers of fog being sucked back over a hill they had just descended from. Time-space moves in any direction here. Antarctica is an impossible place to film and the perfect set.
