Dobrey Dyinh, ya’ll!
Or rather Good Afternoon! And the southern branch of the family can figure the last word out for themselves.
I have now entering the third and final week of my stay at the exploration camp, and the thought of putting it all behind on the airplane outtahere is sweet. My reason for coming here is more than half over. I have one manager safely returned to camp and the other well into his five-day break in Hawaii. I will be leaving even before he returns, by this coming Thursday in fact, but I am already developing short-timer’s attitude even though it was all new to me when I got here.
This is one extreme place to be. One minute it is sunny and warm and the next it is (literally) blowing and snowing huge flakes. One day we are slogging around the muskeg and slop in high boots and the next we are digging out of the drifts. The camp is situated behind a westerly hill that protects us from much of the wind, but the coast is not far away and beyond it is the Sea of Okhotsk, one of the nastiest patches of water in the world. The guys here say that the Russian government closes the Sea for nearly half the year to vessel traffic because it is so hazardous in the wintertime, and I believe it.
Typically, the crew works from 8 am until 6 pm. Afterward, the managers review the day and revise plans until 9 pm. These guys work in some of the most inhospitable weather in the world day after day for months at a stretch, with nothing more than their clothing to protect them out on the survey line. By the end of the day they are exhausted from the battle to stay warm, and it does get a little old after awhile. Aside from work, the weather and the occasional yelling match, there is not much to break the monotony. Yet camp life is not without its humor. So far I have gone for a “swim” in the local creek, eaten all the hotdogs I can possibly stand, and watched more Russian TV than should be forced on anyone.
We have been sucking our water from a local stream using a gasoline powered pump and a water hose with a set of filter baskets attached. We pump the water up the hill to a set of water storage bladders in a large tent and distributed from there to the kitchen and the wash tent. Along the way, it is passed through a sediment filter and two paper filters, and past a U/V lamp, which sterilizes any bugs in the water. Generally, we don’t drink it, but if we must then we boil it. For drinking water, we depend on cases and cases of 6-liter bottles flown in from the nearby town of Esso. But we still must have stream water for showers, laundry, cooking, and cleaning,
and the inflow of sediment really gums up the works. As the rivers and streams begin melt in spring, they carry much more sediment than usual. During the typical pumping session we have to stop and clean out the sediment filter about every five minutes or so, because of the buildup.
My partner Sean is a marvelously inventive Alaskan who never seems to be lacking for a workaround. And with good reason: you can’t get spare parts here without an incredible amount of effort. Just as we learned when we were children, you don’t throw anything away, because one day it might come in handy. So to deal with the sediment problem he came up with a suction device that, in theory, would stop the sediment before it got to our filters.
He cut numerous holes in the sides of an empty 55-gallon drum, and fitted it with a two large water filters and a piping system on top that would connect with our hose. He wrapped each of the filters with a couple pillowcases, and then dressed the outside of the drum with a sewn-up bed sheet. We dragged the contraption down to the stream bank with the help of Pasha, our young Russian worker. He had already cut away the snow that had banked up at the water’s edge, digging down 4 or 5 feet to reach the ground. Sean fastened a rope to the barrel and perched it on the edge of the bank, while I hefted up the sandbag to load the bottom of the barrel. At that moment the snow bank beneath us gave way, dropping us into 3 feet of extremely cold water!
The first shock to reach us was the stupidity of what we had done. But that quickly gave way to the shock of water that was just barely above freezing. Pasha, who was watching us from the shore, immediately hauled Sean out and they passed a line to me. After pulling me out it was all he could do to not fall down and bust out laughing at his bosses.
Thoroughly wet and embarrassed, we drove the Argo up to the tent and changed into dry clothes. We got back to the water hole and fired up the pump, and much to our satisfaction – and vindication - we were pleased to see that Sean’s invention worked like a charm. From that time on we have not had any problems with sediment. Now the problem is getting one of us to be willing to go down to the bank to retrieve the suction drum.
I will have to wait until another time to tell you about hotdogs and Russian TV. It is time to get back to work.
Jed
Or rather Good Afternoon! And the southern branch of the family can figure the last word out for themselves.
I have now entering the third and final week of my stay at the exploration camp, and the thought of putting it all behind on the airplane outtahere is sweet. My reason for coming here is more than half over. I have one manager safely returned to camp and the other well into his five-day break in Hawaii. I will be leaving even before he returns, by this coming Thursday in fact, but I am already developing short-timer’s attitude even though it was all new to me when I got here.
This is one extreme place to be. One minute it is sunny and warm and the next it is (literally) blowing and snowing huge flakes. One day we are slogging around the muskeg and slop in high boots and the next we are digging out of the drifts. The camp is situated behind a westerly hill that protects us from much of the wind, but the coast is not far away and beyond it is the Sea of Okhotsk, one of the nastiest patches of water in the world. The guys here say that the Russian government closes the Sea for nearly half the year to vessel traffic because it is so hazardous in the wintertime, and I believe it.
Typically, the crew works from 8 am until 6 pm. Afterward, the managers review the day and revise plans until 9 pm. These guys work in some of the most inhospitable weather in the world day after day for months at a stretch, with nothing more than their clothing to protect them out on the survey line. By the end of the day they are exhausted from the battle to stay warm, and it does get a little old after awhile. Aside from work, the weather and the occasional yelling match, there is not much to break the monotony. Yet camp life is not without its humor. So far I have gone for a “swim” in the local creek, eaten all the hotdogs I can possibly stand, and watched more Russian TV than should be forced on anyone.
We have been sucking our water from a local stream using a gasoline powered pump and a water hose with a set of filter baskets attached. We pump the water up the hill to a set of water storage bladders in a large tent and distributed from there to the kitchen and the wash tent. Along the way, it is passed through a sediment filter and two paper filters, and past a U/V lamp, which sterilizes any bugs in the water. Generally, we don’t drink it, but if we must then we boil it. For drinking water, we depend on cases and cases of 6-liter bottles flown in from the nearby town of Esso. But we still must have stream water for showers, laundry, cooking, and cleaning,
and the inflow of sediment really gums up the works. As the rivers and streams begin melt in spring, they carry much more sediment than usual. During the typical pumping session we have to stop and clean out the sediment filter about every five minutes or so, because of the buildup.My partner Sean is a marvelously inventive Alaskan who never seems to be lacking for a workaround. And with good reason: you can’t get spare parts here without an incredible amount of effort. Just as we learned when we were children, you don’t throw anything away, because one day it might come in handy. So to deal with the sediment problem he came up with a suction device that, in theory, would stop the sediment before it got to our filters.
He cut numerous holes in the sides of an empty 55-gallon drum, and fitted it with a two large water filters and a piping system on top that would connect with our hose. He wrapped each of the filters with a couple pillowcases, and then dressed the outside of the drum with a sewn-up bed sheet. We dragged the contraption down to the stream bank with the help of Pasha, our young Russian worker. He had already cut away the snow that had banked up at the water’s edge, digging down 4 or 5 feet to reach the ground. Sean fastened a rope to the barrel and perched it on the edge of the bank, while I hefted up the sandbag to load the bottom of the barrel. At that moment the snow bank beneath us gave way, dropping us into 3 feet of extremely cold water!
The first shock to reach us was the stupidity of what we had done. But that quickly gave way to the shock of water that was just barely above freezing. Pasha, who was watching us from the shore, immediately hauled Sean out and they passed a line to me. After pulling me out it was all he could do to not fall down and bust out laughing at his bosses.
Thoroughly wet and embarrassed, we drove the Argo up to the tent and changed into dry clothes. We got back to the water hole and fired up the pump, and much to our satisfaction – and vindication - we were pleased to see that Sean’s invention worked like a charm. From that time on we have not had any problems with sediment. Now the problem is getting one of us to be willing to go down to the bank to retrieve the suction drum.I will have to wait until another time to tell you about hotdogs and Russian TV. It is time to get back to work.
Jed
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