Smart tools and systems for exploring the frontier
Britney gives the Nov 1 Sunday Science Talk. (photo: Peter Kimball)
Britney gave the third of three talks by our project in the Sunday Science Talk series this past Sunday. We continue to be happily surprised by the high level of interest in our project from the McMurdo community – Britney’s talk was very well attended and very well received on Sunday.
Britney answers audience questions after her Sunday Science Talk. (photo: Peter Kimball)
Reporting by Peter Kimball
ARTEMIS is lifted into the moon pool in a full test of the ARTEMIS mechanical launching system. (photo: Peter Kimball)
We were out at the bot house yesterday, and stopped just short of putting ARTEMIS in the water. We completed a successful test of the lifting system used to put ARTEMIS in the water. The weight of ARTEMIS (1300 kg in air) and limited ceiling height in the bot house make lifting and rotation for launch and recovery a bit intricate. Here’s a cross-section rendering Bill made showing how it works.
Cross-section of the ARTEMIS bot house showing ARTEMIS being lowered into the culvert. (image: Bill Stone)
Reporting by Peter Kimball
We came back from the field yesterday just in time to fire down some dinner and head over to the McMurdo Station Halloween Party. Halloween is effectively a high holiday here, with most people preparing months in advance, and many even packing costume elements and special materials with their weight-limited baggage when leaving the U.S.
I was on the wrong end of the preparedness spectrum, but managed to piece together a “Fun Police” costume that ended up being quite enjoyable. Because of the sunglasses and mustache, many people didn’t recognize me, even in conversation. I issued citations and written warnings for things like “excessive style”, but found it was most fun to issue “written commendations” to people with excellent costumes and “meritorious service citations” to people like the DJs, bartenders, and galley staff.
David, one of the Crary Lab Assistants made himself an excellent ARTEMIS costume, complete with thrusters, spooling fiber, docking slot, and headlight. Those of us on the project were really impressed by it, and really happy to hear the uproar of applause he got during the costume contest. He was the landslide winner of the Antarctic Theme round. One of the rec office folks was dressed as the ARTEMIS docking rod, covered in front & back lines of flashing blue LEDs. It is a great feeling to have other people on station getting excited about our project.
Britney made some waves when she stepped up to the DJ booth, got them to play California Love, took the mic, and rapped the lyrical entirety of that song from memory… an excellent night for the SIMPLE squad.
Reporting by Peter Kimball
On Tuesday, we did another Sunfish operation to check out the newly installed culverts beneath the Bot House and the Fish Hut, and to test some navigational software improvements. We were easily able to find both culverts underwater, and fly Sunfish to perform an up-close visual inspection.
Sunfish view of the Fish Hut culvert from below the ice.
We also used Sunfish to create a 3D sonar map of the area beneath ARTEMIS camp, which can be seen in the video below. Color in the point cloud is mapped to the point’s water depth. Both culverts are visible as cylindrical tubes piercing through the ice, and only the bottom surface of the ice is visible – the ice extends about 6m above the ice ceiling. Also of interest is a “belling out” of the Fish Hut borehole at the bottom (green data) from the recent additional melting necessary to install the Fish Hut culvert. Sunfish can be seen holding position about 10m below the ice ceiling.
Rotating around sonar point cloud generated by SUNFISH of the area underneath ARTEMIS field camp.
Reporting by Evan Clark
We have spent the last few days preparing to put ARTEMIS in the water. Technically, we’ve spent the last three years doing that, but things are really coming to a head now. We’ve removed the flotation and coverings, and checked the fasteners, housings, connectors, and moving parts. The McMurdo community has scrounged up a few replacement parts for us where needed. Brian has been setting up his radio frequency tracking gear, and those of us on the software team have been setting up mission control and checking the data coming from the ARTEMIS sensors.
In the struggles department, many of us have been fighting nasty colds this week. We’re also having to work a bit to get everyone out to the site when they need to be there, and to keep from stepping on each other as we all work on various aspects of the robot. We’ve been lucky enough to borrow some vehicles, some folks have pulled some very late nights to spread the schedule out, and Bill and John even slept at the camp on Wednesday night. Soon, we’ll have sleeping tents set up out there, giving us some more flexibility in scheduling and transportation.
On the whole, forward momentum is good right now, and the first in-water tests of ARTEMIS feel very close.
The stars aligned a few days ago such that all nine currently-in-the-field Stone Aerospace ARTEMIS team members were in the bot house with ARTEMIS at the same time. I seized the moment to capture a group photo.
Bill, Brian, Kristof, John, Josh, Vickie, Evan, Chris, and I pose with ARTEMIS in the bot house. (photo: Peter Kimball)
However, the group changes today. A C-17, currently in the air, will deliver Mark and Keith to us, but will then take John back to the real world.
The weather has been cold, but nice and calm the last few days. Mt. Erebus was looking excellent yesterday, sunlit even as low clouds shaded the sea ice near camp:
Mt. Erebus is sunlit beyond the cloud cover. (photo: Peter Kimball)
Reporting by Peter Kimball