May 9, 2022

We are slowly finding things and digging them out

The entrance to mechanics garage after one and a half day digging.

Sepp and Basile moved out of the dome today. They have built their own little tents on the surface. Bo, Thomas, Anna-Maria and Basile spent a large part of the day setting up skiway markers and for some it was their first snowmobile trips. It is still very cold, but it doesn’t hurt us so much anymore. It helps that the wind has calmed. Sverrir and Chris with the help of Sepp have been moving a lot of snow to clear garages and to prepare for our main generator. For the first time this season, lunch was at 1300 and dinner at 1900. Frederik makes good food. We are getting into a routine. Due to our much delayed put-in, we soon have to take care of the skiway as the next planes with cargo and many PAX are scheduled to arrive May 20-24.
Somehow, there has been a kind of “COVID”-effect on our application systems. We were delayed 10 days due to lack of expedition permit, as the process somehow got stalled in the Greenlandic system, and now we hear rumors that some of our associated projects, due to arrive in next flight period have not yet got their permits. We keep our fingers crossed. We also got a note saying that our drone permit application has been stalled. J.P. spent all night writing letters to this end.

What we did today:

1. Skiway and lead-ins are now marked with brand new markers.
2. Cable and pipe well located and excavated. Main generator now in position.
3. Excavated large snowblower from cargoline and mounted it on Pistenbully.
4. Tomato huts pulled in place and powered.
5. Partly excavating entrance to mechanics garage.

Ad.1: The old markers are almost buried in snow. Later, we will try to retrieve a few.
Ad.2: Top of cable well was 2 m down in the snow.
Ad.3: During the tough digging the Pistenbully with the snowblower developed a leak.

Weather today: Clear blue skies. Temp. -40°C to -25°C. Wind: 10 kt becoming calm. Visibility: Unrestricted.

FL, J.P. Steffensen