Juliane (left), Brian (middle), and Jim (right) measuring the windspeed after Brian called a safety retreat in the field. The blizzard rolling in can be seen on the right.

Day 15 in the deep field! And today was our most adventurous day yet. Today was also the day at which base-layer clothes were changed (in my case). 3 fresh new base-layers!!! So good! I can’t even begin to describe how nice new clothes feel on my skin. Our resupply flight was canceled again and winds were howling angrily at 18 knots (20 MPH) with snow blowing across the surface. We decided to wait and see if things got better. At 1pm we went for it even though wind speeds had increased to 22 knots (25 MPH) but we got all bundled up in our new layers anyways. We are here to recover meteorites after all. I was a bit anxious because I wasn’t sure how well my 3 new base-layers would protect me from the howling wind and cold. But I’m happy to report that the new layers did an even better job than the old layers. All bundled up (in 8 layers again) we went back to the “achondrite orchard” ice field to traverse in a different area today. We swept with the wind in our backs and raced back against the wind to our starting point, moved and traversed again with the wind in our backs. The wind and the snow load got worse during our traverses. At the end of our second sweep high winds and lots of snow were suddenly rolling in over the mountains. Brian called a safety retreat. Too dangerous in the current condition to continue to work. The windspeed had increased to 32 knots (37 MPH) and as soon as we started on our way back towards camp we found ourselves in a white out. Whoever invented “Big Red” and decided to make it red was a genius! Any other color would have not been visible in those conditions. I was happily following Brian as close as possible. We couldn’t even see camp until we were basically on it. And yet driving through the howling winds tearing on our clothes, the snow snakes racing around us, the horizon and sky becoming one in the swirling snow, the falsified distances that suddenly seem so off, the only thing you can really see is the person in front of you, the dripping snot from your runny nose freezing to icicles, despite all that, it has something magical and mystical to it. It was an amazing experience. Of course without Brian leading us I would have been utterly freaked out and gotten lost which would not have ended well. But we did have Brian. And so we made it safe and soundly back to camp, huddling together in our little tents, warming up and eating dinner. Lovely! And we even increased our total meteorite count by 1 today despite the difficulties! Antarctica is a magical, beautiful, and utterly merciless place! And we love it so much!!