The winds were strong (~25 kts) again this morning, which caused us to stay in our tents until after lunch.  And unfortunately, due to the turbulence aloft, Ralph’s scheduled pull-out flight was canceled.  Ralph’s plans were to only be in the field for the first portion of the trip, with Jim taking over when he leaves.  But, since we deployed late and Jim had good flights to McMurdo, we have had the pleasure of both of them in the field so far.

The first meteorite of the day, with Brian’s feet for scale.

We braved the elements in the afternoon, and had a very full and productive half day.  We headed back (into the wind!) to the trough, where the weather turned out to be less windy than at camp.  We explored the southern end off the trough this time, and immediately Johnny spotted a substantial specimen that we collected.

Johnny continued to reel in the meteorites — his second meteorites was a fist-sized carbonaceous chondrite — and Ralph and others also spotted numerous specimens.  After flagging a number of meteorites, most of us went back to collect specimens that had be flagged on our previous visit to the trough, while Ryan and Ralph went off to find a flag line from a previous year (2010).

All in all, we collected about a dozen meteorites today, for a total of 58 meteorites collected and a dozen or so additional specimens flagged.  Given that we’ve had only 3 total days in the field, it’s a respectable total.  We hope to add to it substantially, of course, although we also hope — for Ralph’s sake! — that his pull out flight will happen tomorrow.  So we’ll lose his contributions, but will strive to put all his instruction over the last 3 days to good use.

-posted by Shannon and Devon, Dec 27, Davis-Ward