OIB: Fourwheeling Antarctica

1. 0:00You could say Kyle Krabill is fond of his four-wheeler. But that's not what made him
2. 0:08carefully pack it for travel, outfit it with specialized equipment like a GPS tracker, and bring it along
3. 0:16on a 10,000 mile trip from his home in Virginia to the frozen continent of Antarctica.
4. 0:24Twice a year, Kyle takes part in a NASA mission called Operation IceBridge. He and he colleagues Robbie and John
5. 0:32travel to both poles to measure our planet's changing ice with the use of lasers
6. 0:36mounted on aircraft. But to make sure that data is accurate, the entire mission relies on precise calibration
7. 0:44basically they need to know exactly where the ground is.
8. 0:48Usually, they both set up ground stations and also drive around on a level surface, like a runway, to get a reference
9. 0:57map of a known elevation. But for the first time last fall,
10. 1:01IceBridge was flying out of McMurdo Station in Antarctica, a place with not much bare earth. And the runway? A floating
11. 1:09sheet of ice in McMurdo sound, which moves up and down with the tides every day. The solution? A trip to nearby
12. 1:17Black Island. Kyle Krabill: The reason it's named Black Island is because the wind blows
13. 1:21so hard, all the time, it blows the snow off. It's good for us because
14. 1:25we want to, measure, the actual dirt, on the island.
15. 1:29The road that goes down it, bad for us because it's a very tough
16. 1:33place to get to and do some work. Narrator: The plan: wait for a
17. 1:37calm enough day for the McMurdo helicopter squad to be able to ferry the
18. 1:41ATV over to the island, followed by Kyle, Robbie, and John.
19. 1:49On the first attempt, they only made it halfway there.
20. 2:05But finally, the four-wheeler made the trip, followed by the crew.
21. 2:25Kyle Krabill: For this the entire thing was different than we've ever done It wasn't an easy thing. Any time you
22. 2:33deal with helicopter operations and a place where the wind can blow up to 160 miles an hour, it's a tough place
23. 2:42to work, it's a tough environment to work in.
24. 2:50The adventure was really fun. It was something different, and the day ended up looking really clean, and it worked well.
25. 3:02Narrator: A job well done, it was time to ferry the ATV back to McMurdo,
26. 3:06and when the campaign was over, return 10,000 miles to the
27. 3:10Eastern Shore of Virginia, where Kyle and his four-wheeler would have quite a story to tell.

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