Thirteen minutes.
A tracking platform vital to the success of an expensive, carefully planned solar experiment worked exactly 13 minutes.
Then it stopped cold.
Very cold. Minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit cold.
South Pole cold.
The glitch sent a chill through Stuart Jefferies and his team.
In December 2016, the professor in Georgia State’s Department of Physics and Astronomy led a six-man crew representing five institutions in three nations to Antarctica. Their mission: Set up and operate telescopes and other instruments that record high-resolution images of the sun.
Jefferies and his team had worked for months to coordinate their seven-week expedition. They arranged transportation and procured scientific equipment. They mapped logistics and shipped supplies. In Christchurch, New Zealand, they selected special extreme cold weather gear.
Once in Antarctica, atop ice miles deep, they established a remote observatory site five kilometers from the relative warmth and comfort of the American Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. They spent two weeks preparing the site. They built instruments in a confined remote building with no infrastructure for dealing with complicated optical systems. They spent 10 days testing and debugging the whole operation.
Then, exactly 13 minutes into the experiment, the tracking platform froze up and refused to budge.
In most places, repairing mechanical problems requires only a wrench, a strong arm and opposable thumbs.
In Antarctica, the rules change.
"Because of the extreme conditions down here at minus 20 to minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit,” says Jefferies, “jobs that may be relatively straightforward back on the mainland can be a challenge, and we can’t just go to the local parts shop for things we need."
Secrets of the Sun
It’s not Jefferies’ first experience at the pole. This is his seventh expedition. His perceptions haven’t changed since his first trip 30 years ago, a 1987 project with the Bartol Research Institute at the University of Delaware.
“This is a place of unbelievable beauty,” he says, “but it is also very harsh.”
Harsh. In ice tunnels below the polar station, temperatures routinely plunge to minus 60 degrees Fahrenehit … this in the Antarctic summer. A cup of water tossed into the air turns instantly into fine ice crystals. Touching anything metal left out of doors can be a painful reminder that skin adheres to super-cold metallic surfaces.
Still, solar scientists flock to Antarctica like moths to a flame.
Here, despite unpredictable weather, the sun can theoretically be visible 24 hours a day for six months straight. The Antarctic is a land of the midnight sun.
Sponsored by the National Science Foundation’s Division of Polar Programs, Jefferies’ project will allow researchers to measure and characterize gravity waves in the sun’s atmosphere.
Scientists want to know how those waves transport energy, and they seek wave data to map the sun’s structure and study changes in its atmosphere. Mysteries abound — the solar coronal heating enigma, for instance. Scientists have long wondered why the temperature of the sun’s atmosphere rises from about 6,000 degrees at its visible surface (the photosphere) to several million degrees in its outer atmosphere (the corona).
“By studying the magnetic, acoustic and gravity waves in the sun's atmosphere,” says Jefferies, “we hope to improve our understanding of some causes of space weather, like solar flares and coronal mass ejections.”
As Jefferies points out, adverse space weather disables satellites, causes power grid failures and disrupts communications.
“All of this has a significant impact on society.”
Gremlins in the Gizmos
The glitch with the tracking platform was unusual, but Antarctica means business as unusual.
“We place our telescopes on top of a platform that follows the sun,” Jefferies explains. “The platform was built in the early 1980s and has worked flawlessly ever since. This year, our experiment was about 150 pounds heavier than previous years, and it appears that we didn't quite get the balancing right when we set everything up at our remote site.”
Did the platform’s bearings seize up? Did the clutch fail? Jefferies and his team brought the device indoors to warm it and started troubleshooting. Days stretched to 20 hours. Still, spirits remained high.
It takes special people to work in special conditions, and Jefferies’ team is a well-seasoned, good-natured crew, he says.
“Everyone on the team was picked for two reasons,” Jefferies says. “First, personality and ability to work in a team environment under pressure. Second, some unique expertise that will help enhance the project’s scientific return.”
Bill Giebink, the project manager, hails from the University of Hawaii, one of Jefferies’ career stops before joining Georgia State in 2016. Giebink is a sort of scientific Swiss army knife, experienced in mechanics, electronics and telescope optics. “Most of all,” says Jefferies, “he has phenomenal organizational skills, a must for expeditions like this.”
Neil Murphy, like Giebink, accompanied Jefferies on a 2007 polar expedition and is on loan from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. Murphy brings with him varied skills as an accomplished instrument builder, plus expertise working the atomic vapor cells used in instruments.
From the European Space Agency, Bernhard Fleck adds extensive experience in seismic probing of the sun’s atmosphere, along with unique analysis skills. Francesco Berrilli and Stefano Scardigli, from the University of Rome Tor Vergata, build instruments that study the sun’s convective properties. Data these instruments capture have space weather applications that complement Jefferies’ search for atmospheric gravity waves.
Camaraderie counts.
“Every single team member has not only a fantastic work ethic but also a great sense of humor,” says Jefferies. “That’s something you definitely need here as things don’t always go as planned.
Bill Giebink, the project manager, hails from the University of Hawaii, one of Jefferies’ career stops before joining Georgia State in 2016. Giebink is a sort of scientific Swiss army knife, experienced in mechanics, electronics and telescope optics. “Most of all,” says Jefferies, “he has phenomenal organizational skills, a must for expeditions like this.”
Neil Murphy, like Giebink, accompanied Jefferies on a 2007 polar expedition and is on loan from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. Murphy brings with him varied skills as an accomplished instrument builder, plus expertise working the atomic vapor cells used in instruments.
From the European Space Agency, Bernhard Fleck adds extensive experience in seismic probing of the sun’s atmosphere, along with unique analysis skills. Francesco Berrilli and Stefano Scardigli, from the University of Rome Tor Vergata, build instruments that study the sun’s convective properties. Data these instruments capture have space weather applications that complement Jefferies’ search for atmospheric gravity waves.
Camaraderie counts.
“Every single team member has not only a fantastic work ethic but also a great sense of humor,” says Jefferies. “That’s something you definitely need here as things don’t always go as planned.
Ice-cold Speed Bumps
Nobody laughed when the tracking platform stopped after 13 minutes.
No one panicked either.
“Actually, one of the things you learn about working in Antarctica,” Jefferies says, “is that there are always unexpected speed bumps to navigate. It wasn’t a complete surprise when things got complicated.”
Even simple things get complicated. One afternoon, Jefferies left the observation site shelter (called “The Smurf” and painted bright blue) to put eight small bolts on the side of the instrument box.
“The bolts are small, so I had to take my gloves off,” he says, “but the temperature with the wind chill was about minus 40 Fahrenheit. After about two minutes, my hands were so cold I couldn’t feel them.”
Jefferies dropped a few of the bolts on the ice … and he couldn’t make his fingers work to pick them up.
“I had to go inside for 15 minutes to warm up before I could retrieve the bolts.”
After the tracking platform failed, the team removed its sides – outdoors – to examine the electronics.
“We were working with frozen cables and trying to diagnose the problem with the temperature way below zero and the wind hitting us at 20 miles an hour,” says Jefferies. “Let’s call it a … challenge.”
Necessity mothers a lot of invention at the South Pole.
“We don't have the resources we do back at home, of course,” Jefferies says. “You have to be a jack-of-all-trades with MacGyver tendencies.” (MacGyver, a weaponless secret agent in a popular television show that ran from 1985-1992, used encyclopedic scientific knowledge to thwart enemies. In one well remembered episode, he used a paper clip to foil the plans of a villain.)
Good neighbors help, too. The National Science Foundation runs the South Pole station, supporting science primarily conducted by United States institutions. But harmonious collaborations take place with scientists from around the world.
“The local community at the South Pole is fantastic,” Jefferies says. “Everyone wants science projects to be successful, and they go out of their ways to help if they can. It is a very supportive environment.”
Ice-cold Speed Bumps
Nobody laughed when the tracking platform stopped after 13 minutes.
No one panicked either.
“Actually, one of the things you learn about working in Antarctica,” Jefferies says, “is that there are always unexpected speed bumps to navigate. It wasn’t a complete surprise when things got complicated.”
Even simple things get complicated. One afternoon, Jefferies left the observation site shelter (called “The Smurf” and painted bright blue) to put eight small bolts on the side of the instrument box.
“The bolts are small, so I had to take my gloves off,” he says, “but the temperature with the wind chill was about minus 40 Fahrenheit. After about two minutes, my hands were so cold I couldn’t feel them.”
Jefferies dropped a few of the bolts on the ice … and he couldn’t make his fingers work to pick them up.
“I had to go inside for 15 minutes to warm up before I could retrieve the bolts.”
After the tracking platform failed, the team removed its sides – outdoors – to examine the electronics.
“We were working with frozen cables and trying to diagnose the problem with the temperature way below zero and the wind hitting us at 20 miles an hour,” says Jefferies. “Let’s call it a … challenge.”
Necessity mothers a lot of invention at the South Pole.
“We don't have the resources we do back at home, of course,” Jefferies says. “You have to be a jack-of-all-trades with MacGyver tendencies.” (MacGyver, a weaponless secret agent in a popular television show that ran from 1985-1992, used encyclopedic scientific knowledge to thwart enemies. In one well remembered episode, he used a paper clip to foil the plans of a villain.)
Good neighbors help, too. The National Science Foundation runs the South Pole station, supporting science primarily conducted by United States institutions. But harmonious collaborations take place with scientists from around the world.
“The local community at the South Pole is fantastic,” Jefferies says. “Everyone wants science projects to be successful, and they go out of their ways to help if they can. It is a very supportive environment.”
Important South Pole structure:
The container on the right houses a generator that provides electricity to a subterranean dwelling, and the black building on the left is a solar-heated lavatory known as "the Duke."
Worldly Pursuits
Jefferies says that same kind of supportive environment drew him to Georgia State after 10 prior years at the Institute for Astronomy at the University of Hawaii.
“I was attracted to Georgia State because of the forward-looking philosophy of the upper administration, and the supportive atmosphere both in the astronomy department and at the university level,” he says.
In the second semester of 2016, Jefferies taught a graduate class (ASTRO 8900), and he started teaching an introductory astronomy class for undergraduates (ASTRO 1000) after he returned from the South Pole at the end of January. If this year’s experiment proves successful, he plans a return polar trip in 2018 — this time with a Georgia State graduate student on the team.
Jefferies says his journey into solar physics has been a stroke of fortune, filled with MacGyver moments and little planning.
He earned his Ph.D. in neutron physics at the University of London, where he lectured and produced papers with sexy titles (if you’re a sun scientist) like “Modeling Solar Oscillation Power Spectra. II. Parametric Model of Spectral Lines Observed in Doppler-Velocity Measurements.” He eyed a job at a nuclear reactor in Russellville, Arkansas, but a newspaper advertisement changed that.
“Birmingham University needed someone to help set up solar observatories around the world,” Jefferies says. “I have a passion for travel, and so I applied. To my surprise, I was offered the job … even though I knew essentially nothing about astronomy.”
For the next five years, Jefferies traveled the world setting up a global network of instruments for solar studies. (“It was a crash course in solar physics,” he says.) He stopped at Maui, Hawaii, where he worked at Mees Solar Observatory atop Mt. Haleakala. (“I was known locally as Crater Man,” he says.) He worked at Caenarvon, Western Australia, then on Tenerife in the Canary Islands. Between assignments, he would fly back to Birmingham, England, to build instruments for the next installation.
He traveled between gigs too — Fiji, Tahiti, New Zealand, all over. These worldly adventures let him indulge his hobbies — mountain biking, surfing, ocean swimming and trail running. Summers, he took along his daughter, Danielle, a sophomore now at Long Island University Brooklyn. On Maui, his wife, Colleen, teamed up with him to coach age group swimming. (Jefferies’ LinkedIn profile calls him Professor of Physics and Astronomy and Head Swimming Coach.)
“I'm hoping to find a team I can help out in Atlanta once I get back from the South Pole,” he says.
Last, but not least, Jefferies says he “loves trying new foods.” He must have been thrilled when the producer of super-chef Anthony Bourdain’s “Parts Unknown” television series contacted him as part of a special edition on science in Antarctica.
No thrill, though, matched the one Jefferies got in mid-January.
The team had taken apart the balky tracking platform. They rebuilt the clutch and made other adjustments. They reassembled it and crossed their fingers.
On test day, Jefferies and the team pulled out of the Amundsen-Scott base station in a van fitted with large tires deliberately left partially flat to help with traction. The Italians played Pink Floyd on the way to the observatory site; it was minus 30 outside, with wind.
They left behind a warm galley serving hot meals three times a day; a mini theatre with an extensive movie collection; a gym; a recreation room with a pool table; a music room with drums, guitars, and amps; and a sauna including twice-a-week, two-minute-maximum hot showers. (Polar visitors can join the 300 Degree Club by pumping the sauna temp to 200 degrees Fahrenheit, then cooling down outside in 100 degrees below.)
Jefferies and his team put the tracking platform in place. They mounted the equipment. They manned the controls and glanced at the heavens for luck.
The tracking platform worked perfectly. The experiment would proceed. The science could start.
At the bottom of the world … Stuart Jefferies stood on top of the world.
*Charles McNair publishes nationally and internationally. He is the author of two novels, “Pickett’s Charge” and “Land O’ Goshen.” He was books editor at Paste Magazine from 2005– 2015. McNair lives in Bogota, Colombia.