Operation Deepfreeze 2000 - PACTOR in the Antarctic

Frank Wolfe, NM7R

In addition to being an active Amateur Radio operator, I am lucky enough to work as the Radio Electronics Officer on a civilian merchant ship, the Richard G. Matthiesen. Under contract with the U.S. Military Sealift Command, the ship usually carries jet and diesel fuel cargoes from refineries or fuel depots to military bases all over the world. Occasionally, we refuel ships at sea. Through a special lease agreement MSC charters the Matthiesen, or one of her four sister ships, to the National Science Foundation, to take a fuel cargo to McMurdo, Antarctica, once each year. They call this annual supply mission "Operation Deepfreeze." One of the special construction details of these "Champion class" double-hulled tankers is an ice-strengthened bow. Although this doesn't make us an icebreaker, it does afford limited protection in order to transit water beset with thin  loes or small blocks of ice. It always amazes me when people ask, "Why would you take an oil tanker to the Antarctic?" The answer is simple. In order to keep the generators, helicopters, snow-cats, trucks and airplanes all running, there has to be a supply of fuel.

For the last year or so, "Matt" has been trading in the Mediterranean Sea and northern Europe. To keep in touch with home (in Washington State) I occasionally accepted phone patches from friendly fellow amateurs on the east coast of the U.S. The clean strong signals required for patches on HF are difficult to come by near Europe, and almost impossible in the "Med." Radio Officers' normal work rotation is four months on the ship and four months off. While I'm home, I run phone patches for maritime mobiles, help with the maintenance of local repeaters and teach license classes for the Sunset Empire ARC. I'm also an active VE. That's how I met Dave. He had taken a class from our club, and earned his Technician license at one of our VE sessions this fall. He was soon on the air on 2 Meters.  One night, Dave, W7DEK, had been talking on a repeater with a friend in Oregon City, about 100 miles away, and commented enthusiastically to me on the range. I couldn't help but smile.

On returning to work in December, I decided to investigate a new mode. Although I'd used AMTOR and Packet before, PACTOR would be a new experience. I started experimenting on 20 Meters. I made mistakes at first, but soon got the hang of it. I love learning new things, and one of the wonderful aspects of our hobby is that there is always something new.

Calling (and answering) CQ a few times, I ran into several helpful folks. Following their suggestions I connected to a few of the many mailbox operators, including ZS5S in South Africa, run by Joost, and 9A»APL in Zagreb, Croatia, hosted by Darko. Most PACTOR mailbox operations are set up to scan several frequencies, usually including 15 and 20 Meters. Many have beam antennas that rotate to favor different directions at different times during the day, making connecting with one of these mailboxes easy when conditions are favorable. The information bulletins available on these stations were very helpful. Several MBOs also forward messages to and fromInternet e-mail. I'd discovered a message route home that let me keep in touch from my office on the high seas! I sent a message to my XYL, Kathleen, N7ONG, from the middle of the Mediterranean. Then (unable to resist), I sent a message to Dave. It read in part, "So 100 miles is DX, eh?" He sent an enthusiastic reply. We have maintained a continuous correspondence by PACTOR/e-mail ever since, making me a long distance Elmer.

HF communications at sea

Communications to and from a ship at sea can be challenging under the best of circumstances, but when voyaging to all corners of the world and particularly the extreme north or south latitudes, this becomes especially true. Once I knew the ship would be making the Antarctic run, I began to look for stations I could contact from that far south. The last time I went to McMurdo, in 1995, my only Amateur Radio operating consisted of a few HF single side band contacts. This year, I wanted to be more radio-active. I was hoping PACTOR would be better suited to polar communications than voice had proven.

After loading the Antarctic cargo in Greece, the ship left the "Med" by way of the Suez Canal, bound for Fremantle, on Australia's west coast. The day after we left the Canal, I connected with VK6TN, Ernie Harper in Perth, only 30 km from Fremantle. We had daily chats on the keyboard, and I sent a few short messages to and from home through his mailbox. I was encouraged that I could reliably work his station on 15 Meters from the Red Sea, nearly 7,000 miles away. I hoped that when I headed south from Australia, to the land that's really down under, we might continue our QSOs. Meanwhile, I was stoking Dave's enthusiasm and curiosity with the long range of HF, and the complexity of the path our traffic was taking. A message filed with Ernie in Western Australia would be relayed by Amateur radio links to a gateway station, such as Arnold, ZL1MA, in Auckland, New Zealand, to be posted as outgoing traffic on his mailbox. From there, periodically (about every four hours), messages were forwarded to the Internet for delivery. Any e-mail traffic coming back from the Internet was posted on ZL1MA and then relayed back the same way, and I could pick it up the next time I checked in to VK6TN. In some cases, when propagation was favorable, VK6TN would relay to other gateway stations like W9MR in Illinois, or N»ZO in Florida for forwarding.

Crossing the Indian Ocean I was able to work VK6TN every day, nearly always with good solid signals. As Australia grew closer, I found 20-meter frequencies more reliable. After three weeks at sea, the ship arrived in Fremantle for a bunker stop on 3 January, to top off the shipÖs own fuel tanks. Six hours later we sailed for Antarctica. Ernie came down to see the ship, but arrived too late. We had already sailed. Tankers are, after all, not operated for the pleasure and convenience of their crews!

Traveling the 3,800 miles from Fremantle, on the western coast of Australia, to McMurdo, Antarctica (about 2,000 miles due south of New Zealand), took two weeks. Across the Southern Ocean that encircles the globe, winds blow (predominantly west to east) clear around the world without fetching up on land, making for some of the nastiest weather in the world. Fortunately, on the southbound trip, we could angle across this stretch of water, heading southeast and putting the rough weather on our stern quarter. It was quite exhilarating to be on a 615-foot ship, surfing with the waves, running before a gale. We were able to receive very clear weather charts by HF facsimile from Canberra. This required tight scheduling, first to have the fax receiver on and correctly tuned at the appointed time, but also to make sure that no HF transmissions spoiled the chart. Of course, these charts showed one storm system after another chasing each other around the bottom of the world.

Utility communications on the Antarctic continent are by single side band on 4, 8 and 11 MHz. Our first direct contact with McMurdo Operations was on 11 MHz SSB on 8 January when the ship was still 2,200 miles away.  Most ships have come to rely upon satellite communications, but this close to the pole, the geostationary satellites are very low on the horizon and therefore unreliable. The required unobstructed path from our parabolic antenna to the satellite was frequently blocked by the stack or radar mast as the ship constantly changed direction to avoid icebergs. Satellite telex, phone and fax became quite problematic. Any telex traffic that would have gone out by that route had to be sent by high frequency instead, using "SITOR." the commercial cousin of AMTOR.

Commercial gear

The workhorse in my radio room is an ITT Mackay MRU-35 HF transmitter, standing six feet high in its blue rack. This 1980s vintage gear comprises a 3,000 volt power supply fed from the ship's 480-volt mains, a synthesized exciter and a linear amplifier. The exciter is tuned with lever action thumbwheel switches to any frequency from 2 to 30 MHz in 100 Hz steps. Modeselection is with push buttons: A3A, A3J, A3H, A1 or F1. The linear amplifier uses an 8122 to drive a 4CX1500B, and will produce from less than one watt to more than one kilowatt output over the entire HF spectrum. Each time the frequency is changed, the amplifier and antenna coupler must be retuned. One becomes quite adept at this, and there are lots of pencil scribbles around the knobs to make resetting to an established frequency quick. The 35-foot fiberglass vertical antenna and semi-automatic coupler are mounted just outside the radio room on the bridge deck, 60 feet above the water.

For reception, there are three 3030A commercial receivers, also lever action tuned. The lever action tuning is designed for the channelized world of commercial operation. It is very easy and fast to set a specific frequency. It is awkward and time consuming to scan a band. Once a signal is found on the receiver, the transmitter must then be set and tuned separately. Each of the receivers is provided with a wire antenna. These are an 80-foot vertical wire hung from the radar mast and stack, a 65-foot horizontal wire running aft from the radio room, and a 250- foot wire running forward, 50 feet above the main deck. All the receiver connections, including the antennas, are made through a push-button-switch matrix panel. This allows any antenna to be used with any receiver, and any receiver to be used with the data controller or phone handset.

Some years ago the original SITOR equipment broke down, and repair parts were not available, so I mated an AEA PK-232MBX data controller to the station. I have used it quite successfully for our commercial operations for more than five years. In addition, I have used this rig for amateur operations, when permissible.

Hectic schedule

Scheduled SSB contacts with McMurdo Operations and Weather on 11 MHz., and our icebreaker escort on 4 or 8 MHz, in addition to my normal work, kept me hopping.  I still managed to keep in contact with Ernie twice a day on my off-duty time. Ernie interrupted his normal routine and pointed his beam at me for the entire month that the Matthiesen was "down south". This turned out to be critical, because few amateurs look toward the South Pole on any kind of routine basis. In addition to being weak, signals can flutter or reverberate in the polar regions, and there are sometimes whistles, warbling static bursts and other noises one generally doesn't hear elsewhere. Dave,studying for his General Class license, asked me if it were possible to use HF to talk directly between stations as far apart as we were. I answered, yes it was possible, but there were a lot of "ifs" involved.

Once south of the Antarctic Convergence at about 60 degrees south latitude, the weather changed dramatically, influenced by a large high pressure area that sits over the South Pole for most of the summer. The temperatures plummeted and ice began to litter the sea. Fog was a problem. Fog banks with visibility less than 200 feet were frequent. Since the navigation bridge is 500 feet back from the bow, fog makes us painfully dependent on radar. Although we do have two independent reliable radar sets, they do a better job of showing the difference between ice and water than between thin ice we can push through safely and icebergs or thicker floes that we cannot.

Propagation changes

At about 65 degrees south latitude, the ship passed the south Magnetic pole, and radio propagation became quite strange, to say the least. On 12 January, I found, to my utter surprise, that I was able to connect with W7IJ's PACTOR MBO in Olympia, Washington, near my home, using a 20-meter frequency. Of course, I dropped off a message for Dave, telling him how close the signals were landing that night. Yes, you can make a direct QSO when nature winks at you. Once south of the Antarctic Circle, the sun doesn't set in summer, so the familiar rules of day and night skip no longer apply. The sun traveled around the sky, making it appear to be a constant midmorning or midafternoon during the 24 hours of each day. It was as if I'd entered a different world, cut off from the rest of the globe.

Antarctica has numerous scientific research bases. Most of the supplies and personnel for the entire continent move in and out through McMurdo base and Williams field, the adjacent ice airfield. McMurdo's position is latitude 77-50S, longitude 166-28E. Situated just south of Mt. Erebus at the west end of the Ross Ice Shelf, McMurdo is less than 750 miles from the South Pole.There are only two supply ships a year - one ship brings in dry cargo with everything from cylinders of helium gas for research balloons to trucks, food, clothing, building materials and scientific apparatus and it all must fit on one ship. All the continent's trash is recycled, and back-loaded for the return trip to the States. All the fuel for operations on the continent comes in on the other ship - that's us.

About 40 miles north of McMurdo, we met, and refueled, our icebreaker escort the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star. The last 20 miles or so of our journey was blocked with thick, solid sea ice, more than we could handle on our own. The icebreaker smashed a channel choked with the broken chunks of ice that have nowhere else to go. Seals, penguins and killer whales moved in along the sides of the channel, the seals and penguins to catch fish, the whales to catch unwary fishers. The Matthiesen is 90 feet wide, so shouldering through an ice-choked channel takes a lot of energy. At an engine speed that would have pushed us along at 13 knots at sea, we were hard pressed to maintain four or five knots.

McMurdo is as far south as a ship can go. Beyond is solid ice and rock, but no more sea. That is why it was chosen as a jump-off point for early expeditions. Scott's wooden hut, abandoned by his expedition in 1912, is still there, on Hut Point, next to the ice dock where the Matthiesen moored. Antarctica has ice three miles thick and temperatures as low as 128 degrees below zero. It is truly the "coolest" place on Earth. It is also the driest. Every time anyone stood up or walked across the floor there was an audible zap from static electricity. Our eyes stung and lips cracked from dryness. Unloading the nine million gallons of fuel that we brought in (without spilling a single drop) took us four days.

In 1995 when I last made this trip, the only word my wife had from me after leaving Australia was when I called from McMurdo two weeks later. It's tough being out of touch for that length of time under these circumstances. Being able to relay short messages back and forth by Amateur Radio really eased the hardship of separation. Communications have improved in McMurdo. Five years ago there were three satellite phone lines available on a part-time basis. Now there are ten lines and Internet access. The ship is far more limited. Satellite phone service, when it is available, is very expensive. No Internet and no satellite TV! In many respects, the South Pole station has better communications than we do at sea. Even alongside the ice-dock in McMurdo, however, I was able to contact VK6TN, checking in from down under.

Leaving Antarctica

The return voyage through the ice was very similar to the southbound trip. Icebergs and fog, bone chilling temperatures and wind-like razor blades, all under a stark midnight sun. Arriving at the Antarctic Convergence we set our sights due north, toward a bunker stop in New Zealand. Crossing the Ferocious Fifties and the Roaring Forties directly northbound is akin to plodding across a busy freeway. The wind and waves on the beam made for a very rough few days, but even with my chair lashed to the desk to dampen the rolling, I was still able to correspond with Ernie and Dave on my keyboard.

With New Zealand so close, and Perth so far away, I was able to shortstop messages by connecting with ZL1MA, downloading traffic before it was forwarded on to VK6TN. We arrived in Lyttelton to top off our fuel tanks, another six-hour pit stop, before heading out again. Our orders directed us to Korea and Japan. After that, who knows; anything, anywhere, anytime, that's us.

All the way north, across the equator to Korea, I continued to work VK6TN. For a few hours each day Ernie turns his beam up toward Asia and the Far East. With a strong signal both ways I just have to check in periodically with a position report.

Through the courtesy and friendship of several amateurs whom, as luck would have it, I've never met face to face, I enjoyed very reliable contact with home all the way from the Mediterranean and Red Seas, across the Indian Ocean, south to McMurdo, Antarctica, north again through the South Pacific Islands, and all the way to Korea. That is pretty impressive coverage. It's a pretty impressive hobby as well. I was able to share the excitement with Dave, just starting out in the hobby, answering his questions from halfway around the world, demonstrating the magic of Ham radio firsthand. Learning new things, helping folks and meeting nice people, that's what Amateur Radio means to me. Good luck Dave. Thanks again Ernie!