However, a number of severe operational constraints apply. Except for emergency
rescue operations, the U.S. Antarctic Program won’t risk aircraft and crews when the
proposed landing area poses significant hazards. Helicopters and Twin Otter aircraft
can be safely landed in many locations in which a C-130 cannot.
As balloons are typically launched in late December through to late January,
the recovery operations are carried out in mid to late February, when the program
is performing its winter shutdown activities. During this period, aircraft sorties are
heavily booked, with the highest priorities being assigned to field team recovery
rather than hardware recovery.
What can possibly go wrong?
Japanese American Collaborative Emulsion Experiment
There is only one incident in which a payload was lost in Antarctica. It occurred in
December 1993 and involved the Japanese American Collaborative Emulsion
Experiment (JACEE) 11 mission. After one circle of Antarctica and the mission
declared over, the termination system failed. It was decided instead to bring the balloon down by slowly releasing the helium. However, by the time the balloon reached
ground level it had drifted away from the planned landing location, and cleared the
shore. As a result, the payload crashed through the ice and sunk one quarter of a mile
offshore of Ross Island. Attempts were made to dredge for and recovery the gondola
over the next several days, and even into following season, but to no avail.
SuperTIGER
The Super Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder had flown over Antarctica from
December 2012 to January 2013 to collect data for a study on the origin of cosmic
rays. The plan was to land the payload close to McMurdo Station to undertake the
recovery in the form of day trips, without establishing a deep field camp. But this
payload set down in West Antarctica at a remote spot roughly between the Union
Glacier and the South Pole and required a deep-field expedition style of recovery.
The initial recovery effort was thwarted by the partial U.S. government shutdown of late 2013, and when it finally got underway it would be no ordinary
instrument retrieval. Armed with a GPS coordinate and some pictures from a
reconnaissance fly-over mission in January 2014, the team made a plan to retrieve
the instrument during the summer of 2014-2015, two years later than planned.
Some members of the team, referred to as the “groom team”, would smooth out a
runway for a plane to land. They would get dropped off as close as possible to the
balloon’s payload. Initially, the site looked impossible due to the deeply cleft sastrugi snow (parallel wave-like ridges caused by winds on the surface of hard snow,
especially in polar regions). The plan was for the groom team to travel on snowmobiles, navigating heavily crevassed terrain to find the payload, then set up
camp, prepare a skiway, and bring in the rest of the recovery team.
78 Mission Drivers and Operations
rescue operations, the U.S. Antarctic Program won’t risk aircraft and crews when the
proposed landing area poses significant hazards. Helicopters and Twin Otter aircraft
can be safely landed in many locations in which a C-130 cannot.
As balloons are typically launched in late December through to late January,
the recovery operations are carried out in mid to late February, when the program
is performing its winter shutdown activities. During this period, aircraft sorties are
heavily booked, with the highest priorities being assigned to field team recovery
rather than hardware recovery.
What can possibly go wrong?
Japanese American Collaborative Emulsion Experiment
There is only one incident in which a payload was lost in Antarctica. It occurred in
December 1993 and involved the Japanese American Collaborative Emulsion
Experiment (JACEE) 11 mission. After one circle of Antarctica and the mission
declared over, the termination system failed. It was decided instead to bring the balloon down by slowly releasing the helium. However, by the time the balloon reached
ground level it had drifted away from the planned landing location, and cleared the
shore. As a result, the payload crashed through the ice and sunk one quarter of a mile
offshore of Ross Island. Attempts were made to dredge for and recovery the gondola
over the next several days, and even into following season, but to no avail.
SuperTIGER
The Super Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder had flown over Antarctica from
December 2012 to January 2013 to collect data for a study on the origin of cosmic
rays. The plan was to land the payload close to McMurdo Station to undertake the
recovery in the form of day trips, without establishing a deep field camp. But this
payload set down in West Antarctica at a remote spot roughly between the Union
Glacier and the South Pole and required a deep-field expedition style of recovery.
The initial recovery effort was thwarted by the partial U.S. government shutdown of late 2013, and when it finally got underway it would be no ordinary
instrument retrieval. Armed with a GPS coordinate and some pictures from a
reconnaissance fly-over mission in January 2014, the team made a plan to retrieve
the instrument during the summer of 2014-2015, two years later than planned.
Some members of the team, referred to as the “groom team”, would smooth out a
runway for a plane to land. They would get dropped off as close as possible to the
balloon’s payload. Initially, the site looked impossible due to the deeply cleft sastrugi snow (parallel wave-like ridges caused by winds on the surface of hard snow,
especially in polar regions). The plan was for the groom team to travel on snowmobiles, navigating heavily crevassed terrain to find the payload, then set up
camp, prepare a skiway, and bring in the rest of the recovery team.
78 Mission Drivers and Operations