To err is human; to really muck things up, you need a computer.
The long silences on the blog may be disturbing to enthusiastic readers, for which I apologise by proxy. We’ve installed a new satellite communications system at the base, which provides much faster data transmission (256kb/sec vs. the old 9kb/sec). This is with an eye to future improvements in real-time data transfer for the research projects, telemedicine transmissions, and of course happier overwintering team members. However, the upgrade has had the expected teething problems, which left us without much data capability for the last week. We are now back online, but should you hear nothing but the sound of silence, you know why 😉
I’ve updated the post titled “Listening to Lightning” under the Antarctic Science category with a sound file and a bigger picture of the VLF antenna, so click on the link and check that out. Once the take-over is complete and we have some time on our hands, I promise to continue the articles about the research projects.