Barrow Excursion Feb 28-March 1, 2006: Patrick Cotter

This quick trip to Barrow was for maintenance and troubleshooting of our Barrow Observatory equipment.

My first task upon arrival was to figure out why our mass balance site had stopped transmitting data back to our computer in the Theatre. Initially this sounded like a major problem with the site, but turned out to only require a re-setting of the software used for data transfer. A quick trip out to the site revealed that everything had withstood 70mph winds during a storm early in February.

The next task was to take down and ship out the radar. The antenna had stopped spinning in late December and had been subsequently turned off. Apparently heavy icing of the antenna had occurred which, in turn, ground the gears in the motor to dust. Luckily I had Scott Oyagak to assist me in the removal process. We moved as quickly as possible since the ambient air temperature was near -40 with a stiff breeze making it feel even colder.

Back in the warmth of the BASC theatre, I cleaned up and boxed the unit to be shipped to the manufacturer for repairs.

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