Moving Day

Yesterday was a Thursday. For those on the out side that might be a non event but out here in the wilds is one of the few days stands out. Thursdays are plane days, we bring in new people and take out old ones, refreshing the atmosphere here. A good thursday is less productive but good for the spirits. As some people are leaving and t here fore in a good mood and those returning are not yet tired. For me it means I have less then a month left, as that marked my two week point in this rotation, leaving me with just under 4 weeks to go. Four week too long but that is a separate post.

Along with the frenchies rushing to get out the door for a much needed vacation there was the drill move. One of the drills was being moved from a property south of camp to a site north of camp to look in to a fuzzy blotch on a geophysics map. Because of the move there were two helicopters in our air space and some times the crew change plane. Crowded airspace.

The second Chopper was a Bell A-Star, a luxury bird compared to the Hughes 500 stationed in camp. We needed it to move the larger parts of the drill as the long distance made it near impossible for the Hughes. The Hughes is able to move the drill the few hundred meters between drill set ups on a single property but not the 20 plus Km between the properties. The birds made many trips back and forth, stopping to refuel here nearly every trip. I only took the time to shoot it when it came by with the largest and heaviest kite I ever did see.


A Hughes 500, from last spring.


The A-Star, was able to lift up the whole of the drill shack, all four walls in one lift. A thousand pound plywood kite. The A-Star's extra power must have come in handy for over coming the drag from such a large load.


A Bell A-Star





The move.

Flight Part N of N.

Its been a busy week a string of events left me looking after some aspects of the project that are normally the domain of others above me. So far I have not fucked this up and I am out of time to make a mess of it as the chief geo will be coming back tomorrow.

Thanks to this set of conditions I have been flying back and forth to the drills off sight frequently. So I have been out in the land and taking some photos.
Some little things, flowers I think are a form of Saxifrage, some moss, A Dash 7 and some random lakes from some chopper flights.






I also learned that in Huges 500 the doors suck and that they can pop open in flight which happened to the pilot yesterday. The solution, bring the bird to a near stop and well close the door and go on your marry way. And that is why you always ware your seat belt, because its a long way down an the trees look awful sharp and pointy and the rocks hard and flat.