Photos, videos and docs of tiabunna, with the keywords: "1968"

Fog Bow, Macquarie Island

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Wed, 06 Feb 2019 03:40:36 +0000

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When Ipernity member Herb Riddle recently posted a photo of a fog bow, it seemed I was one of the very few who had previously seen one. Herb asked if I had a photo from my sighting and this is it, taken on Kodachrome slide film at Macquarie Island (a very foggy place) in 1968. Maybe view large.

Explored.

Macquarie Island reunion

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Sun, 08 Jul 2018 12:34:57 +0000

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To add a little context to my previous image, I was at the beach to join my former colleagues from Macquarie Island (in 1968) for our 50 year anniversary reunion. We had several enjoyable days together, drank a few beers, and had a great dinner featuring this fine cake.

The crew regroups

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Fri, 19 Jun 2015 06:09:18 +0000

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The members of the 1968 Macquarie Island ANARE expedition, at our 47th anniversary reunion dinner - where have the years gone? Several others (mainly overseas) were unable to attend. The official 1968 group shot was posted earlier (see note).

The crew

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 15 Jun 2015 05:57:27 +0000

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These handsome and debonair young fellows are the expeditioners at Macquarie Island 1968, posing here for the official photograph. This week I'm hosting a reunion of many of them. UPDATE Reunion over (and very successful - see note) and I've now added the link to the favourite song of the year - played loudly and often.

Macquarie Island 1968: Cinders has the Slipper

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 00:39:19 +0000

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From an old slide. Midwinter is the year's major event in the Antarctic regions: there are suitable celebrations and, in most years at the Australian stations, a performance of a rather bawdy rhyming version of Cinderella. Here Cinderella tries on the 'magic slipper' while one of the ugly sisters watches in horror, saying
"...Strike me pink the slipper fits
Now wouldn't that give you the s###s"

Macquarie Island 1968: Prince Charming meets Cinderella

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 00:39:19 +0000

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From an old slide. Midwinter is the year's major event in the Antarctic regions: there are suitable celebrations and, in most years at the Australian stations, a performance of a rather bawdy rhyming version of Cinderella. See, we did have culture down there! Here the Prince meets Cinders (on the far right) while the ugly sisters and the villain look on.

Macquarie Island 1968: The Isthmus after a Snowfall

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 08:12:36 +0000

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From an old slide. This shows most of the isthmus of Macquarie Island, between North Head (from which it is taken) and the main plateau to the south, also most of the ANARE station.

Macquarie Island 1968: The main station area

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 10:44:19 +0000

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From an old slide. These conditions were known as a "Freeze-up", not least because the pipes bringing our water supply from the plateau sometimes did just that. Fortunately this usually lasted only a few days. The row of nissen huts were primarily for storage, the small yellow building with the cross was known as "Chippy's Church" and was the station brewery. In the right foreground is the kitchen/mess, while the main accommodation block is in the foreground, hidden below the brow of the hill.

Macquarie Island 1968: Met Office area

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 02:29:23 +0000

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From an old slide. View southwards down the "main street", past a hexagonal storage hut from the earliest days of the ANARE Station, then the Met office and balloon shed, with the newly installed WF2 radar to the left and the main bulk of the island beyond. There was a forest of large radio masts to give VHF communications. Most of all, one of the regular drops of snow - the weather here today reminded me that winter is again coming. If you wish to see a "live" view of this area, the Australian Antarctic Division has a webcam viewable at www.antarctica.gov.au/webcams/macquarie-island.

Macquarie Island 1968: Away she goes!

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 02:30:00 +0000

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From an old slide. This was taken just moments after my previous shot. As I commented, successfully launching the large balloon, radiosonde (the white box for sending temperatures) and large radar reflector (the funny mesh thing in the middle) was tricky on windy days such as this one: note the relative angles of the balloon, pulling hard, its payload, and the horizon.

Macquarie Island 1968: Balloon launch on a windy day

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 02:28:56 +0000

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From an old slide. This was some years before ozone depletion was recognised, but scientists wanted more data on seasonal changes to temperatures in the high stratosphere. We had a supply of special high altitude balloons for launching on set dates, but on windy days it was a tricky process and required lots of coordination for two people to successfully get the balloon, radiosonde (temperature sender) and large radar target away.

Macquarie Island 1968: Visiting Leopard Seal

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 21:28:54 +0000

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From an old slide. At various times through the year, we were visited by Leopard Seals (Hydrurga leptonyx) which normally live in the sea ice around Antarctica. They gave an almost reptilian impression and moved quite slowly with a caterpillar motion on land: in the water they were superbly manoeuvrable. They also were able to open their jaws to an incredible extent, showing most impressive teeth (though sadly this one was not preforming for the camera).

Macquarie Island 1968: A new industry arrives...

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 05:49:00 +0000

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From an old slide. The sealers and such have long since gone, thankfully. In 1968 a new industry arrived when Lindblad Expeditions began the first tourist trips to East Antarctica and Macquarie Island. This is part of that first ever tourist group to visit the island, returning to their ship the Magga Dan with some of the "locals" assisting. Several tourist ships now visit yearly. This group had no zodiacs for shore landings, as is now usual, so we backed the station tractor and trailer into the water as an improvised jetty to help get them to their ships' boat. Best viewed large on black.

Macquarie Island 1968: The Gratitude ...

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 01:15:53 +0000

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From an old slide. Macquarie Island has had many shipwrecks over the years. Shortly after the island was first discovered in 1810, the Sydney Gazette carried the report of the discovery and "... several pieces of wreck of a large vessel on this island, apparently very old and high up in the grass ...". Unfortunately the sealing gangs used any timber as firewood for rendering seal blubber, so any traces of that earlier mystery ship had long disappeared before we visited. How fascinating to have known its age and origin, and what a fertile source for speculation!

In subsequent years many ships were wrecked on the island, the most recent prior to our visit being the "Gratitude" which was caught on a lee shore by an easterly gale in late 1898. This section of keel is all that remained in our time - and that, we expected, would be the last shipwreck there. What a surprise when the news bulletins in late 1988 carried reports that our own ship, the "Nella Dan" also dragged her anchor in an easterly gale and, after being stranded on the rocks near the Station, was finally hauled off and scuttled near the island.

Macquarie Island 1968: Immature elephant seal

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 04:15:59 +0000

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From an old slide. This is an immature Southern Elephant Seal putting on a threat display. He's probably about two years old, with what looks like a moulting female resting behind. Surrounding him is some of the giant kelp which grows around the shores of Macquarie Island and is tangled around the beaches.

Macquarie Island 1968: From the old days

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 00:48:59 +0000

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From an old slide. Macquarie Island was found by sealers in 1810. They promptly exterminated the resident fur seals for their pelts, then began on the elephant seals for their blubber to extract oil. By the late 1800s, there were too few elephant seals for that to be viable, so they began on the penguins. These rusty boilers were "penguin digesters", used to cook countless thousands of King and Royal penguins for their oil.

The trade was halted after the Australian Antarctic Expedition of 1911-13 raised public consciousness of what was being done. The explorer Sir Douglas Mawson began a campaign to have the island declared a sanctuary, though even in 1919 there were efforts (which were opposed) to revive the industry. To quote the photographer Frank Hurley (who had wintered in Antarctica with Mawson and Shackleton) writing in the Sydney Morning Herald of 17 August 1919: "I can only term the destruction there as grim tragedy, the remembrance of which makes me shudder still.... The penguins are mustered like sheep and ...." ... (I shall spare you the details) "....it is one of the most pitiful sights I have ever witnessed..... This wanton butchery takes a toll of some 150,000 birds annually..."

These digesters are at a point known as The Nuggets, others are at Lusitania Bay on the east coast.

These remains of the "bad old days" were still there in 2005, but they are in areas where tourists are not allowed to land. Maybe appropriately, best viewed on black (press Z).

Macquarie Island 1968: Roar at the snow

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 23:30:03 +0000

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From an old slide. Toward the end of winter, the bull elephant seals arrive and stake out "their" patch of beach to establish a harem. This is a mature bull with the fully developed extended nose which leads to their name. Yes, the island does have reasonably frequent "freeze-ups" during the year, most for only several days. Best viewed on black.

Macquarie Island 1968: Fur Seal

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 02:16:40 +0000

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From an old slide. The sad record is that when Macquarie Island was discovered by sealers in 1810, they promptly began killing the many fur seals for their pelts. One ship alone was recorded to have taken over 35,000. In total, over 200,000 were taken by the early 1820s: by then the fur seal population had been exterminated and nobody even knows what species had been there. When the ANARE station began operation in 1948 a few fur seals were found in isolated areas, but there was no record of a pup being born there until 1954. Numbers gradually increased and, in 1968, we found small numbers around the rocks on North Head. I understand the population has been increasing substantially since the early 1980s.

But what species is this? I am no sealologist (if there's such a word), but three species now are living at Macquarie - the most common being the Antarctic fur seal (Arctocephalus gazella), the next most common the Subantarctic fur seal (A. tropicalis); and the New Zealand fur seal (A. forsteri). To make it even more complicated, it seems they all are hybidising! I'll take a guess that this is an Antarctic fur seal and will be happy to be corrected by an expert.

Macquarie Island 1968: Gentoo with eggs

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 23:07:15 +0000

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From an old slide. Gentoo penguins are found right around the sub-Antarctic and right around the beaches of Macquarie Island. This one, with its two eggs, was not far from the station.

Macquarie Island 1968: Beach scene

nobody@ipernity.com (tiabunna) — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 20:52:54 +0000

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From an old slide. Typical beach scene on the east coast on one of the few "good weather" days. Giant Petrel nearest camera, Skua Gulls and more Giant Petrels beyond, with Dominican Gulls in and over the water. Elephant Seals to the right, and the usual tangle of giant kelp on the beach. Penguins way in the distance.