The office

My office

Despite the fun adventure side of this job, I am really here to work and this is where the work happens. My desk is the one you can see the monitors on. I share the office with a network engineer who sits on the right. We both cover as a help desk for anyone that walks in the door.

The computer lab right outside my office.

Right outside our office is a computer lab. Most work centers don't have enough computers for all their employees so some come here to do small tasks. Others use it to stay in touch with folks back home. However, the program now lets laptops and cellphones connect to the Internet when the satellite is up so most folks use that to keep in touch with the home front. That is a huge change from when I was on the Ice 12 years ago. Back then, you were really disconnected except for email. Due to some major Internet upgrades, you can now use video chatting like FaceTime and Zoom.

I don't know all the details, but we don't use starlink here. They are using it a little bit at McMurdo. They have tested it here. One person said that it interfered with the science, someone else said it didn't. I don't what is accurate, but having non-stop Internet here would really change the experience for better and worse.