22 January 2004 Click image for full size!
In case you didn't know already, this is how we typically fly in, using military LC-130s- if you look closely, you can see the wheel/ski combination landing gear. Inside, it can be pretty cramped, especially if it's a full flight, but it hasn't been too bad for me so far- there's one flight that I've managed to avoid so far, the boomerang. This a flight where you start in Christchurch, fly halfway to McMurdo and then turn around for whatever reason for a total of six or seven hours. If it's a full flight, this can be pretty torturous!
But this is just a cargo flight come in unloading a dewar of liquid nitrogen. The astronomers use a lot of this, with liquid helium to cool down their instrumentation and dewars like this arrive about once a week. But even with all these supplies, there's always a shortage of cryogens. Since these are typically flown in all the way from the US, a lot ends up getting lost due to evaporation and error like faulty valves. It will be interesting to see if they manage to get through the winter without running out (no flights then, you know!).