September 10, 2012 - Flights!

Hi all - 

Well, I've spent the last two full days out at Pegasus airfield working with everyone to get the UAVs off the ground.  We finally got two off yesterday, which was super exciting!  

These two buildings at Pegasus are our homes away from homes away from homes for the next three weeks.

Sunset at Pegasus on Saturday.

My role here on this project is mostly to learn, but I do get to be involved in a few ways.  Probably the most exciting is helping John forecast for the flights.  We use satellite data, automatic weather station data, and model data to determine current conditions and what the forecast is going to look like.  John and I usually look at the weather separately, and then compare notes.  We are looking for low winds and low moisture levels in the atmosphere.  We want low winds because the Aerosonde planes cannot take off in a crosswind of greater than 8 knots (or 9 mph), and can't fly with head winds greater than about 45 knots (or 46 mph).  We want low moisture to prevent the planes from getting ice on them and making them heavy and hard to maneuver.  Most of the work I do comes after the flights, when I take the data that we got and analyze it.

Originally on Saturday morning, we were planning to go to Pegasus with the intention of doing a "shakedown" flight (test flight), and then on Sunday doing a science flight.  Because the flights round trip to Terra Nova Bay take 18 or 19 hours and the plane must be launched and landed in the daylight, we have to do overnight flights at this time of year.  This means that we launch around 4 pm and land around 6:30 am.  As the month wears on and our daylight increases significantly, we have a lot more room to work with, but right now, we need the weather to be good in a limited window to be able to fly.

Nice weather on Saturday.

Friday night, the weather looked pretty good to fly on Saturday and Sunday.  We planned the day flight for Saturday and the overnight for Sunday.  However, the weather looked shaky for Sunday when we looked at it on Saturday morning, and so we thought we'd try and get in a science flight on Saturday instead.  However, because it was the first flight of the season and they hadn't done a dress rehearsal already, issues came up and eventually we ran out of daylight.  We ended up going through the motions, and taking the plane out on the runway and not launching.  It was a great practice though, even if we couldn't fly.

Plane and launch vehicle on the runway during Saturday's simulation.

By Saturday night/Sunday morning, the weather looked better again to attempt another science flight Sunday evening, and so we headed out yesterday with the intention of flying a shakedown flight early, and then launching the science flight at 4 pm.  The shakedown flight took off around noon with great success.  To launch the plane, it sits on a cradle that is mounted on top of a pick up truck.  The truck needs to reach a speed of 60 mph and then the plane can become airborne.  Cameron is the remote control (RC) pilot, and he manually handles the plane at take off and landing.  The plane that took off on this flight launched at a scary angle, but Cameron is good at his job and managed to correct the plane immediately to avoid any issues.  

Paul and Nick loading the UAV into the cradle on the back of the truck.

The pickup beginning to accelerate down the runway.

Almost ready to launch...

There it goes!  Yikes!

In the air.

Cameron uses a case to try and keep his hands warm while he's controlling the plane.

The plane circled overhead for about 3 hours.  During that time, they checked to make sure the aircraft was working properly, and that the data being received in real time by us on the ground looked good.  The plane landed around 3 pm, and then the preparation for the science flight began.

Coming in for a landing.

Closer...

Almost there...

Safely on the ground.

Everything looked great, and that plane took off at 4 pm.  However, they could tell right away that the engine oil was getting too hot when they hit the throttle, which was probably due to too much heat tape on the engine.  Because they need to be able to run at full throttle sometimes and can't have the overheating issue, they decided to land it, pull off some of the heat tape, and relaunch it.  We were running against daylight, but figured we could get it to go.  And we would have too, but right before launch it was determined that we didn't have a communications link to the aircraft, which makes it pretty useless to fly if we can't communicate with the plane.  So unfortunately we had to scrap the mission, but getting two flights up in the air was really great.  

UAV in the air.

UAV in the air.

Another view.

We're on weather hold for the next couple of days as a low pressure system brings in strong winds.  The weather here in McMurdo will get pretty interesting in the next few days, so at least we can look forward to that even if we can't fly.

A few other notes.  First, John and I put up a weather station outside of our hut at the airfield to be able to look at weather in real time.  We use one of the AWS that permanently sits at Pegasus that I used to work on when we have internet, but this station is good for when we're at the site and don't have an internet connection.  We decided to name the station Aiden AWS, after my little man.

Me at Pegasus AWS in January 2009 (i.e. summer) in my former job.

Me at Aiden AWS in September 2012 (i.e. winter) in my current job.  The temperature, relative humidity, and pressure sensors are next to my head.  The wind sensors are on the black arm hanging off the pole on the roof.  Note the wardrobe change.

Secondly, in case you're interested, the temperatures both days out there were around -25F.  With even the slightest wind, you're looking at wind chills of -30F or lower.  I think one of the times we were out there it was around -45F.  That's cold.  I wear a lot of gear to ensure that I stay warm, and don't leave any skin exposed if I can help it.  I've been warm enough while there, with the exception of my fingers.    They went numb while I was out on the airstrip on Saturday, which really freaked me out, but I changed up my glove configuration for Sunday, and I was mostly ok.  

I wear three layers of long underwear, wind pants, and a parka to keep my core warm.  I also wear a hat, neck gaiter, face mask, two pairs of socks, bunny boots, goggles, and two pairs of gloves.

This is what it all looks like on.