Posted in Media, News, Politics on May 24th, 2008 No Comments »
Remember this summer when the spy plane landed at McMurdo to get surveillance shots on the Japanese “researchers” hunting whales? Now there is scandal because the crew may have stolen a ton of it and shipped it home to themselves, thus cutting into the profits of the researchers/whalers, who know the value of whale meat [...]
Posted in Denver, Grapevine, News, Politics on May 16th, 2008 No Comments »
By necessity practical and by philosophy stern, these folk were not beautiful in their sins. Erring as all mortals must, they were forced by their rigid code to seek concealment above all else; so that they came to use less and less taste in what they concealed. —H.P. Lovecraft Though Denver is not geographically in [...]
Posted in News, Politics on Apr 14th, 2008 No Comments »
On the matter of NSF potentially canceling the August Winfly flights without regard for present employee contracts ending in August, Denver HR wrote (last week): For employees that choose to leave on the flight next week, they are choosing to resign and therefore will not get their summer or extended season bonuses per the Terms [...]
Posted in News, Politics on Apr 9th, 2008 No Comments »
“As always, our focus in these efforts continues to be providing world class support to ensure the US Antarctic Program succeeds in executing the vital mission of productive scientific achievements on the Antarctic Continent.” -RPSC Program Director Recently NSF has discovered that it needs to shave a maximum of $10 $30 million from the USAP [...]
Posted in Grapevine, Media, Photos, Politics on Feb 16th, 2008 2 Comments »
Santa Claus had some HR trouble after this season’s Christmas party. The incident made it into the New Zealand press. Below is his write-up, and a short interview. (The interview took place on January 9, 2008 at the Coffeehouse. Santa asked me to wait until the end of Mainbody to post it.) The Write-Up: December [...]
Posted in Grapevine, Media, News, Photos, Politics on Feb 16th, 2008 No Comments »
Here’s a photo of a New Zealand P-3 surveillance plane that landed at one of McMurdo’s runways last month. I did not publish this earlier because one of my Bureau Chiefs suggested that if I wait, I would be assisting the Kiwis getting the jump on those wily Japanese whalers and/or Patagonian Toothfish poachers. (Go [...]
Posted in Grapevine, Politics on Jan 25th, 2008 No Comments »
[E] writes on his blog: Morale is at rock bottom and everyone is pissed. We’ve all completely lost faith in our superiors and are finding it much harder to get through the day. Even if I believed that [C] deserved to be fire, she definitely didn’t need to be fired. Whatever “problems” she was causing when she [...]
Posted in Politics on Jan 24th, 2008 No Comments »
The decade-long prime support contract for The Program is up for rebid in 2010, and defense contractors are popping up eager to snatch the contract away from Raytheon. One of the company’s key players is EG&G, whose subsidiary, Antarctic Support Associates, held the contract through the ’90s. From a long history of science support for the United [...]
Posted in Media, Politics on Jan 11th, 2008 No Comments »
Dear Media, All RPSC employees, comprising most of the population you will encounter here, have been issued instructions not to speak to you without approval from Raytheon headquarters in Denver. Thank you for your time. Warm regards, Big Dead Place
Posted in Politics on Jan 6th, 2008 No Comments »
Congressman Bob Inglis, a Republican from South Carolina, flew to South Pole last Thursday to see the New South Pole Station, bringing his son, a Raytheon employee working in McMurdo, along for the boondoggle. The DVs returned to McMurdo the same day for a 5:30 wine reception in the Chalet. The DV flight, which was [...]
