they ordered a c-17 from honolulu and flew in our crew separately to fly down from christchurch to mcmurdo. they had to fly down in night vision goggles. i was outside when the plane was landing and it was odd to see the plane running on minimal lights. hell, it was odd to see a plane in the sky. after it landed they had to wait for the crew to cover their eyes to turn on the light trees because they have to maintain their light sensitivity in order to best utilize the goggles. after that they unloaded cargo and then those departing could board. within an hour they were refueled and took off back towards christchurch.
tomorrow is our 4th of july carnival. normally all of the proceeds go to charity, but we have decided to donate the money to the couple. they are both kiwis and since christchurch has been devastated he wont be able to work, and it is expected that she will be hospitalized for a while.
it was very sad to see two well liked and vibrant community members leave. the positive side was that we got 300 lbs of mail and 6000 lbs of freshies. tonight they put out bananas in the middle of dinner which was SO FRICKEN EXCITING I THOUGHT I WOULD PEE!
I was sniffing my banana while working video counter and one of the store girls, took a picture of us.
i really didnt think it was going to be a big deal for me to have freshies again, especially since i work in the greenhouse fairly often and we get salad about every 10 days. but when the rumors were going around that we might get a medevac and might get freshies i started thinking about fruit all of the time.
today was sad, but it was also very good indeed.
