Regarding a thread that I started on Fri May 10, 2002, the subject which I am responding to here, I have just received a response from a researcher at the South Pole itself. In my message I had noted how many flares should be visible per 24 hour period at the Amundsen-Scott south pole station. The archived e-mail that this person discovered recently is here. http://satobs.org/seesat/May-2002/0095.html I will quote what he has told me. [Also included is some other off topic information. It's quite fascinating.] I'm waiting to see if I can list his e-mail address. If so, I will post that later. Although, now that I think about it, his website is listed so you can probably e-mail him through that if you wish. Begin quote: I just stumbled on this old (2002) conversation you had about iridium flares. I am currently in my third year at South Pole Station. Because I run 11 projects, mostly in upper atmospheric physics, I have to walk almost three miles every day of the year to visit my various sites. Anyway, on my way over to my VLF transmitter just now, which is about one mile away from station, I caught one of the best flares I have every seen.....spectacular! You may want to pass this along to your mailing list. Yes, I see flares all the time when I am outside. The sun sets around March 21st and will rise around September 21st and it is almost completely dark now, so the auroras are getting really good now and Jupiter is visible now and just appears to rotate around us all day in the eternal darkness. This is truly a place of magic. If you want to see many photos of the Pole, just visit my website at http://polar.home.att.net I update it at the end of every month so aurora photos will be showing up soon. I have a lot of auroras in April through August, 2004 page of the website. I believe carbon dioxide freezes at about -117 F at this pressure altitude. We experience pressure altitudes as much as 12,000 feet in the middle of winter. Unfortunately, the coldest static temperature I have seen so far is -108 F, although the coldest recorded temperature here was -117F. Maybe the latent heat of fusion will prohibit lower temperatures? Dana J. Dana Hrubes CUSP Science Research South Pole Station, Antarctica End quote. Tom Iowa USA + + + ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Frequently Asked Questions, SeeSat-L archive: http://www.satobs.org/seesat/seesatindex.html
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