Last Friday, the sky was clear and the wind was light so I borrowed a truck and drove to a dark spot just behind the hills on the northeast side of station. The lights of McMurdo cannot reach that far, thus creating an area of almost unblemished darkness by which to view the stars. Unfortunately, this particular spot was significantly windier than town, and there was a great deal of blowing snow. I decided to make my best effort, so I pulled out my star charts and selected a handful of constellations to find. Despite not being able to last outside in that howling wind for more than a few minutes, I found the constellations Musca (the fly), Circinus (the compass), and Triangulum Australe (the southern triangle), three recent constellations that were created and named between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries by astronomers filling in gaps in the southern sky.
I also took a moment to look around me in the utter darkness filled with blowing snow, to listen to the wind, and to absorb the enormous isolation in which I stood. I have had only a few moments like this down here, moments in which the vast emptiness of Antarctica entirely envelops me. This time, I felt a primal terror, a sense of panic for fear of loneliness, blindness, death by freezing, and utter disconnection and abandonment. Of course, even as I had these feelings I realized they were just feelings, as if my mind were observing another more instinctual part of me responding to my surroundings. It was still quite an experience; I understand why some of the early polar explorers went mad during their winter stays. As I drove down the hill back into town, I was still a bit shaken. Nothing about this place should ever be taken for granted, even in as large a station as McMurdo; we humans don't really belong here, and Antarctica shows no mercy.
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