Original subtitles

*

Going to Antarctica is a little bit

like leaving the planet.

No matter what we do or where we go,

we're walking where nobody's walked before.

We're looking at things that nobody's seen before.

You feel isolated,

and the quietness immediately hits you...

...at the same time as the temperature drop hits you.

You realize that you've got to have

everything you need to survive...

...because anything can happen.

*

*

We've been in this tent, what, about 16 hours?

That's all snow right there.

That's a snow wall against my head.

Because of the blowing snow and low visibility,

we're going to just stay put until it improves.

The scientists of the Ross Ice Shelf team

have been confined to their tents, in a Condition 1 storm,

for almost a full day.

You can't see 30 meters in front of you.

It's just windy. It's snowing. It's cold.

Spending a day or more in a tent,

it's kind of a weird concept.

A little bit nerve-racking.

So, yeah, it's not great.

*

Storms in Antarctica

have been known to last over 12 days,

so the team is lucky this storm broke after just one.

It's morning.

*

Wow. Can't believe we were worried about this one.

Beautiful.

Right, pass the stuff.

I was just freezing.

It was bloody freezing during the night.

The team has just 14 days on the ice.

And before they can study

Antarctica's potential impact on the rest of the world,

they have to get

to their research site first.

Wow.

We're eating up our science time now

just because of the weather not playing ball.

We're just really keen to actually get started.

We're going to take the first two measurements of their kind

on the Ross Ice Shelf,

and that water that's underneath the Ross Ice Shelf,

that's really important.

The weather has improved significantly here,

and we're going to get on the move south again.

Antarctica is actually creating

very, very, cold water

that pushes down into the deep ocean,

which then forces warmer water to push up somewhere else,

and that conveyor belt, as we kind of call it,

of water that's actually circulating around the world,

redistributes heat.

That's what keeps other places from freezing over.

You know, the eastern seaboard of the U.S.

would be quite a lot colder

if it didn't get an injection of warm water, which is,

that whole system is being driven by Antarctica.

Alright, guys.

We want to really keep on pushing along today.

We're going to try and push onto Site X,

hopefully make it there tonight.

Everyone's happy?

Let's get some kilometers under the belt.

Time frames are pretty critical down here.

There's a year's worth of planning

that have gone into these events,

that we need to try and make sure that we stick to.

Otherwise, there's potentially some of the science objectives

that wouldn't be reached.

*

*

Even the smallest amount we had kept

because we can always put it into a soup.

There's kind of a distinct lack of food at the moment.

We just have to make do with what we've got.

At Scott Base,

New Zealand's Antarctic research hub,

the storm shut down the supply chain,

grounding all C-17 cargo flights.

We've been delayed Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,

Saturday, and it's Sunday now,

and it's due in, taking off, so we'll see what happens.

*

Here he comes.

To the right, to the right, to the right.

Alright!

It landed.

*

These flights bring in new staff,

sensitive scientific equipment...

Freshies are coming!

...and fresh food.

If we can, like, create a chain,

it'll be a lot easier.

It's always an exciting time,

when the freshies arrive.

Food is incredibly important for the morale of people on base.

You know, there's nothing

like a crisp apple

after you haven't had an apple

for, you know, weeks and weeks.

It's the stuff

that people dream of.

Tomatoes, tomatoes.

Tomatoes.

Eggs.

I've been craving strawberries.

Fruit will be nice.

There's quite a few excited people

around at the moment.

Look, it's full.

About time.

Let's get these grapes inside straightaway.

Pears. Apples, where are the apples?

Apples are right there.

18 miles from shore

is the U.S. Coast Guard cutter, Polar Star.

Try to keep it straight.

All ahead four, aye.

We're lined up great.

All's we gotta do is go forward from here.

This is where we earn our money.

Let's go break some ice.

Her mission is to open a channel

for a freighter that comes once a year.

Now she's at the edge

of 18 miles of 10-foot-thick ice blocking the way.

It's connected from shore to shore,

beach to beach.

It's solid ice across an entire sound,

and that's where the real mission starts.

The Polar Star is America's only heavy icebreaker,

and it is the only one that can break that channel,

so I've got the entire continent relying on me.

I have to turn that ice into ice cubes.

Steady on course, 1-5-5.

Are we ready?

Go to turbines.

If you can imagine trying to drive your car

through a cement wall,

is like those supply ships

trying to drive through that ice.

You just can't do it. It's not made for that.

Now, take a bulldozer,

and a bulldozer would be able to do that.

We are that bulldozer.

Switching over to turbines will give us a lot more horsepower,

between 60,000 and 75,000 horsepower.

The Polar Star breaks ice

by surging up out of the water

and slamming down its full 14,000-ton mass.

In order to generate enough power,

the ship has three gas turbines,

basically jet engines modified to drive propeller shafts,

and it takes a week of round-the-clock throttle

to make it to shore.

Main Control, this is Morrison.

Yes, Captain.

And we just have to monitor her shaft overloads,

as well as temperatures.

Roger.

The engine system was built 40 years ago,

so it's carefully monitored by Lieutenant Morrison

in Main Control.

Turbine Room, Main Control.

Standby, stand clear,

for the start of the number two main gas turbine.

Roger, standby for number two turbine.

Start her.

Hydrostart activated.

*

Port's up to speed.

Roger.

*

Speed?

7 knots.

Course over ground is 1-4-0.

And we're going ramming speed.

1-3-9, just about 5 right now.

*

*

*

It's kind of neat when you see nothing but ice,

no relief.

It's amazing, the amount

of force that, and basically,

the sheer cutting strength

of ice against steel.

We are reinforced, and we have a very thick hull.

And also, the amount of ribs in

the ship, and the hull design.

The hull design

looks like a spoon.

Most ships have a pointy bow, or what's called the stem,

and that stem would just be

ripped off by the ice.

Okay, help the stern come back to port.

*

This goes against all sense

and seamanship and navigation,

looking behind you when you're driving a ship.

We preach to our young ship handlers to always look forward,

but we look behind us,

make sure we're driving in a straight line,

which makes it a lot easier

for the supply ship to navigate in when we escort them.

With all the vibrations and shaking,

there's really no way to get relief.

We've got to just power through it.

*

We're going to try to do

what we were going to do yesterday, again today.

Okay, we're still intending on one install per team,

is that right?

Yeah.

The Mount Erebus team needs chopper time

to fly to the world's southernmost active volcano

and cover 132 different sites

to create a 3D image of its inner workings.

It's just a matter of

if we have enough ground definition to land.

Then we could maybe get some momentum.

The storm grounded them for days,

and to make up time,

they're splitting into two groups,

with the second team

led by associate scientist Martyn Unsworth

and survival expert Richie Hunter.

The cloud ceiling will be at 8,000 feet.

Southerly winds 15 to 25 knots.

Um, so, that'll be a key factor.

Every site on Mount Erebus is completely different.

That really worries me.

We're dealing with completely different terrain,

and the clouds on Mount Erebus

can come in at a moment's notice,

so some sites are at risk of, of extreme weather.

The plan is for Danny and Graham's team

to work site 92, on the southern slope of the mountain...

...while Martyn and Richie head to site 68, on the north face.

Yeah.

That whole of Mount Erebus is a mixture of glaciers,

and it's heavily crevassed.

Some of those crevasses are far deeper than you'd ever imagine.

They're big, black, and scary,

and the, the problem is, they have a snow bridge,

and that makes those crevasses completely invisible.

This site is on a 25-degree slope,

and most choppers can't land safely

on anything more than 10 degrees.

*

When the slopes exceed a safe landing angle,

I'll get out very carefully and actually chip away

on a landing pad on the side of the mountain.

It's very important we're 100 percent certain

we're not on a snow bridge.

The pilot will keep the machine under power

while we make that call.

*

I'm dealing with a volcano underneath my feet.

It's steep angle. It's snow and ice slopes.

If I make a mistake, the outcome can be fatal.

*

The Mount Erebus team's research site

is too steep for the chopper to land on,

so field guide Richie is stepping out, alone,

to dig out a landing pad.

This is not done very often.

The danger, of course, is it's incredibly hard work

to be over 7,000 feet in a polar region

and having to dig a platform.

That's the challenge.

*

*

Break the old shovel if you're not careful.

Alright.

If you dig it too deep,

you can end up with the rotors becoming far too close

to the slope angle of the mountain,

so, given the risk, you need to be on your A game,

and that, that pilot must have complete trust

in us on the ground.

*

*

*

*

So right now, in the front,

we're coming in, you can see the Onyx River,

longest river in Antarctica.

What a great view.

99.7 percent of Antarctica

is covered in snow and ice,

but not here, 50 miles from Scott Base, in the Dry Valleys.

Virtually the only life that can survive here

is microscopic.

And that's exactly why

Craig Cary and his team are here.

We made it! Yay!

My obsession is with understanding

how organisms can survive

in some of the most extreme environments on the planet,

the coldest places on Earth,

the driest places on Earth.

And the Dry Valleys

is the coldest, driest place in the world.

How's it going, buddy?

Good to see you again.

Yeah. Good to see you, man.

The Dry Valleys is the largest ice-free area on the continent,

so, likely, it's got the most biology.

Made it to Miers.

What a beautiful valley.

Kind of nice to come into a big camp like this,

with all of our colleagues.

For 21 days,

12 scientists will break into 3 teams...

Another bright, sunny day.

Time for some more work.

...to cover 50 miles

across Miers, Wright, Victoria, and Taylor valleys...

Today is the first of our sample sites.

It's going to be fun.

...to learn what the climate, the soil,

and the microbial life can teach us

about our own ability to adapt to a changing planet.

These systems are very unique,

and as things change, climate-wise,

they're going to change and could change irreversibly.

Species could die, and as the stewards of this planet,

we shouldn't tolerate extinction.

How long do you think you guys are going to be?

At least eight hours.

Yeah.

I'm a slowpoke.

We got a couple of sites to knock off this afternoon,

and we got one group going to the eastern side of the valley.

Let's go.

We've got people moving

from Miers up to the Wright Valley.

SD card?

Yes.

This is exciting.

So, Paul. Hey, Paul.

What, so, what's, what's up for today?

So, I'm going to head down there now,

and then we'll fly.

Okay.

We'll see how it goes, what the weather does.

Keep us in the loop.

Geospatial technician Paul Bealing

and climatologist Marwan Katurji...

Okay, Marwan, go a little bit clockwise.

Two degrees.

Two degrees.

...are creating a 3D map

of the unique microclimates that exist in the Dry Valleys.

The climate group's experiment flying

was the final peg in the hole that's going to create

probably one of the most interesting experiments

that we've run in the valleys since I've been working here.

It's a big day.

Nervous now, gotta fly.

I always get nervous before I fly.

Anything can happen.

We go to the Dry Valleys

because the surface cover is very simple,

and we can do observations

that we can't do anywhere else in the world.

So, I'm going to start, Peyman.

Okay.

The drone captures what's happening

at the upper levels

of the atmosphere,

and that's combined with data

from the lower levels,

where most human activity

takes place,

to create a complete model.

Okay, diags is running.

What I've done now is set up the high-end infrared camera,

and what we're trying to do is measure

the surface temperature of different surfaces,

the coldest being the lake, obviously,

so the blue violet colors.

And this is one of the dynamics

we're trying to capture in our analysis.

That's what we want.

Weather is a global phenomenon,

and whatever happens in Antarctica

will affect eventually weather in different areas in the world.

Temperature, zero Celsius.

Every now and then, the wind picks up.

My main focus is the surface.

A few meters above the ground is where people live,

where we grow our crops, so this is why it is important.

Good enough.

Alright.

Next is flying the UAV.

*

*

*

When we break ice,

it's like, imagine a 10, 12 Richter scale earthquake.

To be on board during that experience,

just imagine yourself in an earthquake for a week,

nonstop.

With all engines firing,

the Polar St can smash through about 950 feet of ice per hour.

That means it has to break 14 hours a day

in order to finish in a week.

Most boats don't like to go through

even a thin layer of ice,

and we're going through six-foot, seven-foot,

eight-foot chunks of ice continuously.

We're asking a lot of a very old ship.

My God.

We're getting an odd amount of water

dripping from the number 90 turbine enclosure.

Why is that doing that?

We've got an alarm. Send somebody to investigate it.

Want me to put the propulsion mode in neutral?

You can put them all in neutral.

We can't go anywhere.

Something's going wrong.

Main Control, Bridge.

We're seeing some fluctuation in the readings up here.

Put the engines on 30-minute standby.

Alright, well.

Okay, two hours?

Turbines off, ma'am. It's secure.

Roger.

We have to shut down propulsion

and have experts on board determine what's going on.

If I lose a shaft, it's going to cause all sorts of problems.

If you can imagine trying to drive your car

with three wheels... it won't work.

So, the engineers have to take time to fix it,

and that slows my progress down.

Potentially, could cause the mission to fail.

Can you go investigate?

Micronet. Reset.

Working on it.

Trying to get it to be happy.

Come on, ****.

*

Do you have an ETR?

Give us like, two, two hours.

Two hours. Roger.

Just an hour into a week of breaking ice,

a malfunctioning turbine

has the Polar Star dead in the water.

Hello, Captain.

Copeland found a bolt that had come undone,

so he's going to repair that now.

Thank you, Captain.

Yep.

The anti-rotation bar is inside the shaft assembly.

Each propeller shaft

has an individual oil distribution box.

The anti-rotation bar keeps it from moving

while the shaft spins.

If the bar breaks, the OD box will twist itself apart,

shutting the whole system down.

Because of the shaking of the ship,

just like the paper clip

gets bent and bent and bent and breaks,

so we don't have spares,

so we have to manufacture them from scratch.

She's old. We got to baby her, keep her going.

So, we're doing a repair for the anti-rotation bar

in the number one shaft.

So, we're welding a new one before anything bad happens.

The shaking of the ice, I mean, it's violent, and it's nonstop.

12 hours of violent shaking, stuff's going to break,

so we're just trying to prevent that from happening again.

She's an old girl.

We're not going to let her quit, though.

*

That should be good.

The turbine shaft runs along the bottom of the hull,

through a labyrinth of pipes and mechanical systems.

We're going to leave it right here for now

because we got to take that apart first.

And before they can replace it...

Get that antirotation bar in there.

...they have to climb through and prep it.

Our job is to break the channel

so that we can get those supply ships in there

and resupply the continent.

Can you get some bilge filters?

So, they don't realize it,

but the crew down below

has the weight of the entire continent on their shoulders.

*

7,000 feet up Mount Erebus,

Martyn and his team are on the leeward side of the mountain,

and the conditions are slowing them to a crawl.

This will be a pretty challenging site

for the crew today.

We're riddled with gradient.

We've got sastrugi, which is this surface snow,

heavily affected by wind, sun, or precipitation.

It's been absolutely hammered over the last two weeks.

Sastrugi sort of forms ripples in the snow,

and you've probably seen something sort of similar

at a beach, where the wind carves the sand

into some really quite incredible patterns.

Now, the sastrugi in Antarctica can get up to a meter high,

so it's incredibly challenging to dig in.

Sometimes the shovel just bounces straight back off it.

But it's very slippery, hard to walk on.

And we all know that if any gear disappears, not to chase it.

We just wave it good-bye.

The team is working to bury sensors

to create a 3D picture of the volcano's inner magma flow.

Pretty much centered, which is what we're looking for,

and we'll just double-check the orientation.

Yep, it's magnetic north,

which is not the same as geographic down here.

It's actually, quite a bit different.

And each site requires

$100,000 worth of highly sensitive electronics.

Up here, the snow has got

some volcanic ash in it and other stuff,

which makes it a little bit more conductive.

Come on.

So, we're just waiting here for the instrument to start.

Richie, just we're having a bit of a computer issue here.

Okay.

We have to see it's working before we leave.

Otherwise, there's really no point.

Um, we need to work as quick as we can.

I think one of these cables is a little bit flakey.

We want to reconsider our time.

Yeah, I think we've gone over our ground time actually.

Scott Base, Scott Base. Richie.

Just a bit of an update for you. We're still on site here.

We'll be intending on leaving here approximately 11:20.

We're going to try and hustle here, guys,

so just keep on, keep on winding the dial.

Yeah, we're just waiting on this thing,

and sometimes, Richie, these guys just don't cooperate.

Mount Erebus has a significant level of exposure.

Based on the terrain that we're operating in,

it's a steep angle.

We're dealing with a volcano,

so we're potentially looking at projectiles

coming out of that, that crater from time to time.

If we have a delay, there can be a significant safety concern.

That's when things can really go seriously wrong.

We have got the GPS working.

Someone just throw me a jacket a minute.

I'm just having a hard time seeing.

Okay, test data looks great.

It's going. It's looking good.

Okay, let's get out of here.

Antarctica's a stunning place,

but it's incredibly dangerous.

There're so many things that could go wrong.

The risk is always there. It's always changing.

Let's cool that good.

So, there's a satisfaction

of getting back home at the end of the day.

*

*

52 miles away in Miers Valley...

It's really cold today. Light winds.

I hate to think what it's doing up there.

Paul is ready to put his drone in the air

for the first time.

See what happens.

I'll come fire up the probe, okay?

It records temperature,

wind speed, and moisture 50 times a second,

and captures high-definition images.

And the probe.

Camera is on, probe is on.

The equipment on board is custom-made

by guys that make stuff for NASA.

You do all your checks, man?

Yep, yes, we did.

So, we've got around 80 grand in the air.

Looks good.

Ready?

Oui, monsieur.

Let's pull the pin on this hand grenade.

Pin in 3, 2, 1.

Okay, are you ready?

Confirm.

I'm getting nervous.

When I'm flying, don't talk to me.

I never feel relaxed when this thing's in the air.

Anything could happen.

Okay, here we go.

Alrighty, let's get this thing in the sky.

Alright, probe is out.

Probe is out. It's at waypoint?

Yes.

Waypoint engaged.

To get a complete data set,

the autopilot flies the drone

on a set path at different altitudes,

over and over again.

Alright, it's turning around its waypoint.

Heading east?

Yep.

Perfect.

Halfway to its second waypoint

and then make a right-hand turn.

And it's designed to fly

in wind speeds over 40 knots.

It's doing well.

So far, everything's working according to plan.

It's maintaining its 100-foot altitude.

I've got good battery voltage.

Just have to wait for it to finish.

So, now it's halfway along its path.

It's struggling a bit through the wind.

Yeah, there's definitely quite a bit of wind up there.

It's 29 knots. It's really blowing up there.

You wouldn't believe.

Climb to 100 feet.

33 knots!

34, 35, 37, 39, 40, 42.

What's it doing?

Drifted a bit.

Yeah, it missed its waypoint, did it?

Yeah.

I've never seen that before.

Not a good sign.

Is the orientation on the compass wrong?

It's way off track.

I think it got a strong gust.

It's starting to get, like, beyond its capability.

Yeah, the compass is off by 180, man.

Want me to go manual?

Yeah, just go.

Okay, we'll go manual.

Heart rate goes up.

You need to know how to fly the thing manually

because things go wrong.

It always gets knocked around there?

I don't mind flying in some wind,

but when you're getting up some really high wind speed,

there's always a bit of nerves.

Let's see how straight you can fly in this wind.

I'm just going to pick a point on the horizon

and go for it.

We've just brought the one UAV,

so, if the plane crashes, we go home.

Doing some funkiness there.

We've got winds coming from the other direction now.

44, 45, 47, 49 knots.

That's over 100 kilometers an hour.

I'm going to write this down.

50, 52, 53, 54...

59, 60!

Record.

It's still pointing in the right direction?

It's drifting towards us.

What's it doing?

The curse of Antarctica.

What's it doing?

It's still pointing in the right direction?

It's drifting towards us.

Paul is flying

the climate team's $80,000 drone system.

It's fighting so much wind.

It just can't handle it.

And the winds are gusting to 70 miles per hour.

Maintain heading. I'll tell you when to turn.

Thank you. That's good.

Do a right-hand turn in 3, 2, 1, now.

How's that?

That's good. Maintain heading.

That's easier said than done when it's blowing 54 knots.

You're doing good.

We're seeing

60-knot average wind speeds,

which is very high.

The most I've ever flown in is about 50 knots.

Left-hand turn a bit. Keep going.

But, yeah, there's obviously more pressure

to make the most of the remaining time we've got.

It's got to move south a bit.

And if we don't fly,

they're going to be missing

the last component of the data

that they planned on getting.

A right-hand turn again in 3, 2, 1.

I think it just can't handle it.

It's too much wind for it.

We'll do a couple more, and we'll call it off.

Do a left-hand adjustment a little bit.

Like that?

Because it's struggling into that wind,

it's using battery up faster.

We might have to land.

Keep going. Almost there.

Right-hand turn, now.

A low battery.

Now I've got a battery left. I'm coming home.

Okay. That's good.

The team has a complete data set

from higher altitude,

but they still need to get the drone back in one piece.

We've got to figure out where we're going to land.

So, this dry, dusty sand gets into the motor,

so we're going to try and land on this wet sand.

Of course, the danger with that is there's a river,

so if we overshoot our landing and we end up in the drink,

that'll be bad.

The gear is not waterproof.

You ready?

Retract the probe, please, Marwan.

Okay, the probe should be retracted.

Okay, good.

*

You like how I hopped the river?

How cool was that?

Outstanding!

So, from the angle I was standing back there,

there's a bit of terrain.

You can see the skid mark.

Bounce. Jumped.

We have data!

We got data?

Yeah, we got 21 megabytes.

So, I'm thinking it was quite stagnant on this side.

There was localized high pressure,

and that will basically push the high winds

a bit further south to the valley.

Could be one of the hypothesis what you're observing here.

I think we got really good data from the UAV this year.

We were able to fly

from the sandy surface of the Dry Valleys

over the frozen lake,

so we were able to measure two different surface types,

but also wind speed and temperature

from the surface up to 300 feet above the ground,

so we have information

on how the upper wind systems interact with those surfaces,

so thankfully we achieved what we wanted.

Certainly interesting.

Well done.

That's the highest wind speed I've ever flown in,

so that was exciting.

I'm officially a copilot now, not a scientist.

*

We're down to a couple hundred meters

left to, turn off.

And from there, we'll be in completely uncharted territory

where we finally pull up.

We're going to step foot

where probably no other human has ever stepped foot before,

which is a pretty unique feeling.

After days of delays and punishing driving,

the Ross Ice Shelf team is finally in sight of their goal.

Less than 200 meters, the traverse of 2015,

and the end of a saga.

Woo-hoo!

Team is approaching.

375 kilometers,

an average speed of 12.1 kilometers an hour,

a total moving time of 30 hours and 56 minutes.

Wow.

Hey, look!

Woo!

We were getting quite bored of driving.

Finally to get there, that's a magical moment.

You know, we've just dragged all this equipment out there,

you know, a few hundred thousand dollars,

several years of planning,

six months of construction, and then it all comes together.

*

We're in the middle of nowhere right now.

Well, congratulations.

Yeah!

We're about 367 kilometers from, Scott Base,

where we left four or so days ago.

Right on! Okay.

Rob T.

2015, yeah!

This is where we're going to call home

for the next week or so,

so, we're going to make camp.

It's going to be a busy week or so ahead.

We've got a lot of science objectives to complete,

and hopefully, fingers crossed, all goes well,

they'll find what they're looking for on the seabed.

It's only just begun.

*

Just looking at the map,

looking what we already have, where things are.

After deploying an extra team,

Graham and Danny are checking on the season's progress,

and the news isn't good.

Last week, we didn't do much,

because of weather, at all.

We'll never finish.

A lot of places to go still.

There are 59 completed.

There are 10 in the ground.

There are 2 left to repeat and 62 incompleted,

so it's a bit grim.

I don't think we have any chance.

These are some of the most expensive measurements ever,

ever made in the world.

Because just the amount

of resource and infrastructure

that goes into making these

measurements is, is huge.

And it's not looking like we're going to quite manage

to get it done.

I wasn't expecting it.

Yeah, it seems a bit daunting at this point.

If we get a good weather run,

we, we'll be able to catch up a bit, hopefully.

So, basically we just need flying days, but we'll see.

We're not really in control of the flight schedule.

It's hugely frustrating,

but you also have to realize that's part of the game

when you sign up

to work in Antarctica.

And we'll keep plugging away with hard work.

Feels like it's going to be stable

for the next two flying days, which is perfect.

To get another four done by the end of the week

would be great.

One day at a time.

*

The Polar Star has been paralyzed for hours.

OX for Main Control, go ahead.

While Lieutenant Morrison and the team

improvised a fix for one of the turbines.

I don't think you're ready to get it down there.

Now, the only thing to do is install it...

It's slippery down here.

...under tons and tons of equipment.

Right now, we are underneath the starboard shaft

in the motor room, in the bilge.

Right out there, a little further down, is the water.

It's actually really cold right here.

Main Control, Con.

Roger, okay. Thank you.

Yeah.

This ship is 40 years old.

Got it?

Yeah.

Older than most of the people on board.

Pretty close?

Alright, go up a little.

Alright, that's good.

Alright.

The young men and women down below deck

sacrifice their time and their families and holiday seasons.

They work night and day to make sure this ship stays under way,

that those propellers keep turning.

Just as long as you jam that super tight.

I'll give it one more crank.

Ready?

Yep.

It's pretty amazing to see what they can do.

You guys got yours all tightened up?

Yeah.

This whole mechanism right above us is pretty significant,

So, the more secure this is,

the less vibration and damage we can cause.

We don't have anything supporting this OD box,

this shaft is not rolling,

and that would be it for the Polar Star.

Are we all good down there, guys?

Installed, ready to go.

Alright, we're going to start coming out.

Hopefully it will hold this time.

*

Are you standing by, number three main gas turbine?

You ready for a start?

Standby, stand clear for a start

on number three main gas turbine.

Standby, stand clear for a start

of the number three main gas turbine!

Chief, we're ready to go on the port turbine.

Main gas turbine, port shaft up to speed.

Roger.

Restart number one.

*

Where we at?

Fuel pressure seems to be holding.

Check your regulator. Make sure you have pressure.

Pressure is 55.

Good, you are good.

Alright.

Woo!

Roger. System intact, lube oil, 2-0.

Solid, dude, solid.

Yeah, our motto is, 'You break it, we fix it.'

Nice. Success.

They have inspected it and found it to be normal,

so we're safe to operate now,

and, resume icebreaking operations.

Hopefully it won't vibrate as much, and the repair will hold.

That's probably the number one challenge for Polar Star

is to keep her operational.

I'm very, very proud of these young people.

But we're falling way behind.

All have four.

Helmsman, all add four.

We have to work around the clock

to finish the channel before the supply ships get here.