Happy Campers School: Training for winter camping

When you come to Antarctica for the first time you are required to attend "Happy Campers" school. It is a ~36 hour class designed to teach people how to camp in the snow. The USAP (US Antarctic Program) want to ensure that everyone is able to use the materials provided in survival bags in the event you get stuck out in the harsh Antarctic environment and you feel confident that you can survive. The Happy Campers camp had some classroom activities where we learned about using radios and helicopter safety, but most of the class was outside learning how to set up tents, use camping stoves, build a snow wall a snow kitchen and (if you really wanted) you had the option of building a snow trench to sleep in. The snow trenches are supposed to be much more quiet than a tent because there is no fabric to flap around in the wind. 

During my field camp we did not have the best weather. Most of the time we experienced weather condition 2, meaning the wind speeds are less than 55 knots (click here to calculate this speed in different units), visibility is less than 0.25 miles, and wind chill temperature is between -75 and -100 degrees Fahrenheit. A few times we deteriorated to condition 1 (which is windier and colder than condition 2) and the evening of our first day we experienced condition 3, which is clear skies and not so windy and cold as condition 2. 

Arriving at Happy Campers the weather was less than ideal. We had high winds and low visibility.

Me proudly displaying the snow wall we had to build to protect our tents from the high winds. I'm wearing all of my ECW (Extreme Cold Weather) gear to keep me warm. This is the brief period of time where we had condition 3 weather.