Arctic Circle - Going above much of the World

It has been a mixed week here in the far north as work has accelerated getting ready for the upcoming construction season.  Many meetings trying to sort through which projects will have funding and for those that do quickly moving through the winter time preconstruction activities.

Part of this process is making material lists of every part and piece to be built.  Literally it is figuring out exactly how many nuts and bolts will be needed.  All of the equipment that will be installed is ordered and shipped to make the limited barge season schedule.  For many of these villages there may only be two barges that dock bringing with it 98% of things the village will need for the next year.  This could be food, clothing, heating fuel, construction materials, snow machines (most villages have no real roads so not many ‘vehicle’s’ are there other than construction ones), and anything else that you could think of.  It is a different world and if something misses the barge and has to be flown in it gets very expensive.  For example, a sheet of plywood that you buy at Home Depot for about $ 8 to 10 dollars will cost about $ 200+ to fly in so everyone wants to make sure it makes the sailing.

We have about 80 projects this season so getting things to the right village and the correct number of materials sometimes is a daunting task.  Add to that the year out projects that we will buy materials now and ship this season so they will be ready for construction the following year when things first thaw only adds to the madhouse.  We are buying and working the 2010 season, buying many of the 2011 season and shipping all of it from the Pacific Northwest, Anchorage and other places to make the schedules.

In the predawn hours I am flying out of Anchorage northwest with a group from our company to Selawik, a village above the Arctic Circle to look at their water treatment plant to design a new plant that we can order many of the long lead equipment pieces to make the only barge in August.  Part of our task is we only have 25% design drawings so getting enough information to complete enough to order the equipment to make that barge and still have time to complete the rest of the building, plumbing, and other items in the coming months.  We will take lots of pictures, measurements, and calculations to properly size the system for the village’s needs for the next 20 years.

Looking at the weather last week it was minus 40 but this week it has warmed up to about zero so not really bad unless the wind is blowing which it almost always is.  I’m taking my arctic gear just in case my weather reports are wrong.  It is easier to lug the stuff around than to not have it and being cold all day.

There have been several things I want to write about and I have been working on a couple of them this week as it has been a mixed bag of things happening here in Alaska.  There were several avalanches over the weekend killing three people including Jim Bowles, the president of ConocoPhillips Alaska.  He has been involved in leading his company to many of our charities including the new Cancer Center at Providence Hospital and the Science Building at UAA.  He will be missed and his service is at my church, Change Point tomorrow morning.

    

The Olympics are going strong now with some crazy weather to boot another example of Global Warming.  Winter with no winter . . . who would’ve knew.  Lindsey Vonn & Shawn White won gold today with several others advancing in their different events.  What’s with the fence around the Cauldron? 

I’m heading to the airport at 4:00 am so that’s all for now, as it will be a couple days before I post my next one and I need a couple hours sleep.  I don’t know what it is but traveling above the Arctic Circle is so cool every time I have been that far north it seems so special for some reason.

Ice