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Stroke Victim Stranded At South Pole Base
Hugh Pickens writes "Renee-Nicole Douceur, the winter manager at the Amundsen-Scott research station at the South Pole, was sitting at her desk on August 27 when she suffered a stroke. 'I looked at the screen and was like, "Oh my God, half the screen is missing."' But both the National Science Foundation and contractor Raytheon say it would be too dangerous to send a rescue plane to the South Pole now, since Douceur's condition is not life-threatening. Douceur's niece Sydney Raines has set up a Web site that urges people to call officials at Raytheon and the National Science Foundation. However, temperatures must be higher than -50 degrees F for most planes to land at Amundsen-Scott or the fuel will turn to jelly. While that threshold has been crossed at the South Pole recently, the temperature still regularly dips to 70 degrees below zero. 'It's like no other airfield in the U.S.,' says Ronnie Smith, a former Air Force navigator who has flown there about 300 times. A pilot landing a plane there in winter, when it is dark 24 hours a day, would be flying blind 'because you can't install lights under the ice.' The most famous instance of a person being airlifted from the South Pole for medical reasons was that involving Jerri Nielsen FitzGerald, a doctor who diagnosed and treated her own breast cancer. Using only ice and a local anesthetic, she performed her own biopsy with the help of a resident welder. When she departed on October 16, 1999, it was the earliest in the Antarctic spring that a plane had taken off."
McChord Air Force Base has a couple of C-17s in Christchurch *right now* involved in Operation Deep Freeze. Of course, the jets keep the engines running while cargo goes off and on, and as a point of fact, we are now actually doing NVG landings and take-offs.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Not only is the condition not life threatening at the moment, the rescue wouldn't achieve much since by the time the victim could be transported out of there, any damage would've been done already. Not to mention that putting her into an unpressurized plane (if it's too cold for the C130) could be dangerous by itself.
When you sign up for a tour of duty to a place like that, you also sign a number of waivers and documents stating that you are aware that there is no bailing out early, and no chance of a rescue flight in winter. I'm sure it must suck to try to recover from a stroke while at the South Pole, but there is no reason to risk the life of others just to get her out - even less now that she is actually recovering.
At least actual transport is fast once it's safe to send it these days; Amundsen and his team spend 99 days going from the coast to the south pole and back, Scott and his team was on the move for about 150 days before succumbing to hunger and cold (in reality succumbing to bad planning and lack of preparation).
Everything in the world is controlled by a small, evil group to which, unfortunately, no one you know belongs.
Maybe but teh reality is that you would be risking lives to get one person home early and when they got home they would still be a stroke patient. Its hard for some people but some times in an emergency the best thing to do is nothing and the best place to be is where you are. If you don't like that don't go to Antarctica. Its just barely spring here in Melbourne (and in the rest of the southern hemisphere). The sun is creeping south slowly.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Absolutely. Anyone at any age who volunteers to spend time on the South Pole must recognize they have no access to emergency care. I sympathize with her situation, but no more lives should be put at risk to rescue her.
She had the stroke a month and a half ago. The next scheduled flight is one week away. Maybe this would have been newsworthy on September 10th, but at this point, if she's functional, she can last another week.
Honestly, how bad would she (and her family back home) feel if they send a "rescue flight" tomorrow, and it crashes on attempted landing, killing the crew? Or how bad would her family feel if it landed successfully, managed to take off again, but then the engines die halfway to the coast due to jelled fuel, killing the crew AND her?
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
First, email the people on this list and tell them the money saved denying Renee a Medevac flight will not be worth the bad press. Ask them to do the right thing.
Please no. This really isn't about saving money. If that's all it was, they'd do the flight just to head off the bad PR.
Sending a flight to the south pole in adverse conditions costs lives. Figuring a 1 in 15 chance of a crash per round trip and a flight crew of 3, that's 0.2 lives you're paying to airlift her out of there.
That's an acceptable risk for someone who will die unless they're rescued, but that's not the case: she had a stroke; the damage is done. They probably have her on blood thinners now and she's off-duty and taking it easy, which is basically all that they can do for her in a proper hospital to prevent a recurrence. Any rehab therapy she needs can be adequately done by videoconference until they can get a flight down there.
I'm sure(?) that the people at NASA are looking at this and thinking:
"What would this be like if this happened in deep space, with no possibility of rescue or even airdropped (space dropped?) supplies?"
Is there an age restriction on astronauts (to reduce the likelihood of diseases which become more prevalent with age?). Are there any policies about pushing people out of the airlock if they can't be helped (now that would be something interesting to see on wikileaks).
This looks like a bad situation for everyone involved.
How does she know if it was really a stroke? Only by symptoms??? It could be many other diseases from optic neuritis, multiple sclreosis onset... or glaucoma. Did she have a CAT or MRI scan to differentiate? Also if she had stroke and it just affected her vision she may consider herself as very lucky, without thrombolytic therapy. She was also aware that going to South Pole is not like hitchiking in the mountains, no 911 calls. Anyway I wish her well and hope she will recover.
Raines has set up a Web site that urges people to call officials at Raytheon and the National Science Foundation.
With the purpose of what? Endangering more lives? This isn't a rational plea for help, it's irrational panic.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The South pole isn't apart of the US.
Yes it is.
I spent one year as the leader of the Norwegian Antarctic research station (Troll).
We did not have winter flights either, but we had plans for doing it.
We had a set of airport lights we could place along the runway, complete with PAPI lights to guide incoming planes. These were not permanently mounted, but would only require a couple of hours to get in place. I find it odd that Amundsen-Scott does not have something similar.
The real problem is weather, a little bit of wind, and the lights disappear in snow drift. Another problem is that the runway must be cleared of snow, which is a considerable amount of work that is also dependent on the weather.
Apostrophes, how do they work?
Apostrophe's? You add them at random.
http://photolibrary.usap.gov/Portscripts/PortWeb.dll?query&field1=Filename&op1=matches&value=09122008_NVG_C17.JPG&catalog=Antarctica&template=USAPgovMidThumbs
Nice landing shots at night.
Id like to see a SR71 land there.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
A C-17 Globemaster III aircrew from McChord Air Force Base, Washington, performed the first known after-dark landing in Antarctica using night vision goggles on September 11, 2008.
http://photolibrary.usap.gov/Portscripts/PortWeb.dll?query&field1=Filename&op1=matches&value=09122008_NVG_C17.JPG&catalog=Antarctica&template=USAPgovMidThumbs
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
What is the very first thing you do in a first aid scenario? You see someone down you stop and assess the situation. You never proceed to help a victim unless its safe to do so or you want to earn a stupidity ..er.. I mean bravery medal.
You go in all mucho and heroic you stand a chance of increasing the number of casualties. No only does that put your stupid arse in a sling, but it also limits the amount of help that will be available for the original casualty when the smarter rescue team arrives.
Sydney Raines is now actively petitioning for something that could have a very good chance of not only getting people killed, but worse still potentially getting people killed and preventing help for the one who currently needs it.
Neither is Guantanamo Bay, but that's never stopped the US Military.
May the Maths Be with you!
I know Renee personally. In fact, I submitted this story to Slashdot in late September, but it didn't get posted.
There are other factors involved. Renee is aware of the problems with an evacuation this time of year, but was more concerned about being prevented from getting a second medical opinion and being denied a medical attendant on the evacuation flight. She sought publicity upon the advice of her lawyer, who felt this was the only way to pressure the company to do the right thing - and the publicity campaign has worked. Renee is now getting a second medical opinion and will be getting a medical attendant on her evacuation flight.
Polar aviation technology has advanced considerably since 1999, and a Twin Otter can safely land at considerably lower temperatures than an LC-130. You may note that Renee did not ask for an evacuation in August or most of September - merely that a plane be put on standby for an evacuation as soon as possible in October. She didn't earn her Engineering degree or get to be Winter Site Manager by being stupid. There was also concern that the denial of her reasonable request for a second medical opinion, etc., might be retaliation related to some issues with anonymous whistleblowers which she handled.
It should also be noted that some types of stroke can get progressively worse, and that she is currently at a high altitude with low oxygen which might exacerbate the damage. I understand the skepticism, but like I say - she is not stupid.
More information here, though note that this page was established by family members, not Renee herself:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Evacuate-Renee-Nicole-Douceur-from-Antarctica-Immediately/139354572829055
Renee is at the South Pole, at an elevation of 9300 feet - however, because the atmosphere at the poles is thinner than at the equator, air pressure at South Pole is roughly equivalent to 10,500 feet.
However, this is a good point. It is one of the reasons why Renee requested a medical attendant on her evacuation flight, as well as a second medical opinion about her condition. Both requests were at first denied, but fortunately this publicity campaign has succeeded in getting both these requests granted.
As always with news stories, some of the most relevant details were omitted.
(I wintered with Renee at McMurdo Station in 2009, and have been in contact with her regarding her current circumstances.)
The problem is not the added hight of the snow, but that the snow is very uneven (sastrugi). You can not land a plane with wheels on an unprepared antarctic runway, and airplanes taking off from Cape Town (which is the city closest to the Norwegian station) will not be equipped with skis.
They have landed a plane at South Pole in the darkness before.
http://www.polarconservation.org/education/antarctic-evacuations/2001-doctor-evacuated-from-the-south-pole
There is much more to this story than what has been released in the press. Renee was denied a second medical opinion and denied her request for a medical attendant on her evacuation flight. There are also questions of official retaliation for doing her job properly. But those things don't get publicity - and the publicity has helped her get that second medical opinion and the medical attendant.
As I've been saying elsewhere, there were other factors involved. Renee was being denied a second medical opinion, and denied a medical attendant on her evacuation flight. Thanks to the publicity, this has now been rectified. Naturally, the relevant facts never make the news. It ain't sexy.
Someone over 50 can be so good at the job that he/she is the equivalent of two or three "young enough" workers. It could even be that they do look down on older applicants, but decided the younger ones were trash compared to this experienced person.
I assure you that Renee is no whiner. I wintered with her at McMurdo in 2009. She's a tough lady.
There are other factors in play here, which may come out in the future.
Renee was primarily concerned about getting a second medical opinion and a medical attendant for her evacuation flight. Both of these were previously denied to her - but thanks to the publicity, both have been now been granted.
Ah, it's amazing how the absence of a simple space character can change a sentence from true to false.
I've wintered at Pole multiple times. It's a very different place than Troll or McMurdo. The coldest coastal temps are like a warm October or February day at Pole. It's not practical to deploy electric cables in those temps (80F to -100F late in the winter and into sunrise). For airdrops (and the April, 2001, medevac via Twin Otter), they use "burn barrels" to mark out the skiway.
Wind and visibility is indeed an important factor, though unlike a hard-surface runway, you don't clear the snow off of the skiway so much as grade and shape the snow pack so the skis don't sink in. They have limited equipment and limited qualified personnel in the winter (usually 1-3 people) and it takes weeks to take the skiway from mid-winter conditions to ready-for-station-opening condition, and one storm can demolish a week's work.
I'm not there this year and can't comment on specific issues with Renee's situation. Once the Winter is over. I'm sure we'll hear more about how things got to this point, but right now, from 10,000 miles away, our speculation here can't possibly be based on enough facts to be remotely viable.
The standard treatment for stroke includes a clot-busting drug such as TPA if you can get it to the patient in the first few hours after the stroke. While this won't help her, they should keep a stockpile of it around for the next time somebody gets a stroke.
It's a bit more complicated than that - it helps some kinds of strokes and hurts others, so you need to consult a neurologist about it; I don't know if they'd also need to have CAT scan or equivalent medical hardware to help diagnosis.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Oh joy. Publicity has increased the chances that yet another person's life will be risked on the evacuation flight, which will be undertaken earlier than originally planned.
I hope the crew and the medical attendant make it safely back... and the stroke victim, of course. But if they all die in the premature rescue flight, I hope that one of their relatives gets away with arranging the murder of whoever set up the publicity site. And yeah, I am deliberately not posting anonymously, fucking karma be damned.
Back in the dark ages, in a military outpost stationed on top of the Balkans highest mountain, a Party official's son had a kidney stone. We had to get him down, my best friend lost a finger, and another of the guys lost a few toes. I had 30 square centimeters of dead skin on my face and hands. The crisis had passed, but he was freaked out and hyperventilating.
Two years later, the Party fell, and a bit later he drowned in a outdoor shithouse. I doubt the two were related... he had been involved in much worse.
No good deed goes unpunished...
"BTW I'm 10 solo hours away from obtaining my private pilot license."
Well, no wonder you're such an expert on landing at Amundsen in October.
Why, I bet when you were learning to drive you were schooling the engineers at Ferrari.
September 2011: Looking for Cocoa/iOS work in Boston area Cocoa Programmer Quincy, MA