An Antarctic Voyage

Mr  Hannan is a Principal Surveyor with the Australian Maritime Safety Authority. In order to fulfil his lifelong dream to visit and see Antarctica, he took a few weeks leave from his job and has taken up the 1st Engineer's position in Aurora Australis, an Australian Supply ship for Australia's Antarctic stations. He will make a single round trip with Aurora Australis visiting four Antarctic stations, lasting about six weeks. He has kindly agreed to share his voyage experience with us through emails. We will post his emails on this webpage as we receive them.

Part-1

14 October 2006

I am fine. We left Hobart in the afternoon of 12 October 2006 and sailed South. We will be calling at Macquarie Island tomorrow morning.  I understand that there are about 10 -12 people living in this Island. We will be dropping a generator set for them.

The sea is very rough - the ship is rolling and pitching heavily. I am having a feeling of sea sickness. I hope it will be over soon.

Aurora Australis is a "Special Purpose Ship" - powered by 2 main engines of about 10,000 kW. We are carrying 3 helicopters, equipment, and provisions for the stations. There are about 100 expeditioners on board.

Chief Engineer is from Brisbane - an excellent person.

I will write again when the weather is good.

Cheers

Hannan

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Next: Part 2