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Published: June 13th 2010
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Big Trout Lake
The airstrip and community Well, the vacation is officially over.
The second trip to a remote northern community showed me what it's
really like to work up here. Between getting tossed around in my tiny plane, working long days and dealing with shitty weather I am starting to gain a bit more of an appreciation for what it takes to spend an entire career working up north, nevermind actually living up there.
This week's excursion was to
Sachigo Lake, a small community just northwest of my first destination,
Bearskin lake. Interestingly enough, the two trips were originally supposed to be combined, but because of a death in the community at Sachigo the whole place shut down... apparently it is commonplace for the smaller communities to just shut the doors for a few days or so following the death of a resident, with the exception of family etc. At any rate, it meant another flight up north.
This time Adrian and I were joined by a couple of environmental techs from one of our consultants. Although our official role was the same (monitoring the contracted work) the job this time involved lots more water sampling than was done at Bearskin, so we'd be helping out
and actually getting our hands dirty this time.
Apparently I'd gotten lucky with my first few flights, in that they were fairly smooth. Although we were flying in the same little
Pilatus PC-12 the air conditions made for a much bumpier ride. Oddly enough, according to Adrian there is a direct correlation between how nice a day it is and how much we can expect the plane to get tossed around.
Now I'm a pretty good flier (even before coming up north I'd been in one or two smaller planes and never had an issue) but when turbulence hits these little single-engine guys, it is
turbulence. I knew that everything was under control (I'd been repeatedly warned by other Hydroids that these rides can get a bit rough) but I was surprised at how much the plane got tossed around...you can actually feel the difference between when the engine is lifting the plane and when the thermals are. Also, 'turbulence' in one of these planes doesn't just mean 'bumpy' -- occasionally the entire plane will skid slightly to the side before straightening out (it feels just like fishtailing in a car on a slippery road). Despite my having to
become accustomed to a new definition of the phrase 'bumpy ride', we were safe the entire trip and arrived on time.
Our first flight was actually to a place called
Big Trout Lake to drop off some cargo (remember when i said they coordinate everything meticulously?) before taking a short jump from there to Sachigo. This short hop (Big trout to Sachigo) gave me a chance to see what the pilots were really capable of.
If you'll recall on my first flight, Adrian had warned me that a very flat or distinct border between cloud levels was indicative of a heavy air density/pressure gradient between the two atmospheric levels, and resulted in a bumpy ride. Turns out he was right, because my first flight was relatively smooth and I did not notice a distinct cloud-line whereas there was a very sharp bottoming-out of the clouds on the day of our trip to Sachigo. Now the flight from Thunder Bay to Big Trout required us to reach maximum altitude because of the distance we were traveling (again the flight was similar in length to the Toronto-Thunder Bay trip) but only a small leap was required to move from Big Trout to
Raining on my parade
A view of the rain by Sachigo, from the nice-and-sunny Big Trout Sachigo so
the pilots stayed just below the cloud line for the entire flight. Because they did not have to climb as high, and because the largest turbulence is a result of the plane crossing the heavy atmospheric gradient, by staying just below the cloud line and not crossing over the pilots were able to avoid most of the turbulence and we had a much smoother flight. It was incredible to look out the window and feel like my head was almost scraping against the cloud line for the the whole flight.
We arrive in Sachigo and unload our crap -- unlike in Bearskin Lake, the station here is right beside the airstrip so we don't have far to go. The reason we are here is to take samples from a series of groundwater monitoring wells... apparently a rather large spill occurred here some years ago so monitoring is still going on to make sure that the cleanup and remediation measures were effective. Since we arrive late in the day, we locate the wells and prepare our sample bottles and then head in to unpack and cook. Day 2 is when it starts to get interesting.
Of course,
on our only full day of fieldwork it is pouring rain. We all came prepared however, so out comes the rain gear. It's a good thing we have the means to keep dry because sampling can be a tedious process and we end up spending the better part of 12 hours out in the rain. It was also quite cold -- I mean, that is to be expected since I'm way the hell up north, but I was still caught off guard when a mid-June morning felt like a November one.
Because the wells haven't been sampled in months, it was likely that the water sitting in them has become stagnant and therefore, in order to ensure a sample representative of the actual groundwater conditions, the wells must be purged. Guess what lucky guy got this job. Now this isn't so bad, if a bit tedious, as long as the wells are clean, but some of them have become clogged with silt an in one case, thick clay. Needless to say I got a decent arm workout trying to pump through that one, and it made for a fun day in the rain.
On our third (and last)
Staying below the cloud-line
The pilots, saving us some bumps day in Sachigo the rain subsided, giving me a chance to wear something other than raingear, and I learned why the rain had been a sort of blessing in disguise: It had kept the bugs away. It is amazing how quickly mosquitos will swarm to you the minute you step into the woods, regardless of how much DEET you are covered in. According to Adrian it was not nearly as bad as it might get later on in the summer, so it's a good thing we have a supply room full of bug spray at the office.
Samples taken, we wrap up, drop the extra food off with the First Nation agent and hop on our plane back o Thunder Bay. Needless to say, I was out like a light as soon as that plane too off (a couple days of cold, wet and buggy field work will do that to you) so I can't really say how smooth the ride back was. It was a good experience though, hopefully now I'm a bit better prepared for the rest of the trips I'll be taking this summer... especially the one coming up, where we'll be hitting a slew of
On the Lake
A pier in the Sachigo Community communitie sover the course of a week. Wish me luck.
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