RSV Nuyina is returning to its home port of Hobart today after a successful journey through the Southern Ocean to resupply Davis Station. It’ll be a welcome sight for dozens of weary expeditioners, who’ve spent up to a year at the station.
“We’ve been away from our friends and family for 400 days so it was fantastic to see the Nuyina’s bright red shape coming through the icebergs,” Davis plumber Mick Cloke, who is on the ship, said.
“You really know the end is in sight then but there’s still a mammoth task ahead, with the resupply and handover.”
Before the ship left Davis, the expeditioner band The Red Hot Chilli Penguins gave a final performance on ice (above).
The ship left Hobart on Voyage One on October 10, with 80 passengers and 35 crew on board.
After a few days in Burnie to fill up with what’s known as Special Antarctic Blend – a fuel that’s refined so it doesn’t solidify in extreme cold – the ship headed south to find the right kind of ice to conduct ice trials.
The Nuyina is designed to break ice that’s 1.65 metres thick at a speed of three knots in a straight line but it hadn’t been formally put through its paces.
After the ship cut a swathe in, engineers got down on the ice to test it for things like thickness, density, salinity and strength.
“We lifted someone down to the ice using the ship’s main crane in a personnel basket,” technical and engineering support manager Michael Zgoznik said.
“They tested the thickness using a cordless drill with a very long drill bit.
“We then deployed a brow from the vessel so people could walk to and from the ship from the ice, very similar to how they do it in port.
“We also put an ice radar on the front of the vessel to monitor the ice thickness to help us understand the ship’s fuel usage … during the trials.”
The final report isn’t finished yet but is likely next year.
