The preparations for heading to Antarctica begin at Christchurch, New Zealand at the International Antarctic Center. The center serves as the headquarters for operations at McMurdo (the US base), Scott Base (the NZ base), as well as the Italian base. Here is where we get all of the Extreme Cold Weather (ECW) gear needed to keep you warm on the ice.
There are ton of different clothes options depending on what your job is, but essentially everybody gets: a giant big red coat (“Big Red”), warm overalls, gloves, mittens, a hat, a neck gaiter, ski goggles, and comically enormous boots:
Wearing it all together feels pretty silly inside (and is insanely hot), but you need to make sure everything fits. Once you fly down you’re stuck with what ya got!
The jackets come with sweet name tags to help you identify your jacket in a huge rack of identical Big Reds, and to help identify who people are out in the field when their faces are all covered up!
Nathan P. Lourie 