There was a knock at the door...

An amazing true story, which I read in the original Palmer Station logbook in 1987...this really happened early in the 1965-66 summer season.

Everyone on station was gathered in the main room (pictured above) to watch the movie.

There was a knock at the door.

The door was opened. There was a Chilean naval officer in full dress uniform. His ship had just anchored in the harbor and they were paying a social call.

I really didn't believe this story, and at the time I didn't think I'd be able to verify it. But after posting it on my website I heard from Jack Cummings in 2001. He was the Navy radio operator who wintered in 1965 and was still around. The movie hadn't started yet, and he was in the head (at the southeast end of the station--a room shared with the generators, and the actual facility consisted of a seat over a cutoff 55-gallon drum)--the window had a view of the path to the station, and he saw the officer approaching. You can read his version of the story in this blog post, one of many he wrote describing his year at Palmer Station.

The Chilean vessel was almost certainly the Yelcho, which showed up on 30 December...not the last call it would make at Palmer Station. Yelcho (formerly the World War II era fleet tug USS Tekesta) had aboard the Baron Gaston de Gerlache, leader of the 1957-58 Belgian Antarctic Expedition. The Palmer personnel had luncheon aboard Yelcho on the 31st, followed by a New Years Eve party for the ships crew at Palmer Station. Yelcho departed Palmer on New Years Day (this information from the December 1965 Antarctic Status Report and the March-April 1966 Antarctic Journal).

The Coast Guard icebreaker Eastwind did not arrive at Palmer to relieve the winterovers until 4 January 1966. On 9 January it headed north, giving the winterovers (presumably including Jack Cummings) a courtesy visit at the British base at Argentine Islands before heading to Punta Arenas.

Jack shared the above photo (from his 1965 winter) with the USAP Antarctic Photo Library (link to original). Visible in it are CSC Thomas Atkins, the cook, HMC Charles Axworthy, medical, and the back of the head of Ohio State glaciologist William Ahrnsbrak.