ET

Researchers flown from Pole 'had fight injuries'
By Paul Chapman in Wellington

OFFICIALS in New Zealand refused to comment yesterday on suggestions that some of 11 Americans evacuated from a remote polar research base had been involved in a fight.

Speculation flared when it emerged that one of the men was being treated in hospital for a black eye and broken facial bones. Another evacuated worker is understood to have been dismissed over a disciplinary matter.

A Hercules transport plane made a risky 15-hour flight from Christchurch, initially to pick up four sick men for undisclosed medical reasons. Instead, 11 men came back. The flying season to Antarctica ended two months before the flight..

When the aircraft unloaded on Tuesday night, the media were kept well away. The reason given for the flight was to rescue a man seriously ill with a heart condition.

Ronald Shemenski, 59, a physician at the Amundsen-Scott polar research station, was on his way to Chile last night on the final leg of his rescue from the South Pole. Dr Shemenski is suffering from gallstones and pancreatitis.

-- Anonymous, April 26, 2001

Answers

Love to know what they were fighting over... could have just been a bad case of cabin fever...

-- Anonymous, April 26, 2001

Source?

-- Anonymous, April 27, 2001

ET = Electronic Telegraph. You have to subscribe:

Try here

ET also has a super search engine and doesn't charge for retrievals (yet). They've never bothered me with any spam over the six or eight years I've been subscribed. (One of the few remaining conservative British newspapers, and very well-written features too.)

-- Anonymous, April 27, 2001

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/117/world/After_risky_South_Pole_rescu e_:.shtml

After risky South Pole rescue, sick doctor anxious to go back

By Kevin Gray, Associated Press, 4/27/2001 03:22

PUNTA ARENAS, Chile (AP) He's a world traveler and a former stunt pilot. And until a recent gall bladder attack forced a change of plans, Ronald Shemenski was also the only doctor on duty in the windiest, coldest place on earth: the South Pole.

The 59-year-old doctor, who was airlifted out of the long Antarctic night this week in a risky rescue mission, says he's sorry he had to leave the Pole behind. And he's itching to get back for the next winter.

''If I had my druthers, I'd be at the Pole. But the window of opportunity to get me out was now. I couldn't sit around and wait,'' Shemenski said hours after a Twin Otter propeller plane carried him from Antarctica to Chile on Thursday.

He said he never worried about the flight out ''these pilots were good'' and that he rested on a makeshift bed atop a ''couple of 55- gallon fuel drums'' in a parka with a fur-lined hood.

''I'm fine,'' Shemenski said.

He would have preferred to tough it out at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station he left behind. ''I didn't want the crew to risk coming down there,'' he said.

But in an interview with The Associated Press, Shemenski acknowledged that it would have been dangerous to stay on. He was diagnosed with inflammation of the pancreas. Pancreatitis can happen when a gallstone passes down the bile duct, irritating the pancreas. It is potentially life-threatening.

''When I got sick, I was having quite a bit of pain. I wasn't sure what was going on. We did some lab tests down there and nothing fit what I was feeling,'' Shemenski said. Doctors in the United States helped make a diagnosis that he had a gall bladder attack.

''It could have progressed to being very serious and the main question was, 'Was this going to happen again?''' he added.

Rescuers decided to chance a risky trip before worse weather set in, making the Pole unreachable. Shemenski was the only physician among 50 researchers working there his replacement was brought in by his rescuers.

The airlift was one of the riskiest to the Pole in winter, with the pilots of the eight-seat craft braving snow, cold of minus 68 degrees and darkness. The sun set last month and won't rise until late September.

On Tuesday, the red-and-white plane with its stubby black wings and skis for landing gear touched down safely on the ice at Amundsen- Scott. In the hours beforehand, the 50 scientists scrambled to lay out the welcome mat.

On a barren landscape where only an occasional moonbeam casts a feeble light, scientists turned out to clear the runway of snow and blowing debris, packing down the ice. In temperatures that dipped to 80 degrees below zero, they rolled out barrels of trash and set them alight a jury-rigged landing guide in the dark polar night.

''People were out there loading the barrels and lighting the debris in minus 140 wind chill,'' said Shemenski, moved by the support.

For the pilots in the Twin Otter, it was like finding a small spark of light on a vast and shadowy plain sheathed in faintly shimmering ice.

Living in one of the most desolate spots in the world, Shemenski said he found friends and human warmth at the Pole ties that were hard to leave behind.

''I hoped for a winter season down there. We had just become family down there and we were barely two months into our long winter,'' he said.

After reaching the pole Tuesday, the plane was warmed by heaters blowing all night to keep fuel from freezing. Then it made the eight- hour dash Wednesday to Rothera, a British base on the Antarctic peninsula, across the water from Chile, before Thursday's last leg.

The pilots said the ride was surprisingly smooth. But it was long: 4,446 miles from Punta Arenas, Chile, to the South Pole and back.

Sean Loutitt said he and co-pilot Mark Cary and flight engineer Norm Wong encountered no problems aside from extreme cold.

''The weather was the biggest concern,'' he said, adding they anxiously checked at least four separate forecasts simultaneously. ''We took our time. We had our limits, and we waited for the best forecast to depart.''

Shemenski has worked in Johnston Island in the South Pacific and Kodiak in Alaska, making friends far and wide.

At the Pole, he received an outpouring of e-mail messages from many friends and acquaintances, some unheard from in years. ''I've been traveling for nine years, so I have friends all over. I heard from most of them,'' he said.

Shemenski, who is from Ohio, planned to fly back to the United States on Friday or Saturday for a checkup and probable surgery. And he hopes he'll be well enough to go to the Pole again. ''If I get this medical condition taken care of, I'm hoping to go back next winter.''

Tom Yelvington, general manager of Colorado-based Raytheon Polar Services, which organized the airlift, said he would love to see Shemenski get his ailment behind him and be back on call as the South Pole's lone doctor.

Said Yelvington, ''He wants to go, and we want to have him.''

On the Net:

Raytheon Polar Services: http://www.polar.org

National Science Foundation: http://www.nsf.gov

-- Anonymous, April 27, 2001