Week 18 at the Pole

The South Pole Telescope with some auroras low in the sky and the Milky Way visible overhead.
Aman Chokshi, SPT/NSF

Finally more stars and auroras can be observed at the South Pole as the sky continues to get darker and darker. With hardly any wind last week, which makes it more comfortable to be outdoors, IceCube’s winterovers enjoyed some time just staring up at the sky. Getting a good view of the Milky Way has been difficult lately due to some persistent cloud cover, but a fellow winterover captured it over the South Pole Telescope, above. In station news, they held a belated celebration of Cinco de Mayo (on Siete de Mayo, for the weekend), did some emergency response team training, and enjoyed the popular French galettes and crepes that were on offer during community cooking, thanks to IceCube winterover Celas.