Free Blazing Ice by John H. Wright

traced its long course, and marked it with a line of black flags.
    â€œThis thing’s just a minnow,” I laughed. “We might as well throw it back in.”
    We named it “Baby,” and that was good enough for now. Then we headed back to in McMurdo to get our PistenBully into the shop, showers for ourselves, and a home-cooked meal. Sunday we’d have another go at it.
    But they wouldn’t all be like Baby. And we didn’t know where they were. If we had some way of looking through all that snow, from up in the air… . If we could map the whole field of crevasses laid out all at once… .
    A wretched blow of foul, horizontal weather pinned us down for two days after we returned to camp. When it blew itself out, a clear line of seven green flags, spaced every three hundred feet, led out from GAW and stopped at the black flags marking Baby. We were safe to that point. Beyond the black flags lay the white sameness.
    Tiptoeing into it, one hundred feet past Baby, the radar found the second crevasse. It lay just south of our road. This time we brought up the drilling and blasting supplies.
    Shaun and Eric rigged ropes and belays. I dragged a pair of wood planks over what we thought was the bridge. If I fell through, the ropes might save me. But I tested the boards, and the snow bridge did not collapse.
    I brought the Jiffy drill back over the boards. Its power head was a two-stroke gasoline engine weighing twenty pounds. It took both hands to run it. The drill chucked five-inch-diameter steel auger bits, each one three feet long and five pounds. I drilled one bit section down, added another, and then drilled down some more.
    At twelve feet deep, my hole had found no void. I lifted the whole string a couple of feet, and then slammed it all back down. It landed on firm bottom. Drilling farther, at fourteen feet the hole broke through, I lurched forward, and fell off of the timbers.
    â€œThere she is.” I regained my footing and withdrew the drill string.
    Four more holes made the five-spot pattern. The first hole made the middle spot, like on a dice, and one more in each corner, five feet to a side. Russ volunteered to drill them, but I needed to see how it went. The whole business was awkward. Ropes in the way. Balancing on the boards.
    After drilling, it was time for blasting. I talked through the next moves while all of us squatted on the snow. “We drilled five-inch holes because we brought out three-inch dynamite. Next time we’ll use the inch-and-a-quarter dynamite and drill two-inch holes with the little power head. Now, this is this end of the stick; this is the other end. The ends are different. This is how you punch holes in the stick, and this is how you lace it with detonating cord …”
    Each one helped assemble the charges, then I carried them back over the boards and lowered them into the holes. We pulled back all our gear to the firing line. I walked one end of the wire from a blasting reel back to the loaded holes. The electric blasting cap I carried was no bigger than a short nub of pencil, and it had two thin wires wrapped around it.
    â€œNothing with these explosives is particularly dangerous until I connect this blasting cap with those charges. Each of you will be handling dynamite and detonating cord. Nobody but me handles the blasting cap.”
    After fixing the cap to the detonating cord and connecting the wires, I smiled: “Now let’s see how this will work.”
    Back at the reel, the other end of the blasting wire connected to two brass lugs on a wooden box. The box had a T-shaped handle. Lifting the handle pulled up a toothed metal rod through the box. I explained to Shaun, while demonstrating: “Stand like this, grab the handle like so, and when you hear me say ‘Fire in the hole,’ push the handle down. Hard. Don’t be shy about it.”
    Taking one more look around the place, I started the count: “Blasting in five