tiabunna's photos

Young male elephant seals (Mirounga leonina) spend their days either sleeping or practicing fighting (done by bashing together, as was happening here till I interrupted). Fighting skills will become important later in life, when they try to attain "Beachmaster" status. From an old Kodachrome slide taken with a Minolta SR1 and Auto Rokkor 1.4 58mm lens..

The hut on the small hill was the auroral observatory. Snow showers have left a covering on Mt Tulloch. in the distance. The ANARE station is to the right of this photo. From a Kodachrome slide.

Scanned from an old slide taken inside the fibreglass dome, hence the red cast. The old WW2-vintage radar we removed had automatic target tracking: this new one was fully manual. That's progress! But the WF2 could follow the weather balloons for about two hundred kilometers. On a windy day at Macquarie Island, the balloons often did not rise more than ten degrees above the horizon before disappearing in the distance, even though they climbed at about 300 metres/minute ...

"Rachel" was the name given to the ancient (WW2 vintage) AA3 Mk VII anti-aircraft radar that had been used to track weather balloons at Macquarie Island since (I think) 1953. She lived in a small hut, to give some weather protection, with a radome above. One of our first tasks was to dismantle the hut and decommission her, to be replaced with a new WF2 radar.

Our new WF2 balloon tracking radar in its red radome shows up well in this photo, taken about February in 1968. The "Nella Dan" was stranded on the rocks adjacent to the radar in December 1987 and scuttled offshore on Christmas Eve of that year. You can find some excellent photos of the stranding by entering "Nella Dan Macquarie Island" in the Flickr search box.

Taken during the annual changeover of expeditions. Looking across the main part of the station down the isthmus toward the main part of the island. In the foreground, the surgery is being extended, while in the distance on the left, a DUKW is unloading meteorological stores.

Looking past the radio shack (yellow) and meteorology office area, with some of the many aerial masts. In those days Macquarie was not a Tasmanian National Park, so that's smoke from burning rubbish in the distance. No fires allowed now! The weather here is more typical than in most of my photos.

Taken during changeover of annual expedition parties, looking past the Nissen Huts used for storage and down the isthmus past the radio and meteorology offices, with the main part of the island beyond.

Taken during station changeover (see DUKW unloading in background), December 1967. Elephant seals in the foreground.