{"id":22,"date":"2015-08-03T01:42:55","date_gmt":"2015-08-03T01:42:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/?p=22"},"modified":"2015-08-03T01:42:55","modified_gmt":"2015-08-03T01:42:55","slug":"emotional-roller-coaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/2015\/08\/03\/emotional-roller-coaster\/","title":{"rendered":"Emotional roller coaster"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before my flight left for Anchorage yesterday, I got the good news that our equipment had arrived safely in Deadhorse.\u00a0 Additionally, although Will had one missed connection on the way up, the team appeared to be making good progress in their travels.\u00a0 I even saw a giant moose in the bog right next to one of Anchorage\u2019s runways as we made our final approach.\u00a0 Things seemed to be in good shape.<\/p>\n

\"Almost<\/a>

Almost there!<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Snow<\/a>

Snow capped peaks on the approach to Anchorage.<\/p><\/div>\n

My mood was changed quickly right after landing in Anchorage however.\u00a0 As usual, I turned on my phone, and it gave new meaning to the words \u201cblew up\u201d.\u00a0 Emails, text messages, missed phone calls \u2014 this can\u2019t be good.\u00a0 Sure enough, many of those messages were to tell me that the one road between Deadhorse and Oliktok Point had been closed due to a partial collapse that occurred while the oil companies were moving heavy equipment.\u00a0 There\u2019s never a dull moment when it comes to the North Slope of Alaska.\u00a0 Based on a variety of reports, this road block could take anywhere from 12-48 hours to repair.\u00a0 This news presented a somewhat serious dilemma \u2014 Deadhorse is not exactly a metropolis filled with lodging options, and when something goes wrong, those options narrow pretty quickly.\u00a0 The decision we were faced with was to either change our flight and stay in Anchorage until the road was reopened, or roll the dice, stick with our original itinerary and figure it out once we got there.\u00a0 The first option being safer, but substantially more expensive \u2014 lodging in Anchorage in the summer runs between $250-300 per night, per room, not to mention the airline change fees \u2014\u00a0 and the second option being riskier, but having the potential to really pay off if we could somehow get past the roadblock and up to Oliktok on schedule.<\/p>\n

After thinking things over at dinner with Nathan and Dale (Will was still on his way up), discussing things over the phone with Al Bendure from Sandia, who was already in Deadhorse and keeping a pulse on things up there, and calling around to a variety of lodging options, we decided to accept the risk of heading up to Deadhorse this morning.\u00a0 It sounds as though, if necessary, we\u2019ll be able to at least get some people past the roadblock, so the lodging issue becomes less of a concern.\u00a0 Also, several of the places I called gave me as some hope, although admittedly statements such as \u201cwe should probably have a room or two but I can\u2019t confirm until tomorrow\u201d and \u201cwe almost always have at least some bunk space available\u201d aren\u2019t completely reassuring\u2026\u00a0 My gut tells me that we\u2019ll be able to get our team to Oliktok today, although it\u2019s certainly been wrong before.\u00a0 As I type this on the flight up to Deadhorse, some doubts creep in, but ultimately I think we\u2019ll be just fine.\u00a0 Stay tuned!<\/p>\n

\"Sunset<\/a>

Sunset over downtown Anchorage.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before my flight left for Anchorage yesterday, I got the good news that our equipment had arrived safely in Deadhorse.\u00a0 Additionally, although Will had one missed connection on the way up, the team appeared to be making good progress in their travels.\u00a0 I even saw a giant moose in the bog right next to one… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-20 12:51:31","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22\/revisions\/27"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/erasmus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}