THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, August 22, 1995 TAG: 9508220288
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHARLENE CASON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ST. JOHN'S, NEWFOUNDLAND LENGTH: Long : 211 lines
If the Titanic hadn't sunk in 1912, taking more than half its passengers and crew, Andy Hampton probably wouldn't be married to his Canadian wife, Darlene, today.
And Preston Simmons wouldn't be making himself at home in a Canadian hotel, serving wake-up coffee to his co-workers.
The two have been to these refrigerated reaches of the North Atlantic so often they can practically predict where they'll find their targets.
They're looking for blocks of ice, up to a mile long and 500 feet high. And that's just the part that sticks up out of the water. No one can see the other nine-tenths of iceberg targets unless they use sophisticated radar, something like Superman's X-ray vision.
The two Coast Guard petty officers are part of the International Ice Patrol, iceberg police that formed 81 years ago shortly after the Titanic tragedy. Nearly 20 countries contribute money to the United States, which was elected early on to safeguard the Great Circle Route between Europe and North America from other icy disasters.
For most of their military careers, Hampton, 40, and Simmons, 39, have been radar operators on the C-130H (Hercules) planes that are used to track and map icebergs. They are stationed at the Elizabeth City Coast Guard Air Station, the only U.S. base assigned to fly nine-day-long missions twice a month from January to August.
The 11-member crew flies to St. John's, Newfoundland, stopping along the way for ``ice picks'': oceanographers and marine science technicians from the Coast Guard Research and Development Center in Groton, Conn.
When the crew is on patrol, they fly six- to eight-hour daily reconnaissance detachments, mapping an area the size of Pennsylvania every day. The mapping is done mostly by staring into aging radar screens in a darkened plane cabin.
``Yeah, we're still in the Ice Age in some ways,'' says Hampton, a tall, auburn-haired, bear of a man whom the crew alternately refers to as ``the crazy redhead'' or Binky. Hampton reminds the crew of a zoo bear that some of them met when they were stationed together in Alaska.
Eighteen years ago he met Darlene, when she was a desk clerk at the same hotel where he still stays on ice patrol trips out of Newfoundland. To Hampton, she was a good enough reason to volunteer for more trips; they were married 17 years ago.
Every iceberg, just like every snowflake, is different,'' Hampton says. ``I may see a shadow or a mist coming off the berg, but a boat has a wake that shows up. Icebergs can look like a round blob or a square or be boat-shaped.
``I've identified targets as ships when they were icebergs and vice versa. It's all just an educated guess. But, if I'm in doubt, I usually say it's an iceberg, just to be on the safe side.''
Hampton makes his educated guesses with SLAR, side-looking airborne radar. It's the analog radar system that's been used for tracking icebergs and vessels for 20 years.
The Coast Guard is testing a new digital radar system that will track targets quicker and more efficiently. Still, the current system is better than the old days, Simmons said, when ice observers sat on boxes in the cockpit and charted bergs with binoculars and a clipboard.
Ice patrols routinely fly ``ladder patrols,'' six legs of about 350 miles each that extend east of Newfoundland into the Atlantic. Like the rungs on a ladder, the patrols work their way north into the Labrador Sea.
Correctly identifying targets is only one of the pressures of flying on ice patrols. Anything can go wrong when a crew flies as often as this one does.
The radar can quit. Turbines pumping pressurized air into the cabin can lock up, sending the crew into an orbit of popping ears, dry mouths and dizzying headaches. Turbulence is sometimes so bad that staring into a radar screen is more like watching the bouncing ball on an old-fashioned sing-along.
Poor visibility regularly makes landing a throw of the dice. Ninety-knot winds can keep the patrol from even flying to Greenland, one of its stopovers in the Arctic Circle.
Usually, if it's just a matter of rain, clouds, cold or thunder in St. John's, the patrol goes. But winters are historically harsh on the island of red rock cliffs and pointed fir trees. Dense fog is what causes problems to fishermen and fliers alike.
``In the old days, when we charted icebergs visually, fog was the biggest influence on whether or not we went out on patrol,'' Simmons says. ``It wasn't uncommon to go to the airport every day for 21 days and never fly once.''
Says second class Petty Officer Tommy Cascio, another sensor operator, ``Everyone who works on the ice patrol is a volunteer.''
He joined the patrol about eight years ago. Since then, he's met and married Newfoundlander Paula Winter and made more than 50 trips to the North Atlantic.
``The days are hectic, long, but every day is different,'' says Cascio, a dark, quiet man who loves to talk about his children, Winter and Lucas. ``It keeps you on your toes.''
``But it's not boring,'' says Simmons, his blue eyes showing stress. ``Try looking at a radar screen six to eight hours a day. It's tiring, and it takes a lot of concentration.''
Whether the crew flies or not, it always ends up back at the Airport Plaza Inn, an enforced home away from home. On most ice patrol trips, the crew falls into a routine: Fly all day, talk all afternoon, eat all evening.
It's not unusual for most of them to head straight to Earhart's, the hotel bar, as soon as they hit the doors. They pile their flight jackets and bags against a wall and plop down on padded bar stools. Linda the barmaid knows exactly who drinks what.
Simmons helps her out; sometimes he answers the phone or takes a drink to one of the hotel's permanent residents, an old gentleman sitting off to the side in a wheelchair. The next morning, Simmons will be the first Coast Guardsman in the restaurant for coffee, priding himself on being the earliest riser, helping the day staff serve coffee and hot tea.
``Sure, I make myself at home,'' he says with a smile. Simmons almost always grins, so no one is ever sure if he's serious or kidding. ``This is my home six months out of the year. It gets real old real quick. I have to make the best of it.''
Talk in the bar centers on the mission, always the mission. Where will they get the part they need to fix the turbine? How did the new radar work out? Is the storm front going to keep them from going into Thule, Greenland, tomorrow? Do they need to shift the cargo around?
Eventually the talk turns to dinner. Most of the crew have made so many trips to St. John's, they know where all the best restaurants are in the city that boasts it has the world's friendliest people. St. John's, with a population of 160,000, is the capital and largest city on the island of Newfoundland which, along with Labrador, makes up Newfoundland Province. Once a fishing town, it relies more and more on tourism as its big money-maker.
But there are still those hole-in-the wall places that tourists know little about. One of the ice patrol's favorites is a little Chinese restaurant, so tiny that when the waitress asks a group of six, ``Smoking or nonsmoking?'' Chief Warrant Officer Bob Vessey laughs, ``Does it really matter?''
Members of the ice patrol go to bed early, get up early, start the whole routine again and again. Pack for overnight, because they never know where they'll land at day's end. Eat a good breakfast at the motel; stop at a supermarket for ``flight food'' to last until late afternoon; ride to the airport five miles away in rental vans.
Check the weather. File a flight plan. Go over every inch of the plane, even though they just did it when they landed 16 hours ago. Take a hundredth look at the radar equipment. Hope they can fly today. Hope they see some icebergs today.
Ice observers Carol Channel and Elisa Fusco want to see icebergs. But they'll settle for growlers - bergs the size of a grand piano, weighing up to 500 tons, that don't usually show up on radar - or bergey bits, chunks of ice the size of a small house.
The two women settle on their perches before the plane takes off. For the next six or seven hours they won't move from seats focused on the plane's only windows, located on either side, near the front. Eyes sharp, they concentrate on the glass.
Flying at 6,000 to 8,000 feet, they know they probably won't see anything. But their job is to stay put. There's always a chance there will be a break in the clouds; then they can visually measure some of the dozens of icebergs the radar picks up every day.
Channel says spotting icebergs with binoculars means a pretty accurate estimate of their size and the distance between them. Visual spotting enhances the daily radar reports that are sent by computer and fax back to the Groton headquarters.
The Coast Guard center issues maritime bulletins every 12 hours, charting icebergs within the area called ``the limits of all known ice.''
Channel says she doesn't mind flying at high altitude and waiting for the parting of the clouds.
``The weather doesn't stay away because you have a mission,'' says the 32-year-old marine science technician with unruly brown hair that she constantly pushes away from her face. ``If there's poor visibility, you don't want to be down there at 200 feet. The bergs can be 500 feet high.''
If the weather's good, pilots Lt. Bill Thompson and Lt. Gerry Dolan will fly at low altitude, maybe 200 feet. When the C-130 gets in close to the white mountains of ice, most of the crew - even those who have done ice patrols for years - crowds into the cockpit and around the two small side windows to take photographs or make videos.
There are ``ooohs'' and ``aaahs'' and ``Omigod, would you look at that!'' It appears that the thrill of the chase and the magnificence of the catch never wears off for some of the crew.
But Hampton and Simmons stay in front of their radar screens. They've seen it all a thousand times.
``Back before the SLAR, we routinely flew at 200 feet,'' says Hampton. ``Once we broke through the clouds at about 200 feet and a 300-foot iceberg was sticking right up there. The pilot banked sharply, and that's when I quit looking out the windows, back in the '70s.''
Occasionally the pilots not only circle bergs at low altitude, they open up the rear cargo area of the plane. Anyone who's brave enough to strap on a harness and clip it to bolts in the floor can get a sea gull's eye view of the ice. Close enough to feel the frigid air surrounding it. Close enough to smell the crispness of the world's purest frozen water.
For Hampton, who's retiring in about six months, the patrols he started doing nearly 20 years ago are coming to an end. He's ready. Ready to retire to Florida with his ``Newfie'' wife, who became a sun lover the minute she discovered the South. Ready to take the kids camping.
``My wife's great. She's put up with a lot, over the years, with me going on these trips,'' said a weary ``Binky'' when the ice patrol's last trip of the season was finally completed the first week in August.
``It'll be good to get home.'' MEMO: Related story on page A4.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by DREW C. WILSON, Staff
Members of the International Ice Patrol look out the back of a
C-130H as it makes a low pass over an iceberg in the North
Atlantic.
The U.S. Coast Guard crew waits by their C-130H tracking plane in
Greenwood, Nova Scotia, for the Canadian Air Force to deliver a part
to repair a small turbine.
Photos by DREW C. WILSON, Staff
Andy Hampton, a Coast Guard petty officer, rests on the luggage in
the back of the plane on a trip home to Elizabeth City after seven
days of searching for icebergs in the North Atlantic. He met his
wife, Darlene, on one of his early trips to Newfoundland 18 years
ago.
Preston Simmons, a Coast Guard petty officer, and Steve Martin, a
Navy oceanographer, examine images from the side-looking airborne
radar, an analog radar system that's been used for tracking icebergs
and vessels for 20 years.
Map
KEYWORDS: U.S. COAST GUARD ICEBERG by CNB