Hannah got the opportunity in early January to travel to Chile as part of a National Science Foundation research project that focused on monitoring an active volcano, Cordon Caulle. This volcano was formed in 2011 when an eruption triggered by fault activity in the Pacific Ocean, caused a lava chamber to erupt, forming the new volcano. This project focused on understanding why and how Cordon Caulle formed, and Hannah, along with her friend and lab mate Faith, were tasked with flying a drone carrying a magnetometer over the volcano. This highly accurate device measures magnetic fields, and allows researchers to determine how active a volcano’s magma chamber is. Hannah and Faith traveled as part of a group of 18 other scientists and students to Cordon Caulle, and camped on the remote volcano for over three weeks. This picture shows their gear set up as they get ready to travel to Chile!
Successfully carrying out these flights required laying out detailed flight areas throughout the area of both Cordon Caulle itself, and the larger magma chamber, which included flights over this lava flow that formed in 2011 during the eruption. The lava is over forty feet high and highly treacherous, and during last year’s missions, a drone went down by crashing into the lava flow, so they were extra careful in making these flights.
A view of the Andes out the window during the flight from Santiago to Puerto Montt!
Flying from Reno to Puerto Montt, Chile, took 15 hours and three different flights, and they flew with the drone and all the equipment. Flying with lots of technical equipment meant that they were stopped at many points along the way to be questioned by security, but they made it through safe and sound and were ready to rest and check into their hotel.
Getting the drone set up and working out some technical issues in the hotel before getting ready to travel to Cordon Caulle. The magnetometer hangs on a long cable below the drone and is a very delicate piece of equipment, so this took some getting used to!
It wasn’t all work and no play though! Before traveling to the volcano itself, they stayed with the rest of the group in Puyehue National Park and got to enjoy beautiful hikes, delicious food, and swimming. Coming from winter in Reno to full summer in Chile was absolutely lovely, and they took full advantage of all the beautiful national park had to offer.
Hannah and Faith are ready and raring to go! This morning they traveled to an open field below the volcano to wait for the helicopter that would take the team to Cordon Caulle. You can hike, but with all the gear and equipment that the entire team was taking, a helicopter made more sense. In total, it took ten flights to get the entire crew to the base camp that they would set up together.
Hannah enjoying her first helicopter ride ever! It was a short one, only eight minutes, but it was amazing to see the landscape give way from lush vegetation to the harsh, ash and lava world of the volcano.
Home sweet home! In an area that looked a lot like the moon landing, the team set up their tents and settled in for 18 days of work and fun together.
Always ready to jump into action, Hannah and Faith were put in charge of digging the latrines for the camp - pretty important job, even if it was a little bit crappy!
The drone ready to fly!
A rainy day on Cordon Caulle! The team included people from Chile, Germany, France, Canada, and the US and it was so amazing to get to meet so many people from all over the world. The team shared amazing nights around the campfire, played a million games of UNO together, and taught lots of dirty jokes in about ten different languages before the trip was through. In this picture, a huge rainstorm made cooking outside difficult, so (from right to left) Faith, Simon, Hannah and trip leader Phillip made a makeshift shelter and cooked a pasta dinner for the team.
Another field meal! Hannah and Faith were joined by Andi from Cornell University in drone flying, and the trio had so much fun together. Here Faith and Andi are using the drone cases to make tuna burritos with beans and bell peppers, a meal that they ate pretty much everyday for lunch, so Hannah is pretty sick of tuna for awhile!
Hannah launching the drone, carefully holding the magnetometer so that it doesn’t drag along the ground as the drone takes off.
What an amazing place to get to work in - waking up everyday to Cordon Caulle steaming to the south, the mighty Andes to the west, Puyehue volcano to the north and the giant lava flow to the east. It doesn’t get much better than that!
The team takes a mid-day nap while waiting for batteries to recharge at the base of Cordon Caulle.
Hannah and Faith have been on lots of adventures together from wrangling desert tortoises together to flying over volcanoes, and they always have a blast, Hannah could not have asked for a better adventure buddy and friend!
The night skies at Cordon Caulle were world class. Very little light pollution and Southern Hemisphere stars combined to make this a magical experience and a chance to see the Southern Cross for the first time was one of Hannah’s favorite parts of the trip.
Cordon Caulle is still a very active volcano, and the steam rising off of it was an amazing sight. The team also used it for all kinds of purposes, since just sitting on the ground would warm you right up. The amazing cooks for the group, Matthias and Simon, even cooked meat in the thermal features, burying chicken and beef in the ground and digging it out hours later, a perfectly slow cooked feast!
Hannah off on another adventure!
Inside the biggest tent, the team organized gear and fun activities. On this rainy day, the laptop in the middle of the tent was put on top of a battery and used to play multiple movies for the whole group, even though you could barely hear it over the sound of the rain. The group enjoyed watching 21 Jump Street and Live Die Repeat together, a truly one of a kind movie experience!
Playing cards was also a huge hit, and resulted in much hilarity, with UNO and Boondoggle, or Golf, as particular favorite games.
Hannah also had amazing privilege of celebrating her 24th birthday on Cordon Caulle. The team put together a “cake” made out of Twinkies and Ho-Hos, and added a question mark birthday candle to top it off, singing the Chilean version of Happy Birthday and passing around a liquor produced in Chile, pisco sours. What a way to celebrate a birthday!
After an amazing trip, the team packed up and flew back to Puerto Montt together, having enjoyed a once in a lifetime experience.
Hannah and Faith celebrating with a huge seafood dinner in Puerto Montt after a successful trip of data gathering and scientific work.
And like any good trip, this one ended with lots of laundry hung outside of Hannah’s house to shake out all of the volcanic ash. This was an amazing experience, and one that Hannah will truly never forget.