New Year Bash at 48 below and zero visibility, up in the north pole

I was really upset about my company screwing my new year plans. New year eve party has always been the best and most awaited party in the year. And every year like every other person who follows the Gregorian or rather the English calendar, i like spending with my friends or relatives, partying till mid night, dancing and getting drunk. This year, i was in Alaska and accordingly i had made plans with some of my friends to go to a ski resort and making sure that the entry to the new decade is the best till now in my life. Everything was planned and finalized until my manager called me a week earlier and asked me to go to a site in Prudhoe Bay.
















Prudhoe Bay during Summer

Prudhoe Bay is in the artic circle, and the site where i am posted right now is no where near to any human civilization. We got a few camps here wherein employees working for the Oil companies stay and works in a rotation of 2 weeks on and off. For all the people working here, new year or Christmas was just another working day. Getting to this place involved a lot of formalities and clearance from the concerned oil companies and the US govt. And to add to my agony, alcohol is strictly prohibited in this area throughout the year. On 31st night, while all my friends and relatives were partying and enjoying, i slept off at 8.30pm being upset with my boss, without knowing about the adventure that's waiting next day morning.

The camp i am staying is around 10miles from the facility where i am working on. The weather at this time of the year might get really extreme. In the artic, its always dark during this time and wind blows at times at a speed of 35mph all the way to Russia from Canada and vice versa. Here i am talking about a temperature span of -20 to -40 DEG C and a wind chill which might vary very well around -54 DEG. Frost bite and hypothermia are common here. When the visibility is low and too much of wind, security designates the driving condition as phase 2 and when it gets even worse and no visibility, its called phase 3 weather condition. During phase 3, driving is prohibited unless its convoyed by a Ice removing buldozer at front and a Security van at the back of a bus.

Ice Moving Bulldozer being followed by the Passenger Bus while convoying

As i woke up on 01-01-2010, i tried to make my mood better reminding myself that i don't want to be in this mood for the rest of the year. Since my Indian license is not valid in this part of the world where driving is way different, i use to take lift from anybody traveling to the facility i am working on. Today i took a lift from Jim, who is around 55 years old and works for ABB. Even though he wear specs i didn't doubted his eye's sight as i didn't find any reason so far in my life that i need to make sure abt eye-sight while talking lift. We went out and felt the wind, which was like no other i have ever felt. I felt as if it would rip me apart unless im inside the vehicle quickly. I hope there should be a different terminology or state when the temperature is well below -30. But i didn't had to worry, coz i was traveling with Jim who is as much experienced in Prudhoe Bay, as my age. We cleared the windows and jumped into his pick-up and moved.



Following the security vehicle just before reaching the facility
I didn't know that this weather condition is what is called phase 3 as i never had any experience with phase 2 itself. The visibility was next to zero. I started taking pics to show it to my friends while pointing at lights. Then suddenly when Jim stopped the car and said he's not able to drive any further and he hasn't seen something like that before, it freaked me out. We had covered around half a mile from our camp, there's an army of pickups at our back, counting on us, and suddenly its phase 3, and the narrow road doesn't have enough space so that we coould pull over our vehicle- its something which Jim declared- we're in a BIG MESS. To add to my fear, Jim declared that his eye sight was really poor and started rubbing his eyes. Looking at the nervous face on the old man's, i felt really sorry and insisted to let me drive. But Jim being a strict disciplinarian, he didn't allow.
Jim pulled the radio out but to make the new decade even more interesting, he's radio was out of battery. Here cellphone doesn't work at all the places apart from our camps. I could see a big army of vehicles at our back and we were at the lead- a guy with poor eyesight and an Indian who is not permitted to drive. You should be able to drive with proper guess work and should be able to forecast where a turn might be in or a bend. And if you are even 2inch more off the road, you'll end up in the tundra. Getting out of tundra is not possible in the best weather and needs to be towed and when you are in phase 3, nobody can come for rescue. The cars at our back won't overtake coz its not allowed and its risky.
I rememeber three things very well- first i prayed my gods end number of times, second i wished if there were those bad (or rather audacious) drivers of kolkatta and delhi who doesn't think twice while overtaking and wished somebody overtakes and leads the way. Third, we both were shoutiing at the top of our voice to each other if we were too much on the left or too much on the right. Couple of times, Jim had put on the brakes right at the edge of the road.
It had been well over an hour of driving at a speed not more than 10mph and stopped end number of times. Here i am talking about a wind which makes the visibility such that you can see a max of 10ft and barely can you see the edges of the car and ground besides the car so that you can tell if you are still NOT in the tundra. I made an attempt to get out of the car and ask the people at the back to lead the way, but nobody wanted to take the responsibility. It also made sense in a way that the road was too narrow even for a single big vehicle.
We had covered around 7miles and 3miles were still to go. And these 3 miles were even worst as it involved three turns. One wrong turn will lead to tundra and it might be days before help arrives or maybe the search party finds our bodies if at all we are not beneath a pile of snow. Suddenly Jim put the music on and we started singing Johny Cash. I was convinced that my boss made my new year the most memorable one. I started enjoying the thrill coz we were just 3miles away from help and we were leading the way to so many cars.
Thirty minutes later, we managed to reach a facility where a security truck was waiting for rescue. We pulled over and then we followed it rest of the way.

And now, we are waiting for the security convoy and bus to take us back to our camp. Here at the facility we have enough food for a night, but we are not sure how much time will the convoy take to come and if not to take us back, at least if they get some food for us. Nahhhhhh, but i am sure we'll come out real good, coz there hasn't been a single incident up here where so many employees didn't make it at the same time. But yes, at times they had to stay for nights together. But we already managed to cross the toughest part in the morning which makes me feel that this year will be a really good one as i had been so lucky and moreover was able to lead so many people.