Where heroic hammers quiver and even the most stoic sleeping bags shiver

24/04/2025

Conservation carpenter Dale Perrin brings to life the inanimate tools and supplies his field team depended on at Blaiklock Island Refuge in Antarctica.

When preparing for an expedition in Antarctica, the age-old saying “fail to plan, plan to fail” becomes a stark, enduring reality. In the months preceding such an adventure, much time and energy is spent on the most mundane but also the most magnificent of tasks. An awareness and understanding of human fragility emerge alongside a new appreciation for the inanimate objects you choose to take with you. 

Before we arrive, before the icy winds claim our frozen breath, let’s step into the world of the silent companions that join us on our adventure, providing safety and success. Not only for our modern expeditions but for the many decades of exploration that have come before us.

Planning their work before leaving Punta Arenas, Chile (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

Keys clatter into action, letters fuse into words, words combine into sentences, sentences into paragraphs and paragraphs part, allowing some breathing space. Contracts are diligently drafted, sent with a swoosh and rapidly received in all corners of the world. The team assembles. Antarctica awaits.  

An elegant, proud, wise silhouette stands to attention, soaring above the crisp white and black text below, quivering with excitement as to what the next move represents, we have been here before, old friend, the pen whispers to the paper. As ink flows, swirling into action, a signature forms, setting into motion the next eight months of careful consideration, precise planning and diligent dialogue.  

Dale studies the plans (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

Spreadsheets swing into a steady hum of sums, quantities and queries. Lists flow, spilling like rivers ready to burst their banks. Credit cards groan as receipts coalesce into chaotic stacks. From the depths of forgotten archives, historic photographs, records, and diary entries resurface, longing once more for the light of day. Stories lost to the passage of time, no less important than the krill that support all life in the southern seas. From which we guide our knowledge, decisions and philosophy.  

From the shadowy depths of the storage container, proud, mighty toolboxes emerge, warming at the call of adventure. The hammer whispers to the nail bar, trying not to wake the others, “It's our time to shine.”

Dale at work at Blaiklock (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

However, the handsaw’s teeth begin to chatter uncontrollably with excitement, stirring the crew to life. With the realisation that the long, wandering winter is over, the toolbox erupts, just as a humpback breaches the waves, impossible to ignore. 

“Sharpen your edges, hone your angles and warm your grips,” the tape measure announces from the upper shelf, stretching its own blade.  

Dale's trusty tape measure in action at Blaiklock (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

One by one, materials arrive, chauffeured by white vans, into the vast warehouse hall. A great echoing expanse, stretching as far as the eye can see, shelves rising from the polished concrete floor, like Icebergs rising from the mirrored surface of a calm sea. 

Each item greets another, awaiting its future assignment. Lengths of the highest quality timber lay calmly next to one another, at peace with their strength and resilience in any circumstance. A jiggling box, thousands of nails, jubilant at the prospect of new horizons, clambering over one another, eager to be the first to serve. In the corner, rolls of bitumen roofing felt huddle like penguins against a harsh winter’s day, shifting in an orderly rotation – waiting for the moment one of them must step forward.  

Stacked with military precision, the operational and emergency equipment stand to attention. Sleeping bags at the ready, ration packs – savoury servants to all, impenetrable tents eager to protect. All peer down from their high perch, upon the disorderly, quite ordinary tools, murmuring amongst themselves. 

Separate from the crowd, in a crate of its own, a first-class cabin, for the most vital package of all: the burly, well-built first aid kit glows in honour, ready in an instant to parachute into action. 

The carpenters at work at Blaiklock (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

All await their mission brief, the final call to join forces, combine skills and provide comfort, warmth and support to their human counterparts, who could not operate without them. In their quality and ability, they rely on each other. One without the other would not suffice.  

This is building conservation like no other. To venture to a place where heroic hammers quiver and even the most stoic sleeping bags shiver. Preparation is second to none, for we may have… nowhere to run.

Job done (UKAHT/Michael Duff)

Dale Perrin, Conservation Carpenter