Our Abode: A Research Centre

 What do the words “research station” conjure? Perhaps cheap, grooved wall-panelling? Perhaps a cafeteria table surrounded by a few 40-something year-old men with grizzly beards wearing lumber jack shirts and eating spam? When I knew I was going to be at a research station in Churchill, Manitoba I looked forward to this and to a built-in desk under a window in a bedroom appropriate for a monk.

I think it might be best to describe the Churchill Northern Studies Centre building by starting at its front door on a cold February afternoon. Its welcome matt is a grating under foot to scrap off snow. Surely that’s not remarkable, except that there is nothing under the grating for several feet.  Human fertiliser also drops down the composting toilets’ waste pipe to the basement level. But I’m getting ahead of myself. (Oops -- was that a pun?)

Churchill Northern Studies Centre's Welcome Mat

Stepping through the set of double entrance doors one becomes enveloped in the sweet light floating through the atrium. There's a gift shop to one side, where one can rent artic outerwear. The canteen is on the other side.  

Ground floor of CNSC. Canteen on left and gift shop on right. 

Canteen. Yes, the windows and walls are slanted. 

In the photo of the canteen did you notice the sloping walls? The angled windows? The angle optimises the amount of light entering the building as the sun travels higher and lower in the sky according to the seasons. Sure, the canteen's food is delivered cafeteria-style but it doesn’t taste it. Moist chicken drum sticks, salads with chickpeas, crunchy broccoli with dried cranberries, desserts that demand to be taken as second helpings. This night owl was enticed out of bed to make it in time for an 8 AM breakfast because the pancakes were so unexpectedly tasty and the bacon so perfectly cooked.  A highlight was the pasta dish with pesto made from greens grown in the research station's greenhouse and nourished with the aforementioned fertiliser. This space-station-style reliance on local resources was inspired by the closing of the rail line for a few years.  The research station shares some of their "Rocket Greens"  with the town’s restaurants and supermarket.

Wait, I didn’t tell you that the research centre is located at what was once a U.S. army rocket range, built in the 1950s in collaboration with Canada.  

View of the rocket range from the canteen. 

In a future post I’ll show the buildings and structures that launched sounding rockets into the upper atmosphere. One guide said the Americans wanted to study how the Soviets manipulated the aurora. Well, there does exist the notion of militaries manipulating the ionosphere to disrupt communications.  But Google suggests that the technology didn’t really exist for the Soviets until the 1980s, the era when the Churchill range was left to languish. So instead of monitoring enemy activity, the launches actually produced serious scientific investigations of the aurora and the brand name of the research station’s lettuce.

Light from exit signs in the canteen. 

Back to describing the canteen — I  want to point out that this large room has safety exit signs emanating red light. That, and the fact that the canteen has windows, should solve a mystery for you when looking at the aurora pictures in a future blog.  Well, o.k. here’s one aurora pic to whet your appetite ;-).

Have you ever seen light from the aurora through clouds? This is not the typical picture in the tourist brochures.  

After settling in on the first day, we headed into the town. Walking out onto the parking area we could get a better look at the over all building. It has been awarded a silver distinction in the Leadership In Energy And Environmental Design (Leed) ratings. Notice the curve on one side and the angled roof — this shape allows the snow to blow over the building rather than pile up on one side of it. The wooden ‘ribs’ for supporting the curve form beautiful structures inside the building.  

The Churchill Northern Studies Centre. Viewing deck on the right. We mainly viewed from the parking lot and around to the deck.  Never alone.  The employees didn't want to entice the bears to consider snacking on an easy-prey tourist. 

Some of the best things about CNSC include its small dome for watching aurora in the warmth (versus the metal balcony for watching the light show in the cold), its fish/bird/circle-for-the-universe logo, and it’s bunk beds. Danielle's new husband Dustin accompanied her on this Valentine’s day weekend. But they divided the instructors up into male and female rooms, leaving Dustin to share with a roommate who entertained him by singing ska in his sleep.  Since I shared with Danielle, I felt I could risk the joy of sleeping in an upper bunk — I reckoned she’d pick this senior up off the floor if I fell out or perhaps even catch me on the way down. Anyway this may have been my first last-time spending a night at that height.

The staircase leads up to the little aurora viewing dome. The curved wooden 'ribs' support the curved outer wall.  

Dustin showing off the lovely CNSC logo -- you can find a fish, a bird, and a circle for the universe.

From this rambling you can tell that the CNSC did not match my initial expectations. No indeed. It was gloriously different and yet still whispered "research home''. And I did get to have my cake and eat it too — I did get that long, built-in desk under the window.