DEWLine Station (FOX Main) at Hall Beach 50 Years Later

you you you you you you my name is Brian Jeffrey and this is the story of my walk down memory lane as I went back to the place where I first started my working career in 1960 arrived in Hall Beach in July 29 1960 and a few days later on August 4th had my 20th birthday there traveling up this time was a whole lot nicer and a lot more pleasant than it was in the DC 4cf iqm ironically the aircraft that took me back this time for CG IQ you that's mean is one of the main sights one of the six main sights on the dew line also known as Hall Beach this video consists of a number of stills that I took as well as a couple of videos that'll allow you to get a better idea of the station at the time I was there here's the picture of an old snowmobile this is the original from Barty a snowmobile skidoo here's the weather station in the fog here's a picture of the train that houses the sleeping quarters for the workers on the site these are triple antennas facing east and west communicating with cam five and Fox one and of course the radome that how is the FPS 19 radar antenna this problem has the power system and here's the hanger still in existence today the radar system is now been replaced but the antenna system is still there this is the weather station and terpil scatter antennas I'll talk more about those later Travel is much different than it was in the old days when now they have one or two planes a day when I was up there we got one plane a week if the weather was good one of the last four remaining ATCO buildings still at Fox main this is the reclamation area where they been storing up on the waste material hazardous waste and trying to seal it so they wouldn't damage the land in u.s. play much bigger part now than the Eskimos did in the early years this is the assistant manager for the site one of the Weathermen this is Rick truck Newfoundlander whose hospitality made my trip exceedingly pleasant to pick a lounge area for existing staff and this is the storeroom down at the airport notice the television set we didn't have TVs in 1916 even the bedrooms are large now because they've combined two bedrooms to make one these are the triple scattering 10 is huge huge antennas very land sights there is my destination in the distance and you see it in the fog what was your - trouble scatter antennas which is the probably the largest trouble link in the world my intent is the goal there and climb up on top of them and see if I can get a picture of the site so it's probably going to be about a 15 or 20-minute stroll over there and then we'll see what we can see when we get there and what half way between the antennas which you can see enemy pretty impressive looking fellows probably about a hundred feet tall or so and if I scan a little bit around the horizon you'll see the flag is still here unlike yesterday when it was a beautiful fairly clear day but we're just about halfway between the those antennas and the main site here that you can see I've left behind so we're going to carry on with the tour and see what those big suckers look like oh my vote Oh 3/4 of the way there you see these things are fairly impressive and if you look at the size of them in relation to the building in between I would think that there are a hundred maybe 125 feet tall so the challenge is going to be can we go up to the top and we'll take a look behind you antennas and see what's there here I'm at the first of the two troppo antennas as you can see now at the base this is a huge monster and it's a big sucker and I'll take you around the back in a minute but I want to show you phlox Maine from here which is over there I don't know if you can see this but it's basically buried in the fog so climbing to the top of this antenna to get a picture of the site today is going to be a non-starter well let's just walk around the back of this sucker here and see what it looks like these two antennas are so large that the Nunavut government asks that they not be taken down because they can be seen for miles and miles and miles are now landmarks for the Inuit as well as for other people I know you I was talking with a gentleman today you said you can take off from Raleigh Island which is the next site over and within a few minutes in the air you can actually see these things in the winter time of course absolutely phenomenal because they're two black specks on the horizon this is an actually pristine structure not as a bit of rust on an extremely well-made course is absolutely no solve up here because I had problems go over and take a look at the building and see if there's anything there that might be of interest you can see the huge infrastructure on these antennas this is the one on the right and then here's the 12-volt outer building that had the transmitters in it I believe or at least some equipment but can't get into it now and there is the second antenna I hope to climb to the very top and there's a ladder cage in there that would allow me to do that but I would be able to see anything today so there's not much use doing that if the weather is good tomorrow before I take off for home I may come back down here and take the climb now this is the tunnel that connects train B to train a and vice-versa I'm going to stroll down here and try to keep the camera as steady as possible the idea is hopefully I don't meet anybody I wanted to a walkthrough of the a train showing the recreation module and then the TV area and finally the dining room so that's the plan it's about 8 o'clock and evening I'm going home tomorrow ball goes well the weather has indeed cleared up as you may be able to see in fact I'm going to pause at the window here and stoop down and take a look out and indeed there of a to large antennas that we visited earlier today in the distance and as you can see we have some incredibly clear weather and you can see for miles and there is basically nothing so let's continue down the stairs this is the rori you would have come in the building in the early days and here is the entrance to the operation zone where the station Chiefs office would have been and then off to the right the door wasted electronic modules so long here would have been offices now we have a small area with some computers next one has the TV system in it this has all the channels for the TV sits in the station smoking-room and the canteen with various venues and then we're going into the recreation area this good-looking gentleman over here is Mario who it's been extremely helpful and a crises mindlessly watching television last fire break in the building and now we're into the cafeteria dining room area now normally where you see this wall here that would have been a wall but they've added on this extension which is quite large and as you can see it is a fairly substantial sized dining room and we'll take a peek at some of the features here this is the food preparation area and you'll actually see six plates up on top of the county and all those are for RCMP officers who will be showing up later on this evening to get their meals this is the food prep area there's always treats on hand come over here you can see some of the desserts that are available to be had just for the taking they're always out here covered up ready to go ready to be munched on over here we have the ice machine microwave if you want to cook up something coffee and there's toast here in the morning all of your breakfast azar here ready to go if you want you can also of course have a hot breakfast in this cooler here is all kinds of incredible pastry treats I have I hate to say this been munching away on one at the back there which is a chocolate mousse having had a couple of those the next freezer over is full of various drinks that one can indulge in I've been pretty good in drinking primarily milk then over here we have the ice cream core there's at least four or five containers of ice cream in there any kind you want just go and take it anytime day or night and as you can see fair amount of area for people to have their dinners in down at the far end on display is a polar bear skin much like the one I used to own that got stolen from me many years ago much to my disappointment and again this module was added on in later years of this parchment portion of the mongols that wall you see over there where the opening is that would have been the wall of the existing module train that was punched out when they added on this addition so basically that is the a train it goes past a little further on in the direction with a camera zoom now but I believe that is mainly with freezers which contain the food and other supplies for the kitchen hope you enjoyed this miniature tour of the a-train back in the 1960s of course we didn't have television we didn't hear much I'm taking a walk down through module train fuzziness Emily bedrooms as we go this is the train that was added at the end of the original train many years ago to increase the accomodation facility it's like walking down a tunnel there right now and then you're going to come into a firebreak and this is gonna be one of those right here that's just an area a separate state different modules and as we continue down we're now in the old section typical small bedroom four-bedroom module I'm holding together before we come to another five modules together we're coming to a train or a firebreak rather this particular fire break actually has a library in them so that folks can take one lead one I'm going to continue down to my room so Wilfred it down here also not all the lights your work hi there this pass-through module will have the washrooms in the laundry area and this is actually one of the old dark rooms or the room that would have been a dark room in the early years of the doing another fire break and of course another library in the fire break good use of something that without otherwise have no value module with four bedrooms another module with four bedrooms and if you're not getting seasick by now it means that you're of a pretty strong stomach and I'm coming up to my particular bedroom which is right here as you can see they've got me on here room 19 and this is actually two rooms and you'll see that they've taken down the wall here and divided it into sort of a bedroom and a bed of a sitting room and here's my work desk and you'll notice the weight lighting fixtures up here and in fact how decorative the ceiling area is in this particular part of it and in this area here this will be the standard ceiling that used to be in the building at one time again a double bed where as in most of the other beds they are single beds notice the fancy side table lamp without a shade but I do have a unifier and here are the two windows that I have to keep as closed as possible it'd have been nice son simply interferes with trying to get to sleep so that is my VIP accommodation at all Beach on July the 3rd 2012 you the photo of the abandoned weather station is no longer used but the building is still there I'm in the very first module of the B train I have no idea what this equipment is this is now where the generators would have been but there's some stuff here I'm sure Lyle would figure out what it is looks like it's for the water system practices water filtration station you can see down the corridor we're now looking way down to the far end of the V train module this is where the mechanical systems would have been I'm going to as I walk down here we'll see where we go some of these rooms have been included rooted in the bedrooms oval here is the Sunnah of all things in the middle of nowhere and a typical small bedroom that would have been used with a closet and then again for more bedrooms in this module now we're getting the area with concrete floor whether this is a secure area where people can store their personal equipment while they're on the site because none of the doors are locked in the building so you notice here the floor is great concrete this is some additional equipment here's all the drawings for the building here getting concrete floor this is where the generators would have been originally and here we have an exercise area again this is where the mechanical systems would have bend and indeed the original movie room was in this area as well so there's one exercise area and here is the second so as you can see some pretty fancy equipment a couple of very good Precor treadmills a punching bag and whatever that sucker is there and we'll just come around here to see the rest of the exercise equipment and then the other arrays are the offices at the signup desk is a five dollar bill as you can see us as reserved for the last person leaving the northern warning site Fox name so somewhere down the road someone's going to collect this five dollars again this is where we would have come in fact this is where I came in the building this is the entranceway here and then you turn and go down to the offices and going back this direction you can see way down the corridor no my room is just on here a little bit we have the men's room here and package take a look down as you can see it's quite small and tidy and very functional so I'm only about one bedroom modular line and here we are with my room with my name number on it all ready to go let's take a peek in and see my incredible quarters it was time to leave and a trip that I was so glad be able to take and a chance to see the Midnight Sun for one last time you you you you

Channel: Brian Jeffrey

Views: 37,060

Rating: 4.8833818 out of 5

Keywords: DEWLine, Arctic, Cold War, Radar Station, Hall Beach NWT, FirstAir, Brian Jeffrey

Id: kwHCxLR5NIQ

Length: 25min 9sec (1509 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 06 2013