History: Mark Leinmiller

Mark Leinmiller and his family have become friends of mine since my selection as Antarctic Scout. Pictured are Mark, his two daughters, and me at my home. Mark and I are not only Antarctic Scouts past and present, but we also are both Atlanta natives who attended (or attend, in my case) Georgia Tech.

Mark Leinmiller was the third Antarctic Scout to accompany an expedition to The Ice. His trip was in celebration of 50 years since Eagle Scout Paul Siple traveled with the 1928 Byrd expedition as the first Antarctic Scout. Shortly after Mark's return from The Ice, the Boy Scouts of America developed a program with the National Science Foundation that would regularly send Eagle Scouts to work in Antarctica. The BSA now holds a national selection process and sends an Eagle Scout to work with NSF every other year.

During his five months with NSF, Mark worked primarily in the Transantarctic Mountains using Darwin Glacier field camp as base. He was a field assistant to two groups from the University of Maine doing projects related to glaciology and glacial geology. Mark lived in canvas tents and cooked on a Coleman stove after mapping, digging, and collecting samples from terminal moraines. Other assignments took Mark to the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Siple Station, McMurdo Sound, and South Pole Station.

5,000 feet above the Byrd Glacier, Transantarctic Mountains, 1978.

After his return from Antarctica, Mark received a degree in industrial and systems engineering from Georgia Tech. He has enjoyed an international career in automation technology and engineering, and started his own consulting firm in early 2002 to assist high-tech firms with marketing and business development programs.

Mark and his wife, Pam, have two daughters. When he is not pacing the sidelines of a soccer field, Mark can be found mountain biking, photographing wildlife, or working on various community service projects. The Leinmillers live in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia.

The photo was taken at one of the surveying sites high above the Byrd Glacier (16 miles wide, 42 miles long). These camps were literally 5,000 feet above the glacier. We placed large targets in several locations on the glacier, then tracked them using a theodolite (surveyor's instrument). The first few days were very difficult to find them again, so we had helicopter support. I went out with them once to help find the targets (large tarps of Griflin material with bright orange "fish floats" at the corners). I would then use my signal mirror to help the camps take their readings. Once they had a couple of days of data, they could predict better where to look the next day. Here is the stunning part: They found that the Byrd glacier is moving about 10 feet every day! They didn't get radio-echo soundings until the next season, but as I remember, the glacier is very deep--imagine the equivalent of an ice cube 16 miles by 10 feet by however many feet thick being shoved into the sea every day.

Last Updated: January 12, 2004