A life's story: The only female meteorologist who braves Balea Lake's record deep snows

Elena Stanciu is the first, and actually the only female meteorologist to have tied her life to the history of the Balea Lake weather station located in the Fagaras Mountains (Sibiu County), at an elevation of 2,057 m, which sees the deepest snows in Romania, with the white cover usually well above one meter thick.

Elena Stanciu seen here before the weather station's instrument shelter
Photo credit: (c) Isabela PAULESCU / AGERPRES ARCHIVE

"Balea Lake is my second home. I'm the only woman at the weather station, actually the first and only woman who came to work here. In the beginning, they were placing bets as to how long I would resist. ... And here I am, 21 years since I started working at Balea Lake. I'm from Bucharest, I live there and do the shuttle between Bucharest and Balea Lake for the job. And I enjoy it very much. I could have moved to the Bucharest Meteorological Institute, but I didn't want to. (...) When I go home, after a two-week work stint, I feel as if everybody is running into me, it's so crowded, especially if I go to the city centre. That's the reason why I don't go out too often while in the city," Elena Stanciu told AGERPRES.

To get to her workplace, meteorologist Elena Stanciu has been shuttling for 21 years between Bucharest and Balea Lake, on a distance of over 300 kilometers the most spectacular part of which is the 3,700-m stretch between the Balea Waterfall (1,243 m elevation) and Balea Lake. To get to the job, the Balea Lake weather people are required to travel the 3,700 metres by cable car, and if the car is not running because of extreme weather conditions, they must climb on foot, accompanied by mountain rescuers, working their way through the fir forest, past the waterfall, and sometimes braving the...