From November through February, the 73 Airmen and three LC-130 Hercules supported the United States Antarctic research efforts as part of Operation Deep Freeze, the Department of Defense’s annual support to the National Science Foundation’s Antarctic, News, features and commentaries about Air Force Reserve people, equipment and missions
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Antarctica is the highest, driest, coldest, and windiest continent on earth. So perhaps unsurprisingly, it spent the last 35 million years in relative isolation. People only discovered Antarctica in 1820, and it took another 100 years for people to reach the pole. But how many people live in Antarctica now?
Antarctica is extremely inhospitable. Image via Wikipedia.
Antarctica has no real permanent residents just research stations and field camps staffed either seasonally or year-round. Yet in the summer season, if the weather is favorable, Antarctica usually hosts up to 5,000 people. When the summer fades into winter, many stations get completely depopulated, and the ones with a permanent mission keep much smaller crews to keep the stations running. During the wintertime, Antarctica’s population goes down to around 1,000 people.
Nathan Rott
Nathan Rott is a correspondent on NPR s National Desk, where he focuses on environment issues and the American West.
Based at NPR West in Culver City, California, Rott spends a lot of his time on the road, covering everything from breaking news stories like California s wildfires to in-depth issues like the management of endangered species and many points between.
Rott owes his start at NPR to two extraordinary young men he never met. As the first recipient of the Stone and Holt Weeks Fellowship in 2010, he aims to honor the memory of the two brothers by carrying on their legacy of making the world a better place.
Antarctic ice runways under construction for medevac Australian Antarctic Program Press Release | December 29, 2020
Estimated reading time 3 minutes, 22 seconds.
Work has begun on constructing two Antarctic ice runways to use in the medevac of a patient from Australia’s Davis research station.
A team of five, with more than 1000 kilograms of equipment, was flown by Chinese helicopter to the ski landing area, on the ice plateau behind Davis station.
CHINARE helicopter arrives at Davis research station. Dan Dyer/AAD Photo
The expeditioners will spend three to five days building the two kilometer ski-way to receive a Basler aircraft.
1400 kilometers away at Australia’s Wilkins Aerodrome, near Casey station, another crew of eight is preparing a three-and-a-half kilometer glacial runway.