The Twilight Zone

Video transcript

The winter sun in Antarctica barely rises above the horizon.

Simon Goninon, Leader, Davis research station
Living in twilight is something definitely to get used to. It’s a bit weird, you’re walking to work, it’s 8 o’clock in the morning or thereabouts, it’s pitch black, it might as well be midnight.

This is the last sunrise and sunset at Davis research station for more than a month.

The sun is up for only 44 minutes and won’t return for five weeks.

The lack of natural light makes it hard to maintain normal sleep patterns.

Dr Jeff Ayton, Chief Medical Officer, Australian Antarctic Division
It’s the light acting on the back of the retina in your eye that gives you that time stamp to say that this is morning time and you should be awake and that sets you up for the rest of the day.

As Antarctica goes dark, winter expeditioners look forward to the return of the light.

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Nuyina Harbour Tests

Video transcript

ROB BRYSON: Manager – Antarctic Modernisation Branch

Nuyina is about to go into the first of a series of trials which is the harbour acceptance trials, which will be conducted alongside the wharf in Galati, Romania. What this is, is a whole series of 190 different tests that will test everything about the ship to make sure that it’s ready for the next stage in the trials process.

TEXT BOX: The Harbour Acceptance Tests (HAT) will test the ship’s propulsion, bilge, ballast and auxiliary systems.

ROB BRYSON: The HAT represents the first time that we’re powering up all the systems on the ship. The ship finally comes to life. Even though we’ve had little bits of systems working in the past, this is the first time that they’ll all work together.

TEXT BOX: The HAT is the first of three trials – harbour, sea and ice.

ROB BRYSON: It’s an important part of testing the ship and making sure it’s ready to go to sea for the sea acceptance trials. Following that we’ll move into the third phase of the testing program which will be special sea trials, which will involve taking the vessel off the coast of Norway and into the Arctic to test it in sea ice conditions.

TEXT BOX: The Nuyina will arrive in its home port of Hobart in late 2020.

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Nuyina landing barges

Video transcript

TEXT BOX: Two barges for the icebreaker Nuyina are being built in Tasmania to support Antarctic resupply.

ROB BRYSON (Manager – Antarctic Modernisation Branch): These barges are the primary link between the ship and the shore. We don’t have wharves or jetties in Antarctica, the ship doesn’t come alongside anywhere, so we have to use the barges to transfer all our cargo ashore and all our breakbulk containers and all our equipment.

TEXT BOX: Each barge can carry 45 tonne loads of containers, vehicles and other cargo.

ROB BRYSON: The great feature of these barges is their ability to ride up on the beach and discharge their cargo straight on to the shore, so that’s a tremendous capability that we’re building alongside the Nuyina and bringing into service.

TEXT BOX: The barges are being built by Taylor Bros, who have been crafting vessels for 83 years.

TEXT BOX: They employ naval architects, designers, and specialists from eight trades.

PHIL TAYLOR (Director – Taylor Bros): One of the first job I ever did for the Antarctic Division was in 1980 when we converted the first landing barges they had. They had four outboards strapped across the back of the barge and they were virtually a square brick. They were pretty uncontrollable so we turned them into a jet powered barge.

TEXT BOX: The jet propulsion system provides greater manoeuvrability than propellers

ROB BRYSON: The barges directly complement Nuyina because they’re made for each other. So from the ground up, the design’s been complementary. Seeing this design finally come to fruition is fantastic and a great achievement for all involved in the process today.

PHIL TAYLOR: We’ve had a lot of experience with Antarctica projects and we’ve learnt a lot out of working in a cold climate. Yeah there’s always challenges and that’s good, that’s what we like here, doing something different.

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Deep Frozen Democracy

Video transcript

During winter, our Antarctic stations are ice-bound and isolated.

So, how do our expeditioners get to vote on election day?

Each station has two volunteer Returning Officers appointed by the Australian Electoral Commission.

Sam Sanders, Assistant Returning Officer, Casey station:
I’m Sam, 28 years old…actually no, that’s a lie. I’m 27 (laughs). Sam Sanders, 27 years old, from Melbourne, and I’m the Bureau of Meteorology technician down here at Casey station.

Craig Butsch, Returning Officer, Casey station:
G’day, my name’s Craig Butsch, I’m 46 years old, from Darwin, originally from Melbourne, and I’m down here at Casey station with the Bureau of Meteorology as the senior meteorological observer.

The Casey polling booth has a view over the sea ice.

Sam Sanders:
So we’ll be voting later on today. We’ve set up the booth down at the wharf, and we’re ready to roll.

This year a total of 49 expeditioners are registered to vote as ‘Antarctic electors’.

The AEC emails ballot papers for each voter to the Returning Officers, who print them out.

Craig Butsch:
So people down here at Casey will be voting with a paper ballot. They’ll be placing it in the secured ballot box, and the next day myself and my assistant Sam will be counting the votes and then phoning them through to the AEC in Hobart.

Sam Sanders:
Yeah look, I think it’s really nice to be involved in what’s going on back in Australia, and voting is a nice way of doing that, and it’s good to be involved.

Craig Butsch:
It’s a little bit cold today, so we won’t be having a sausage sizzle but we will be having brunch. We’ll get our sausages, but it’ll be an inside-brunch-sausage instead of an outside-democracy-sausage-sizzle-sausage. (laughs)

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New Centre for Antarctic, Remote and Maritime Medicine

Video transcript

Antarctica is a remote and extreme environment.

There’s only a single doctor on each Australian station to provide medical care over winter.

Chief Medical Officer Dr Jeff Ayton “In Antarctica we are isolated for nine months of the year and we’ve had to deal with anything from mental health issues right through to major trauma in isolation.”

The skills developed by Antarctic doctors will now be extended to other remote and regional areas through the Centre for Antarctic, Remote and Maritime Medicine (CARMM).

It will bring together a network of specialists to support healthcare in isolated communities.

Advanced telehealth systems will play a key role.

Chief Medical Officer Dr Jeff Ayton “We’ve got access to real time monitoring but also near real time and real time imaging coming through. Providing the necessary support 24/7 to the distant doctor and the community that they are serving.”

The Centre will also provide accredited training and education pathways for generalist health practitioners.

Chief Medical Officer Dr Jeff Ayton “CARMM has been a long time coming and this is fantastic and an amazing opportunity to bring together for Tasmania and Australia, a cold climate academic centre of excellence which will deliver health care, training, education and research and innovation well into the future.”

CARMM is a partnership between the Australian and Tasmanian Governments and the University of Tasmania.

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A glimpse beneath the ice

Video transcript

The Totten Glacier is the largest in East Antarctica.

It stretches 30 kilometres across and up to 2 kilometres deep.

But little is known about what lies beneath this mass of ice, whether it’s bedrock or water.

Dr Ben Galton-Fenzi “By understanding how much ocean is under the glacier we can then understand how susceptible they are to climate change.”

For the first time researchers have found a network of lakes underneath the glacier using seismic testing.

They set off a series of small explosions two metres below the surface of the glacier, sending out sound waves.

Dr Ben Galton-Fenzi “That will echo off different layers in the ice and the bottom of the ice. Then we have geophones, that are basically microphones on the surface, that will listen to that sound and that will tell us how thick it is and the characteristics of the ice and the ocean below the ice.”

The research will help better predict future sea level rise.

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