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Person removing propagules from building materials.
University student Adéla Moravcová removing propagules from Princess Elizabeth Station building materials.
Photo: D. Ertz

Involvement in the building projects

We examined materials for the new Belgian Princess Elizabeth Station and the British Halley VI Station which will be built in the 2007/2008 Antarctica summer.

The Belgian station presented a unique risk for introducing propagules to Antarctica. It was pre-assembled in the Tour & Taxis museum in Brussels, and opened to the public. The human traffic and exposure to the environment may introduce a variety of propagules to the station material. Aliens We worked with the Belgium National Antarctic Program to search and remove propagules from the dismantled station in preparation for its trip to Antarctica.

Framework (space frame) to be used for building construction.
The space frame to be used in the construction of Halley VI.
Photo: J. Lee
With the help of Morrison Construction we also sampled the materials for the new British station. Materials were gathered from and stored in several countries. This included raw materials and prefabricated parts. By sampling these materials we obtained a snapshot of the propagule load which travels on a variety of cargo on various routes to Antarctica.

This page was last modified on 23 November 2007.