Antarctic video gallery
Top tips: isolate like an Antarctican
Video transcript
Oh no where’s Antarctica? It’s not on the board. We’re all ice-olated.
Hi I’m Dave the station leader at Davis station in Antarctica. While we chose to be in isolation down here for winter, you back at home have had it forced upon you, so we thought we’d give you some helpful hints and advice about how to make the most of being stuck at home.
Go out for some exercise
Well, it’s a beautiful day for a bike ride here at Davis, balmy −12 degrees
When it’s a beautiful day like today, remember get outside and smell the roses…This is plastic but you get the idea.
Maintain your social distance
Here at Davis station we have our own isolation rules. We have to stay at least 15 metres from moulting elephant seals.
Share the housework
Just doing a bit of cleaning, as part of our chores, as community duties. It helps us to stay active as well and everyone keeps it nice and tidy.
Indulge in guilty pleasures
When in isolation, keeping a routine can be important, even small things like turning out lights.
What are you guys doing in here?!
It’s Married at First Sight finale!
On windy days, hook onto blizz lines
Down here at Davis, we don’t let the weather stop us, there’s a blizzard outside, but we’re inside having fun, ridin’!
Food is your first layer of insulation
We’ve got the crunchies, the picnics, this has to last for a month. There’s a few people that have gained a few kilos since being here, not going to mention anyone.
Follow health advice
We recommend listening to the experts back home, keeping away from public places like beaches…there’s always one.
Hey mate. Personal hygiene is no game.
Play nice
Take care guys, we miss you, all the best!
[end transcript]
Farewell Orange Roughy
Video transcript
FAREWELL ORANGE ROUGHY
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty has been working on the Aurora Australis for more than 20 years
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “It has been my second home for the last 20 years and, yeah, for most of the crew have been here for a long time as well. I think six or seven years is probably the shortest amount of time anyone’s spent here. Yeah, it’s — yeah, we're very fond of the old girl, yeah.”
Australia’s icebreaker was launched in Newcastle in 1989
Its first winter voyage was to Heard Island in 1990
The last Antarctic huskies came home on board in 1992
For three decades, the Aurora has made over 150 voyages, carrying more than 14,000 expeditioners
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “When we get to the fast ice, that requires ramming the ship into it most of the time. So we have to use full power, push the ship six, seven or sometimes eight knots into that ice and push through it as far as we can get. Usually the ship will come to a stop and then we'll have to back up and do it all over again, and we'll do that perhaps hundreds of times.”
But it hasn’t always been plain sailing
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “The old girl has sustained a bit of damage over the years from various events and, as one of the chief mates once said, it is a contact sport, icebreaking, so you do have to expect a few bruises every now and again, and the Aurora’s had her fair share of those.”
The ship recovered from engine room fires in the 90s, and running aground at Mawson station in 2016
It was central to many rescues of other ships
And it remained the lifeline for our Antarctic stations
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “When people at home ask me, “What do you do for work?” I say, “Oh, I work at sea,” and then there’s usually this progression because that sparks their interest. “What sort of work do you do at sea?” and eventually I say, “Well, I work on the Aurora Australis.” I give up and say, “Yeah, I work -.” “Oh, tell us more about that.” And so, yeah, I don’t usually tell them I work at sea unless I've got a half an hour to spare.”
The Aurora Australis has enabled an extraordinary array of polar science
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “Sometimes you're seeing things that haven’t been observed ever before. Sometimes it’s just numbers on a page that you might get from, say, a CTD sample when we're doing oceanography work, or sometimes it might be some strange creature that comes up from a deep sea trawl. Yeah. Sometimes it’s ice conditions that we've never experienced before. So when I say marine science voyages, it covers everything from oceanography, marine biology, sea ice science, glaciology and sometimes atmospheric sciences as well, and we've had many voyages where all of those disciplines are placed together on the ship and it’s — yes, it’s an all-singing, all-dancing science fest.”
The Aurora’s career with the Australian Antarctic Program may be over, but the wonder of going south will live on
Ship’s Master Gerry O’Doherty: “Every voyage, there’s always new expeditioners. There’s always people that have never travelled with us before and we get to experience their wonder at seeing an iceberg and their excitement. You know, the thing’s four miles away, it’s a spec on the horizon and they're jumping up and down, and to relive that helps you relive your own first experience and it reminds you of how special it is, just in case you might have forgotten.”
[end transcript]
Constructing Cool Sleds
Video transcript
In this small workshop on Tasmania’s east coast, big things are happening.
Elphinstone Engineering have won a multimillion dollar contract to build 28 sleds
Business Owner Graeme Elphinstone; “This is the biggest single order we have had for Antarctica.”
The sleds will be used to transport expeditions to search for the oldest ice on Earth.
Next year they’ll carry a mobile station 1200 kilometres inland from Australia’s Casey station.
Australian Antarctic Division Traverse Project Manager, Anthony Hull; “The expected temperatures at our proposed site where we are heading to can be up to −30°C, −50°C.”
The traverse train will have five 12.5 metre sleds for accommodation vans and 23 smaller sleds for cargo
Australian Antarctic Division Traverse Project Manager, Anthony Hull; “The flat deck sleds are a universal platform. So those sleds we can put a range of different types of cargo on those, you know 20 foot containers, 10 foot containers, fuel tanks, general cargo.”
Business Owner Graeme Elphinstone; “We’ve been able to build a sled that is a lot less maintenance in the field and also been able to carry bigger loads over longer distances.”
The sleds will be pulled by tractors modified for harsh Antarctic conditions.
The last of the five tractors will be transformed by the end of this month.
[end transcript]
Far South Symphony
Video transcript
GORDON HAMILTON, composer/conductor:
I’m here in Antarctica near Casey Station working on a symphony, and that symphony is for the Tasmania Symphony Orchestra, the London Mozart Players, and also the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, all to play.
In 2018, Gordon Hamilton went south to create a musical legacy for the Aurora Australis
GORDON HAMILTON:
I was really drawn to this program because — well, Antarctica is a place that may as well be as far away as Mars or the Moon. It’s somewhere I thought I would never have the opportunity to visit, but has always been there in my imagination, like, I think, for most people, and it’s a place that lends itself so much to art and music and cinema.
He recorded the sounds of the icebreaker and Antarctica
GORDON HAMILTON:
So the orchestra will play and I'll compose music around these recordings as if they are the soloist in an opera or in a song.
But often it was the lack of sound that really inspired him
GORDON HAMILTON:
That’s a kind of silence that I've never really experienced before. Perhaps in this symphony there are moments of epic silence.
The first people to hear his new composition were on the icebreaker itself
GORDON HAMILTON:
It was a really nice situation to share the piece about the Aurora Australis on the Aurora Australis and the recordings of the ship as they played through the speaker, we could hear the ship making these groans and these noises and whistles while the piece was playing, so it was actually very special.
Now the premiere of ‘Far South’ brings the music of Antarctica to the world
GORDON HAMILTON:
These sounds will have a lot of resonance for people that know the ship because the ship has a lot of memories — contains a lot of memories for these people — for all of us.
[end transcript]
First Hercules flight from Australia to our Antarctic ice runway
Video transcript
An icy first for the Australian Antarctic Program.
Project Lead, Matt Filipowski; “It’s very exciting because it’s the first time that a RAAF C130J has operated to Antarctica and to the Wilkins Aerodrome.”
RAAF Commander Air Mobility Group Carl Newman; “Hercules are fantastic aircraft and can carry up to 20 tonnes of cargo. It can carry that cargo approximately 3000 nautical miles.”
The plane flew the 6900 kilometre trip from Hobart in 13 hours. It was specially modified for this Antarctic mission.
Project Lead, Matt Filipowski; “Recently the Airforce has put external fuel tanks onto the aircraft and that’s given it increased endurance, or it can fly further and longer, which it needs to be able to do to operate to Antarctica.”
The Hercules had a crew of 8 on board for one of its longest ever flights.
RAAF Commander Air Mobility Group Carl Newman; “This is one of the most challenging environments for aviation in the world. The weather will be of great interest to the crew, the conditions of the runways, the ability to operate aircrafts on the ground in very cold temperatures.
Once on the ground at Wilkins they delivered cargo and refueled.
Project Lead, Matt Filipowski; “The Hercules primarily carried its own fuel down, but we had a small amount of cargo on there and they were also able to return a small amount cargo back to Australia for us as well.”
The Hercules is on track to provide another aerial support option for the Australian Antarctic Program
[end transcript]
Fuel munching microbes clean up Antarctica
Video transcript
These are microscopic secret weapons. Native Antarctic microbes are being used to clean up contaminated soil.
Remediation Manager, Tim Spedding; “We manage the soil condition so that those microorganisms can do the best job and be the most effective at using that fuel as a food source and they break down that fuel and ultimately clean up that soil.”
Scientists at Australia’s Casey station have built a luxury dirt ‘hotel’ to boost the microbes appetite.
The ‘mega-pile’ is the largest bioremediation construction in Antarctica. The size of an Olympic swimming pool, it can hold 750 cubic metres of soil.
Remediation Engineer, Rebecca McWatters; “It includes a really thick protection layer made up of a variety of barrier materials. We have a clay liner, we have is a high-density polyethylene welded plastic layer, we have protective textiles and then we have soil.”
The conditions are continually tweaked to be perfect for the fuel-munching microbes.
Remediation Manager, Tim Spedding; “So a few degrees above zero, higher moisture content, maybe 10%, 12% water and a lot more oxygen.”
This will greatly increase the aeration of the soil and hopefully the soil will be able to be rehabilitated quicker. Less than 0.05% of the Antarctic continent is ice-free, so all the soil is precious.
Remediation Manager, Tim Spedding; “We want as many nations as possible to adopt what we are using.”
[end transcript]
Nuclear Watchdog
Video transcript
Australia’s Mawson research station in east Antarctica
Inside this ordinary-looking shipping container is a crucial part of the global network that polices a ban on nuclear testing
SANDRA SDRAULIG, RADIOCHEMIST, ARPANSA:
The CTBTO stands for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation. The purpose of that organisation is to monitor the planet for signs of nuclear explosions.
One of 80 stations around the world, this sampler ‘sniffs’ the wind for tell-tale radioactive particles
DAVE DAVIES, DEPUTY STATION LEADER, MAWSON:
On a daily basis we check the air sampling that’s done here. So, there’s a filter that’s changed every day that actually senses the atmosphere for contaminants that would indicate some sort of nuclear activity.
The high volume air sampler catches airborne particles on filter paper
SANDRA SDRAULIG:
They do occur naturally and in this monitoring station we will see some naturally occurring radionuclides. Others that are non-naturally occurring can be there as a result of a nuclear explosion or some other process.
The filter is compressed into a disc, for analysis and storage
SANDRA SDRAULIG:
Finally the filter is placed on a gamma spectrometer where it’s analysed. A computer monitors the work flow, collects the data which is then transmitted to Vienna via satellite to the international data centre.
ARPANSA relies on expeditioners to run the sampling during the year
DAVE DAVIES:
A lot of things I've done down here that you’d never get the opportunity anywhere else, and, yeah, that’s what makes it exciting. It’s why I like the job. The day is never the same and there is always something challenging to try your hand at.
(ARPANSA=Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency)
[end transcript]
Marine surveys
Video transcript
DR GLENN JOHNSTONE, APPLIED BENTHIC BIOLOGIST, AAD:
We're standing on sea ice, about a metre, 1.7 metres thick and underneath is probably 20 metres of water before we hit the sea floor.
DR JONNY STARK, MARINE ECOLOGIST, AAD
We are here doing some environmental surveys for the Davis aerodrome project, so we're doing marine environmental surveys all around the Vestfold Hills which is a largely unexplored area.
These marine scientists are using a small submarine to explore an unknown underwater world
DR JONNY STARK:
We've got onboard cameras, we've got laser scalers to measure the size of things on the seabed.
What they find builds a picture of the biodiversity around the site of the proposed runway
DR JONNY STARK:
All right so we've got polychaete reef here mate.
DR GLENN JOHNSTONE:
All of those different kinds of organisms you’d normally see on a reef in Tasmania or southern Australia, they're here, they're in different communities, different sizes, colours, shapes and there’s a obviously a lot of them here and not found elsewhere, they're endemic to Antarctica — all of the organisms here are endemic to Antarctica.
They find stony reefs several kilometres long, made by polychaete worms
DR JONNY STARK:
They stretch from the surface down to 30 metres, much like coral does really. They're amazing, they're real biodiversity hotspots, they're just crawling with life. I reckon there must be billions of sea urchins in Ellis Fjord. Everywhere you look there’s a sea urchin, crawling over the polychaetes, all over the rocky habitats, everywhere.
DR GLENN JOHNSTONE:
That’s one of the biggest excitements, is that we're popping this thing down, through sea ice and we don’t know what we're going to find and we do know that nobody’s ever been to this site before, so we know that when we do see it, we're the first people to see it.
DR JONNY STARK:
You're like explorers, you know, the first people to look in these places properly and document what’s here. The fjords particularly around Davis, they're really extensive and we know barely anything about them.
[end transcript]