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Antarctica ClearlyExplained.Com

Antarctica

ClearlyExplained.Com

2 January 2007

updated: 13 August 2009

by Richard Conan-Davies BSc Dip Ed

A straightforward and fast information
guide to Antarctica from ClearlyExplained.Com

What is Antarctica?

Antartica is a land mass and ice mass at the South pole of Earth.

Here are some basic geography facts:

• Total: 14 million km²
• Land: 14 million km² (280,000 km² ice-free, 13.72 million km² ice-covered) (estimate)
• Note: Fifth-largest continent, following Asia, Africa, North America, and South America, but larger than Australia and the subcontinent of Europe
• You can explore Antarctica with Google Earth.

What
Why
News
How
History
Future

Why is Antarctica Important?

Antarctica is important for a number of reasons:

Natural and scientific interest - This deals particularly with the biological, geological and meteorological influences that Antarctica has on the world.

Cultural reasons - This related more to the history and early exploration by people and the stories that have become part of legend.

Antarctica has been a major inspiration to artists, movie makers and musicians over the years.

Technological significance - How technology has been developed to deal with the conditions in Antarctica. This might include things like special protective cloths and different transport devices.

images: US Antarctic Program

Mt Herschel (3335m asl) from Cape Hallet with Seabee Hook penguin colony in Foreground
image: wikipedia

News about Antarctica

Antarctica is a regularly reported topic particularly this year, with 2007 being International Polar Year.

• Google news search for Antarctica
• Yahoo! news search for Antarctica

View a live image of the Australian Mawson base in Antarctica.

Read the blog of geologist Dan Zwartz working at Davis Station...more

Official resources and information about Antarctica

• Australian Antarctic Division
• British Antarctic Survey
• Gateway Antarctica - New Zealand
• US Antarctic Program
• Antarctic Treaty Secretariat

How does Antarctica work?

Antarctica has its features mainly due to its location at the South Pole. The South Pole tends to get significantly less sunlight than other places. Less sunlight means it gets cold. In addition the permanent ice cap reflects a large amount of sunlight.

Also Antarctica is on average the highest continent and so temperature decreases with altitude. The Southern ocean is somewhat colder than the northern oceans also maintaining cooler temperatures.

image: Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Antarctica

This weather chart of Antarctica shows very intense low air pressures and high pressure systems that produce very high wind speeds.

image: USGS.gov shows how high Antarctica is. Purple is 0 metres pink is about 4000metres.

The high average elevation height allows cold air to fall down and off Antarctica (this is called Katabatic wind - the Greek word for going down hill). image: wikipedia

History of Antarctica

There are two main topics within the history of Antarctica:

The natural history of Antarctica - this would include things such as how the continent formed...

Antarctica was part of the supercontinent Gondwana more than 170 million years ago. Then some 25 million years ago Gondwana broke apart forming Antarctica as we know it today.

The cultural history of Antarctica - this deals mainly with the personalities and characters that first started exploring the continent..

For example Antarctica was first seen by 3 different people in the 1820s; Thadeus von Bellingshausen, Edward Bransfield, and Nathaniel Palmer.

In 1907 , Ernest Shackleton and T. W. Edgeworth David lead the first group to climb Mount Erebus and to reach the South Magnetic Pole.

The first to reach the geographic South Pole was Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen on 14th Decemember 1911.

reference: Wikipedia - Antarctica

Fabian Gottlieb Thaddeus von Bellingshausen, who first saw Antartica.image: wikipedia

Future of Antarctica

What will Antarctica look like in the future? Will it remain where it is? Continuous tectonic plate activity is likely to continue to move Antarctica.