Exploration of the Antarctic

Published: September 30, 2013, 5:24 pm

Source: NSIDC

Topics:

Environmental History (main) Environmental Monitoring (main) Oceans and seas (main) Geography (main)

First explorers

In the latter 18th century, British explorer James Cook was the first person to circumnavigate Antarctica at extreme southern latitudes. However land sighting is attributed to British Captain William Smith, In February 1819, diverted far south of Cape Horn looking for favorable winds. Five hundred miles south, Smith sighted, and later named, the South Shetland Islands. Almost simultaneously the Russian explorer Thaddeus von Bellinghausen led two ships into the Antarctic Circle on a voyage of exploration inspired by Cook's earlier expedition. On January 27, Thaddeus von Bellinghausen saw petrels and heard penguins which convinced him that land was nearby; later analysis of the ship logs showed he was about twenty miles from the Antarctic coast, and likely saw land ice edge.

Prehistory using ice core exploration

Earliest knowledge of Antarctica derives from scientific exploration in the 20th century. Ice cores dating to 740,000 years before present, and geological data to the Pliocene provide insights to the climate and biota from very early times. However, the continent was not always as cold as at present. It separated from Gondwanaland about 30 million years ago and froze over about 14 million years ago. The Antarctic ice sheets are roughly the mass and extent as they were in the Pliocene (5-3 Million years before present), when mean global temperatures were 2-3º C above pre-industrial values, CO2 values reached 400 ppm, and sea levels were 15-25 metres above today’s.('Bargelloni et al, 2021)

Chronology of Antarctic exploration

The Chronology of Antarctic Exploration can be viewed as twelve distinct chapters, not including the ice core and geological data that elucidate millions of years of climate and ice history:

1. The Antarctic Myth
2. Sighting Antarctica
3. Early Exploration of Antarctica: Sealers
4. Three National Expeditions to Antarctica
5. Exploration of the Antarctic in the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century: Whalers and Others
6. The "Heroic Age" of Antarctic Exploration
7. Perspective of Antarctica in 1911
8. Amundsen and Scott at the South Pole
9. Mawson, Shackleton and the end of the "Heroic Age"
10. Aerial Exploration of the Antarctic
11. Antarctica and the International Geophysical Year
12. Antarctic Exploration and the Antarctic Treaty System

References

1. Antarctica: Exploring the Extreme: 400 Years of Adventureby Marilyn J. Landis, Chicago Review Press, 2001 ISBN: 1556524285.
2. Antarctic climate and environment history in the pre-instrumental period. (2021) Editors: Luca Bargelloni, John Turner et al. Victoire Press. Cambridge, UK. Published by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research. Scott Polar Research Institute, Lensfield Road,Cambridge, UK. ISBN 978-0-948277-22-1
3. South Pole: A Narrative History of the Exploration of Antarctica by Anthony Brandt, NG Adventure Classics, 2004ISBN: 0792267974.
4. Exploring Polar Frontiers: An Historical Encyclopedia, William James Mills, ABC-CLIO, 2003 ISBN: 1576074226.
5. Below the Convergence: Voyages Towards Antarctica, 1699-1839, Alan Gurney, W.W. Norton and Company, 1997 ISBN: 0393039498.
6. The Race to the White Continent, Alan Gurney, W.W. Norton and Company, 2002 ISBN: 0393323218.
7. Index to Antarctic Expeditions, Scott Polar Research Institute, retrieved November 1, 2008
8. Antarctic History, Polar Conservation Organization, retrievedFebruary 16, 2009
9. The United States in Antarctica, Report of the U. S. Antarctic Program External Panel, National Science Foundation, 1997
10. Antarctic History, Antarctica Online, retrieved February 16, 2009
11. The Antarctic Circle,retrieved February 16, 2009

Citation

U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center, Peter Saundry, C. Michael Hogan (2013). Exploration of the Antarctic. ed. Sidney Draggan. Retrieved from http://editors.eol.org/eoearth/wiki/Exploration_of_the_Antarctic