Antarctica: Ready for Winter | Free Documentary

[Music] [Music] summer is coming to an end in Antarctica the crew of the academic Theo tariff is waiting for the malodors Nair Research Station to pack up for winter everything has to be done quickly if the wind gets any stronger the helicopter won't be able to take off and there's no other way of getting people onto the ship from the station they need to hurry winter begins tomorrow [Music] [Music] mother used to be the Soviet Union's biggest Antarctic research station now it only works during the summer in the southern hemisphere summer starts in December and ends in March it's now April so seasonal operations are over geological samples are gathered during the summer unloaded into containers [Music] all water is drained from the station and windows are boarded up and filled in with insulation foam if the snow is given even the slightest chance to sneak in it will be impossible to dig it out the diesel generator is the last to be shut down no one can survive here without heat the operation takes just a few hours to complete now the station is ready for winter the helicopter will fly people to leaf academic fjord off [Music] Arnau they said they wouldn't take us they will they've got no choice they told us you'd come you're here and fortune smiles on us again everything's gonna be fine I'll be 85 in April now I only travel to my dacha my dad chef and to Antarctica actually I've done 26 expeditions I've spent 10 winters in Antarctica I open the leningradskaya station for example and many others and I restored the Vostok station as well I have a recorder with me they made me bring a voice recorder and they've told me to record but no I haven't started yet the academic field ROVs horn signals the start of winter the ship's departure means that for the whole year no one will be able to travel here just as no one is able to leave if you have any doubts about how you will cope in Antarctica you'd better say so now Rush's expeditions to Antarctica set off from Cape Town South Africa while the ship stays in Port for a few days the team members enjoy some time off many of them want to take a tour to the Cape of Good Hope unfortunately there's not enough space on the bus so the polar explorers decide to draw lots to determine who gets to go in the Soviet area to get to Antarctica it wasn't enough to just be lucky you needed relevant experience with drift ice in the Arctic as well as recommendations there was no other way to reach the southernmost continent today it's enough to send your resume to the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute along with a clean bill of health many people believe that once they themed to Antarctica so to speak they turn into polar explorers basically I don't share that view I think polar explorer is somebody who's worked in both Antarctica and the Arctic zones can you call him a real polar explorer Alexia not your met just two days ago both are newcomers and boats are heading to Antarctica for the first time they're going to spend the whole winter together at the novolazarevskaya station I was pretty scared two days before we were meant to leave but when you realize it's actually happening when the date is set and your dream is about to come true and what's next I don't know we'll see if I like it I'll keep doing it but if not so be it tomorrow Alexey you're not you're mugging to Antarctica by plane theirs will be the final flight of the season the landing strips can only operate for short periods each year the where there is too unreliable and the distance is too great this simply wouldn't be enough fuel [Music] polar explorers mostly get to Antarctica by ship just as the early pioneers did it takes the academic theater of a months and a half to get from some Petersburg in the northern hemisphere to the southernmost point on earth almost crossing the whole planet but back in 1964 after our Arctic trip we went to Antarctica that was the first time I felt so acutely just how far away Antarctica is this trip is more fascinating and extensive it takes at least six months to get there the Arctic region is like a relaxing walk it only takes about a month [Music] the ship spent six months at sea approaching the shores of Antarctica several times during the season now the crew is going through the final and most unpredictable stage [Music] and Arctica always comes up with surprises you have to keep your eyes open because there's always something going wrong if it actually goes well for too long I start to worry there's no way Antarctica will let you go on like that without incident [Music] detailed navigational and operational plans are in place but autumn has arrived and no one can ever know just what to expect from Antarctica the academic further off is the only ship for a hundreds of miles well this is the radar as you can see there's nothing where you can't see any other ships just icebergs here you have to look out for yourself but no one to relay messages to except us any other ships or rescue centers are miles away now calling all Antarctica stations this is Akademik Fyodorov radio check please respond Vostok progress Milne novolazarevskaya please respond never letter obscure reading you level four there are five year-round Russian research stations in Antarctica this time the field roof will visit two of them progress a novel laser scan the ship must supply them with everything they might need we work as a tanker a cargo vessel carrier a whole year of food for the two stations is being delivered here we have diced carrot cabbage different types of broccoli and this is meat from Uruguay and these are frozen pancakes it assumes that each polar explorer will eat around eight kilos of meat in a month and around four eggs a week they have their own way to keep the eggs fresh to stop the yolks going off you have to turn them every two weeks they may get a little dry at the stations because of the low humidity but they will never go bad bags containing polar clothing are stored in the freezer when the ship left's in Petersburg four months ago the weather was rainy and damp most of the time if the bags were to get wet well being loaded they may rot in a wall hold to keep them in optimum condition the clothes are kept on ice until they're needed Nikolay get out of there you'll freeze the standard winter outfit consists of four pairs of shoes thermal underwear a fleece cuff and a wind cheetah oh this one is for winter the other one is a mid season coat and this one's for special occasions the coats are much better this time look they also have a vest wait turn around did they listen to what we said no they didn't we wanted the straps to be crossed otherwise they'd slip off your back we write the same comments every single year but it's not so often that they put things right is it okay does it look fine of course it's okay it's for work not your wedding of course it's a little loose it's almost twice the size of you right now I spent less time at home than in Antarctica of course my family is waiting for me back home but I think they get fed up with me after a while they are used to living without me dr. Venter ovitch gave me one toilet roll he said that that would be enough till I got home I said for a year and he answered when I say home I mean Antarctica this will be Johnny and marks first winter in Antarctica Johnny made the decision shortly before his 50th birthday I used to be a bureaucrat seriously but at some point I just started feeling that Antarctica was the only thing that was true and real and it's worth testing yourself here it's a bit less the issue the problem is that those people have already been working there for 3 months how many of us there's six of us we we are joining a foreign collective in the army we would be the rookies not very comfortable the people with experience have already got used to it newcomers had this odd mix of Romanticism practice I wanted to change my life 20 years I never moved from my place Lucan seconds or until the HD if you get fed up with it after a while Susan fun yet that's the pragmatism in our town it's a considerable sum they've offered me my wife just giggled for the first six months before she realized it was real she toured see why my wife's very quiet and there's a good spirit but for a family life that's that's good wife so I wondered if they had billiards there yeah attention all hands the open deck is now out of bounds during the store [Music] on the bridge of the captain the navigation officer and two helmsman the crew change is underway thank you everyone have a good shift [Music] the crew watch is reinforced you have to be twice as vigilant the closer you get to Antarctica for navigation purposes the region is still under explored and icebergs can drift for very long distances [Music] these pictures are from 1987 they Chronicle the maiden voyage of the academic further off the first diesel-electric ice ship to sail to Antarctica our first trip was good a really good one I remember we were in the captain's room all three of us having tea yes I remember that clearly we were having tea the table was there I felt a huge bang and the cup that fell off the table and the tea spilled everywhere it was a rock that wasn't shown on the chart everything was fine in the end though and the rocks position was mat here it is four and a half meters the 1987 obstacle twelve O'Clock crew changeover in the engine room in all 22 people are involved in here the crew is quite big but such a unique voyage demands it they have only themselves to count on when things go wrong during the turbulent 90s we would leave for Antarctica in March or even April so we would arrive in the middle of the Antarctic winter sailing in winter is indeed an adventure I'm still amazed that we managed to break through at all a red-bellied beauty is a wonderful ship together we got through so many scrapes the ship literally went through a trial of fire and ice it was about 4 p.m. during the tea break we had cabbage spice that I still remember that then it all happened there was a fire in the engine room even now I feel uncomfortable when I hear the sound of a fire alarm I changed the settings on all our clocks back home because I can't stand the noise of an alarm all in all the ship went through thick and thin it's the best ship in the whole Antarctic it's impossible for it not to fulfill its task that's never happened it's even written somewhere the academic father of was the only ship in the world able to reach the North Pole alone unaided by an icebreaker the ship enters the ice zone overnight just 24 hours ago they saw only occasional icebergs for Johnny and mark the final countdown has begun it's not far now to the progress station and that's where they'll spend the winter sometimes the progress station surprises us too once that we had an incident there we were unloading fuel when the ice belt started cracking right before our eyes so we had to detach the hose and even cut it a little there were icebergs there it was really extreme but things like this happen producing static one time we had to wait half an hour at progress station the ice belt started cracking if there was a huge iceberg behind us its flipped over and start then it went in the other direction the ship closes in on the progress station the critical factor now is the weather all the food containers will be flown in but will the ship have to pull back and wait for better flying weather we can reach the shore now no problem the problem is we can't use aviation visibility two-port is decreasing and snow is inbound that's how it is in Antarctica everything is up to the weather whether we can work or not depends on the weather it turned out that the progress station frontal activity was at its peak for ten days there was intense and heavy snowfall visibility was practically nothing and the flight ceiling was zero so we had to wait 10 days until it finally stopped snowing [Music] but this time it seems Antarctica is in a good mood and willing to demonstrate its more charming side I can see mountains after a lengthy trip the long-awaited Antarctic shoreline appears this land can only be reached during very short windows of time each year modern transport is of little help the only reliable means of getting here is by sea [Music] checking the line approaching coming soon oh thank god Arnold would wretzky was one of the pioneers of Russian Antarctica there was nothing here except for ice and rock before the first generation of explorers with plenty of experience in the North Pole landed here on the southern continent if you look at the map of Antarctica you'll see Soviet stations all across the continent although not all of them are operational now this is Antarctica kind of uncomfortable after the ship right as for me I came to Antarctica after the Arctic these people have never worked in the Arctic zone there is a big difference an isolated crew is a very serious thing you never know how it will turn out with the newcomers hello everybody the most important event in the life of a station is staff rotation 25 people will be spending this winter at the progress station so who's who sugan oh oh Johnny you've made it Kirill doctor okay doctors so are you guys in the know you know your places take the doctors here's the hydrologist please hydrologist hello mister off module in hello hello there so who knows our places I do a long time no see buddy find him a place I'm Johnny pleased to meet you by the doctor right Dmitry are you settling in hand over between the helicopter flights it's just like on horseback I'm very careful when I have passengers I mean I Drive crazy but with passengers always careful Arnold has come to check up on the progress station after its reconstruction it has recently been declared the capital of the Russian expedition Oh No hello are you going to spend to the winter here foreveryoung our first joint expedition was number 19 yeah how I remember this is good we have to keep up tradition of photographing each winter team it's a great tradition it's the common room this way no no this way here it's here goodness gracious oh now you're talking and do a lot of people work out here yes wow that's great looks fantastic look no other station can boast of such conditions earning board washing machine and hot water all the time of course [Music] [Music] check this out here we keep the eggs and there's no need to turn them I see I see we put five to six boxes there and take them out at the end of the winter are you happy compared to other stations it's like paradise here paradise in Antarctica hello yeah you're lucky here it's like in a fairy tale it really is so Johnny have you settled in not yet I'm waiting for my partner he's probably busy with science right now science getting food you mean I don't know today the whole station is focused on the same job unloading food containers brought in by helicopter from the academic Fuhrer of old and new teams are working together it's easy to see at first glance who's already spent a year here the guys told me there was no point in shading anymore usually when you have to work you shave here you're constantly working and of course there are no women so why do I shave at all women do not stay for the winter at Russian stations married couples were brought here several times as an experiment but it didn't work out they sent an engineer here once his wife was a cook it was hard work she had to carry heavy bags and lots of meat of course she couldn't do it so he had to drop what he was doing and help her we couldn't do his job because of that because he had to help her to say nothing about psychological aspect so he's nature there are two cooks here the weather may change but lunch can never be postponed we've got so lianca soup here still ash with buckwheat on the side steak with onions and mushrooms fried beef liver and sausages I always say guys why do you love sausages so much look what we've got steak a la francaise liver all these cutlets what is it with sausages now what they do is they put all the good stuff on one plate and then come back with another plate and take two more sausages it doesn't matter after consulting with the cook the station head has bought food for the whole station instead of buying lemons it's better to buy limes they've learned that they stay fresh longer when vegetables start to go after cook will cut and peel them fry them in margarine and keep them in the freezer cottage cheese can be frozen too but not sour cream its structure changes which spoils the taste experience has taught them different ways to keep foods fresh for a year space needs to be left between bags to keep onions fresh but it's impossible to say how long a cabbage might last one time I peeled everything away to the heart then I wrapped each one in paper like they did in the old days that didn't help kept going off that's why it stays in the string bags now if it starts to go we just peel it and eat it quickly water for the station is drawn from glacial lakes at the progress station they can automatically get water from a nearby lake but the polar explorers don't like it they're used to going to the remote lakes water there seems to taste better but it's an illusion all water here is the same after distillation and because of the lack of minerals polar explorers constantly suffer from dental problems Alexey I'm scared the last one on the right do you want me to pull it out it's better to fill it multivitamins sit on the table and the guys forget to take them it's difficult to treat them and diagnose it in time they hold out until the last moment when they can't stand it anymore I was afraid because they pull my teeth out all the time here I've lost four in this room alone it's my sacrifice to Antarctica we don't have holidays and no weekends we work 24 hours a day there's one meteorologist one out of this virologist a seismologist energy Oh physicist we still have plenty of work to do no one will do it for you I mean I like snowstorms can't live without it when they start yeah I just started walk walk and walk this polar explorer never gets the full eight hours of sleep because he has to submit weather data every six hours and he has to go to the weather station every day no matter what the conditions the Antarctic has a sort of utilitarian value let's take the weather data as an example if you cover Antarctica with your harm there will be no information from there anymore all the models that we are used to will fail yeah they just wouldn't work just a few days remain for the summer team to hand over to their winter colleagues former bureaucrat Johnny Sack runoff spent a year studying magnet ology he really wanted to come to the Antarctic every station has its own magnetic room there are no metallic objects in such rooms the air temperature is kept stable at approximately 25 degrees Celsius a computer constantly records changes and time has to be accurate to the nanosecond clocks must be adjusted in a very special way for three days we can only take notes there's no time to make changes Alexey siminoff dreamed about Antarctica for several years for example if we take a compass in Russia it will show us north that way but if you take it here it will show north that way even though it's that way if we follow the compass as we used to do it in Russia we won't end up in India as expected but in Chile South America as a student he proposed his own geological theory it was important to him to go to Antarctica to collect the data he needed I didn't find anything new for it though but here there are no influences like TV or anything like that you have to sit and think simply sitting and thinking the station's ionosphere is keeps his instruments in a corner of the same room his job is to monitor high-altitude conditions all the data he collects has to be sent to an Institute in st. Petersburg and the equipment needs regular adjustment in fact every polar job has its own specifics such details are handed down to each new generation of polar explorer these balloons can rise to 42 kilometres they all carry sensors that relay information to a console at the station our work is very important we make aeronautical charts for aircraft like how helicopters can fly for instance similar balloons are released simultaneously all over the world at midnight GMT Russian polar explorers have long invented new ways to make the process more efficient such as how to make them easier to release it is so short but we can still send up the balloon like this there's about 50 meters of rope here how to make it go higher we soak the balloon in a mixture of kerosene and benzene we came up with it it makes it fly higher it can fly up to 30 kilometres without it it will only go as high as 22 other countries don't care so much about how high their balloons go and how to make it faster their inflated with hydrogen and there's a rope down there it's our reference point I can check the top point of the balloon by using that there we go today none of the scientists remember who actually came up with these ideas it comes from Arctic experienced scientists who invented them we had a competition whose balloon would go higher spending the winter here some would call it hibernation but it is in fact hard work spending the winter here is difficult working in Antarctica is difficult maybe I'm used to this this is my sick winter here it's been 9 years in Antarctica already and why shouldn't I come here why at the age 59 should I not come here I like the salary I like the work conditions we've ordered food everything we want salted nuts lobster shrimp ice cream four different varieties of apples pears why shouldn't I be here at home you wouldn't get a job like this for such a salary oh I like it here I feel at ease here free from household problems once you wake up and you're at work no need to cook around 30 people spend winter at the station but only five or so are busy with science generally most of the scientific work in winter boils down to monitoring investigations and observing various processes to be honest science doesn't play the main role here the main idea of our Antarctic activity is geo politics science is just for show our main task is that we have to stake a claim in case of world repetition of station to Lake station okay I'm here I'm going to scape now good luck thanks more than 2,000 kilometres from progress is not another obscure art your mind Alexei arrived here by plane from Cape Town a month ago I even started to study English and set up a computer here Alexei helped me he installed a ton of different programs everything I've planned to have done this as for the atmosphere people and living conditions everything is better than I thought all the kinks are worked out I was really impressed by that the doors swing inward all of them do it means the wind won't wrench it out of your hand and fling it open all houses are placed in a rope with a little tilt from east to west the wind here blows from east to west that's why all of the roads and main trails have rails and ropes so you can hold on to them if it's windy all stations are laid out in roughly the same way they have cabins a mess hall and a galley the first expeditions arrived here by ship as a result marine slang is often used once I called our rooms suites and they burst out laughing they said they were called cabins well ok then a cabin is a cabin the things I've seen in the movies and the things we have here now are completely different we sit here now talking about today's watermelon which was not so tasty and then we retire to our european-style rooms that's an obvious difference the lives of those who built it all up from the very beginning and conquered natured here were completely different [Music] all the while the academic field or F remains bored winter has not begun seasonal workers are still at the station and the members of the old team mix with the new villians shame on me I'm gutted I mean the guys have been practicing all year that's why they destroyed me they will get even with you for the Q I didn't take it out I'm still in my right mind it's hard to grasp what's happening who's coming who's going soon they'll leave you'll leave too and we'll get to know each other there's no need to hurry now it's time to clear things up and answer the main question what changes await us they'll probably happen Antarctica teaches heals and breaks you but it trained you as well I'm much more modest now they ask me all the time why do you go there you idiot you saw it once ok twice there's nothing special about it but no as soon as you come here they tell you look at the iceberg see how it's changed since last time you might think there could be nothing more monumental and timeless than this landscape but it is only transitory this view has changed three times in three days [Music] their last moments of progress the final helicopter is about to take off and then fly a farewell circle around the station [Music] then the ship will sound its horn three times to signal the start of winter for the entire year no one will be able to arrive just as no one is able to leave I still remember that feeling the helicopter made its last farewell circle and was off it was the beginning of winter and only 32 people were left I felt kind of sad that's the third goodbye horn the academic further of moves on the novolazarevskaya station is the last port of call this season it is 2,300 kilometers as the crow flies these final efforts for the departing team they were a chance to reflect upon everything that's happened during their tour of duty that's snow sliding off the dome this is us crossing the crevasse this is a storm warning number two means going out is forbidden we lack a lot of things here no women no trees no traffic lights no traffic police no one to argue with at home you don't even notice such things I'm not sure about the others but I feel lucky even if I never come here again I'll have enough impressions for the rest of my life just because I was here he starts in the middle of winter never again and then you come and here he is even before you partly because they get used to living in a bubble where there are no problems maybe family rows fade from memory they have problems of their own my wife tells me there's a lake and I answer why do you even tell me that how can I help you from here ask your son-in-law let him deal with it they have problems of their own once we return home we'll be buried in problems we might even forget Antarctica they will go back and dive into life at home telling you they will be back they will return they will feel the difference between living here and living there something draws them back they can't help it what do you think if I'm here my wife was barely aware of my expeditions in the last few years we live Tapley it's a pity she died early I was in Antarctica I was not with her I headed the expedition it's a huge responsibility how could I leave it so much had to be done it was so different back then we would go to New Zealand and Australia so I said the children would do everything necessary they would honor her memory and I brought a rock from Antarctica that became her headstone [Music] the novel laserdisc aya stations situation is going to be tough that's what I think recently it's taken a long time to get supplies there we haven't been able to get to it for two years the solid sheet that form the inshore ice belt are known as fast ice they can be up to 2 or 3 metres thick in places to break through the fjord roof has to reverse and then Ram it hard using the full weight of its steel hull a few years ago that happened here there were about four solid miles of fast ice all the way to the shore we were breaking it down for five days I'm hoping for some help from Mother Nature a massive cyclone was due to come through that will generate waves big enough to break the ice we can't cut through so much fast ice by ourselves it's three years old and now and last year we couldn't get through when it was just two it was more than three metres deep then with about a meter of snow on top of that they had no choice but to unload the cargo onto the ice where the Indian Arctic mission usually Moors it's a long way from the Russian station there was about a year's supply of fuel and at that moment Antarctica bared her teeth again a huge chunk of fast ice broke off and almost the whole year's fuel supply for a station was lost to the ocean only four out of ten fuel tanks were left they had to conserve fuel for the whole winter after that now Antarctica has yet another surprise up its sleeve the shore ice that tested and tried the ships endurance as well as the crews patience for two full years has gone by itself forty meters kill the barrier the Fuhrer of heads straight for the barrier the novolazarevskaya stations fuel storage is just a few meters above the shore the notation was chosen as it's the most convenient place to unload 25 meters to the barrier all crew members including the scientists have a part to play in the mooring procedure 2 meters to the barrier keeping such a large ship stable on the glacier is no easy task they must drill into the ice to a depth of around a meter using an ordinary ladle loose ice is manually bailed out an empty gas cylinder comes into play as it offers the best fit timber dries out and breaks too quickly novolazarevskaya is a long way about a hundred kilometres from the shore for the next few days helicopters will transport containers to the station the crew unloads fuel for the aircraft that will head into Antarctica this summer they also drop off fuel for heating during the endless polar winter these barrels will be picked up by the station's vehicles during winter they'll come here dozens of times when there'll be no need to hurry for now though everything has to be done quickly in Antarctica nothing can be put off until tomorrow it's already late autumn and the weather can change at any moment so people work while they can even for 24 hours a day the novelette of sky station calls all hands on deck as well these last days before the beginning are always the busiest especially for those spending their first winter here you have to be sure everything is ready for winter and in the breaks between unloading containers technical details and specifications have to be discussed with your predecessor one last time you have to change the filters here because of the bright moon so be easy take your time things have to be arranged in a proper way we have a new group of specialists here now all of them are young how are they gonna get along with each other I don't know during expedition number 53 those guys didn't get on well you're twenty rights I've voted that yeah he's younger than me I'm the youngest mechanic here I'm the youngest one here on 23 he's only two months older than me only one container remains there's a brief pause as everyone waits for the last helicopter [Music] there's this feeling that something will go wrong and there's nothing you can do about it you'll just have to live with it the whole year no matter what it is everything seems okay now but you worry it will go wrong that's what I felt but gradually it disappeared [Music] in my heart I already feel good here so the only thing is to get along with the new guys and that will be that it'll take a month to get acquainted with them and get used to them only then will I consider it the beginning of winter tomorrow the old team will finally leave and the academic further off will steer north towards her tomorrow winter begins for all of Russian Antarctica what an unsolved mystery for me there's an interesting question what is it that draws me here so much what is it here that's so attractive you understand finally the academic feel that off heads north the Antarctic winter has begun you

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Keywords: Free Documentary, Documentaries, Full documentary, HD documentary, documentary - topic, documentary (tv genre), geology, geology documentary, antartica, Antarctica, antarctica cruise, climate, climate documentary, climate change, travel antarctica, antarctica climate change, south pole, south pole travel, south pole documentary, antarctic station, antarctica station tour, Antarctic, Fyodorov, ice breaker

Id: jDwwWg7fT7M

Length: 52min 16sec (3136 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 09 2020