Claris Law Legal Blogging Community

Editor: James T. Crouse
Profession: Aviation Accident Attorney

Category: Aviation News

For anyone who would like to spend time on Antarctica, the worlds first commercial flight service is now available from Tasmania. This is not, however, the first runway on Antarctica. For years the U.S. Air Force has used McMurdo Base sea-ice runway and when that melts or is too thin to handle the big jets, scientists and staff fly C-130s to the Pegasus land-ice runway and hour away from McMurdo base by SnoCats.

Frieda doubts the weekly flights will draw much of the tourist trade, but these flights will have a tremendous effect on the scientists who are on Antarctica to study the effects of climate change on the continent - the main purpose of this service being to transport scientists and other staff and equipment to this area. The Airbus 319-115LR (LR stands for long range) is capable of flying the 7,500 mile, 9 hour round trip from Hobart, Tasmania without having to refuel. It can carry up 40 passengers and 6.5 tons of cargo.

The new runway, Wilkins Runway, is named after Sir George Hubert Wilkins, an Australian polar explorer, pilot, and geographer. It's 2.5 miles x 330 feet, was cut from glacial ice and laser technology was used for leveling, the "pavement" is snow. Without snow being used as "pavement", the blue ice would absorb heat from the sun, warm up, causing melting and pitting -an unsafe surface for the planes to take off and to land, possibly causing them to slide across the runway. Therefore, the white snow was bonded to the blue ice of the glacier to deflect the sun's rays.

The runway which was started in 2005, cost $42.2 million and three summers to build - the warmest part of the year. Well, guess that's all relative - temperatures went as low and -32F and winds were sometimes the strength of a class 3 hurricane at 155 mph - Frieda doesn't even want to know what the coldest part of the year brings! With these temperatures, no wonder the Upper Peterson Glacier where the runway was built is 2,300 feet thick!

In January, the Governor-General of Australia, Michael Jeffery, described the Wilkins Runway as a remarkable feat of ice engineering. "It is fitting that it is named after Sir George Hubert Wilkins, one of the great pioneers of polar exploration and aviation. He encountered many of the same perils that face our Antarctic aviators today -- ferocious wind, ice and snow blizzards and absolute isolation," Jeffrey said.