Ellsworth Station

Ellsworth Station was built by United States Navy Seabees under the command of Captain Finn Ronne,[2] with the support of the icebreakers USS Staten Island and USS Wyandot, captained by Francis Gambacorta.[3][4] The originally planned site for the station was Cape Adams, but when the terrain proved impractical due to huge ice cliffs, an alternate location on Gould Bay was selected,[3] on the western coast of the Weddell Sea over the Filchner Ice Shelf, and close to the Argentinean Belgrano I Base.[5]

Part of the scheduled agenda for the International Geophysical Year, Ellsworth Station was commissioned on 11 February 1957 and less than two years later, on 17 January 1959, was handed over to the Argentinean Antarctic Institute. Along with the handover, the United States government gave all the buildings, facilities, and existing food supplies while Argentina provided the logistical and administrative services necessary for the continued operation of the station.[5] It was agreed that scientists of both countries would work together at the place in technical studies and scientific research.[5]

On 31 December 1959, the Argentinean icebreaker ARA General San Martín was heading to Ellsworth Station to exchange personnel deliver and consumables when it received a SOS signal from the Norwegian–South African exploration ship Polarbjorn, which had gotten stuck in ice. The Argentineans managed to set the ship free so it could follow with its planned route along the coastline, However, the General San Martín was later unable to reach its own primary goal—located on the deepest recess of the Weddell Sea—due to unusually thick pack ice on the target area.[6]

On 6 January 1962, Frigate Captain Hermes Quijada of the Argentine Naval Aviation, leading a two-plane flight of Douglas C-47s, made a stopover at Ellsworth Base before continuing to the South Pole. He became the pilot of the first airplane that had taken off from the Americas, and then landed at the South Pole.[5][7]

Feasibility of the station came into question when structural problems caused by the unstable ice had the base half-sunken during most of the spring.[1] To protect personnel and equipment, Ellsworth base was closed and all of its staff and equipment were evacuated on 30 December 1962, during the 1962–63 antarctic summer campaign.[5] It continued to be inspected periodically by Argentinean exploration teams:[8] it was eventually covered by snow and ice. The Filchner Shelf sector where it was located as split off a giant iceberg, and then it drifted through the Southern Ocean, where the base's remains have been lost at sea.[1]

The original facilities at Ellsworth Station could house over 40 people.

The area is a passage of weather fronts directed towards the north: although they do not precipitate, they do produce strong winds exceeding 200 km/h (120 mph) which radically lower the apparent temperature.[9]

• Argentine Antarctica
• List of Antarctic research stations
• List of Antarctic field camps
• McMurdo Station
• South Pole Station
• Byrd Station
• Palmer Station
• Siple Station
• Operation Deep Freeze
• Brockton Station
• Eights Station
• Plateau Station
• Hallett Station
• Little America V

Citations

Articles

• Papers and Proceedings. Symposium on Antarctic Logistics. Boulder, CO: National Academies. 1963. p. 746. NAP:12264.

Books

• Griffiths, Tom (2007). Slicing the Silence: Voyaging to Antarctica. Harvard University Press. p. 210. ISBN 978-0-674-02633-9.
• Mooney, James L. (1976). Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Government Printing Office. ISBN 978-0-16-002030-8.

• Fundaciòn Marambio – Base Ellsworth (in Spanish)
• Dirección Nacional del Antártico