Unusual facts about Antarctica that few people know about (19 photos)

Antarctica is a snowy and ice-covered continent that still holds many mysteries. For obvious reasons, its study is difficult, and also not very promising from an economic point of view. However, who knows - maybe we will still see domed cities among the eternal ice?





The largest glacier in the world is in Antarctica

We are talking about the Lambert Glacier, which is located in East Antarctica. Its width is 30-120 km, its length is more than 400 km, and its thickness reaches 2500 meters! It is so huge that about 8% of all the ice on the continent is concentrated in it alone.



In the minds of ordinary people, a glacier is a thick layer of ice that lies motionless on the ground. Yes, some glaciers are like that. But as a rule, they are constantly in motion. Specifically, our hero is moving at a speed of about 1 km/year towards the ocean.

Antarctica is the windiest continent

Some of the windiest places are on Barrow Island (Australia), or on Tornado Alley (North America). But on average, the winds blow stronger in Antarctica. The average wind speed on the continent of eternal cold is 75 m/sec.





One of the windiest places can be called Commonwealth Bay. Wind gusts here often reach 240 m/sec. This fact is even included in the Guinness Book of Records.

There are many reasons why the wind is so raging in Antarctica. First of all, it is the flat nature of the terrain, as well as the high difference between the central and peripheral parts of the continent, which is why it has a somewhat convex shape.

The largest ice shelf is in Antarctica

An ice shelf is, roughly speaking, a large piece of ice that floats on water or partially rests on the seabed. The largest ice shelf is the Ross Ice Shelf.



Its length from south to north is about 800 km, and at its thickest point the glacier is almost 1 km thick. The total area of ​​the natural formation is about 500,000 km².

The Ross Ice Shelf is a fidget, its western part is moving at a speed of up to 3 meters per day. Sometimes giant chunks break off from the giant, which then drift for many years in the open ocean. These chunks are called icebergs. Here's one of them, read below ⬇

The world's largest iceberg broke off from Antarctica

We're talking about an iceberg with the code name B-15. It broke off from the Ross Ice Shelf in 2000. Its dimensions were 295×37 km, or 11,000 km² - this is larger than the area of ​​Jamaica (10,990 km²) and slightly smaller than Qatar (11,300 km²). And the mega-iceberg weighed 3 trillion tons.



And why is iceberg mentioned in the subjunctive mood? Because it… melted ???? The iceberg broke into separate pieces, which melted in about 20 years.

In Antarctica there are… subglacial mountains

The Gamburtsev Mountains are a range of steep peaks that rise almost 3,000 meters in places and stretch 1,200 km into the continent. Well, mountains and mountains, so what? The only problem is that the Gamburtsev Mountains are completely buried under a thick crust of ice.



The Gamburtsev Mountains are some of the oldest on planet Earth. They were formed about 1 billion years ago. Even before the last mass glaciation, the mountains were almost completely destroyed. But about 250-100 million years ago, they began to grow again. However, in the Eocene period (35-33 million years ago), Antarctica began to rapidly become covered with an ice crust. So the mountains disappeared under a thick layer of ice.

There is a huge subglacial lake in Antarctica

Subglacial lakes are nothing new. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of them in Antarctica. But there is one that is truly unique.

Lake Vostok is one of the largest subglacial lakes in the world, located in East Antarctica, under more than 4 kilometers of ice. It was discovered in 1957 by the Soviet Antarctic expedition. The lake has an area of ​​about 16,000 km², a depth of about 1,200 meters, and contains about 5,400 km³.



It is considered one of the most isolated bodies of water on Earth, its waters have not been in contact with the atmosphere for… millions of years!

In 2012, Russian scientists drilled a borehole all the way to the surface of Vostok. Samples showed that the lake's waters could theoretically be home to not only microbes, but also more advanced organisms, including even fish.

There may be a giant canyon in Antarctica

After analyzing satellite images and remote sensing data, scientists at Durham University have suggested that there may be a giant canyon beneath the Princess Elizabeth Land ice.



The length of the proposed canyon is 1,000 km, and the depth is approximately 1,000 m. It may also contain a huge subglacial lake.

There is a volcano in Antarctica

And not just any volcano, but an active volcano! We are talking about Erebus, which is located on Ross Island. The height of the volcano is 3794 m - it is the second highest mountain peak on the continent, and it is the southernmost volcano in the world.



Erebus is not as violent as Vesuvius, its eruptions are not as impressive as our Klyuchevskaya Sopka. It rather smokes like a chimney - a rather impressive column of smoke almost always rises above the top of the volcano.

Antarctica has an "indigenous" population

Antarctica has never been inhabited, who would want to live in a freezer?! The only exceptions are the employees of scientific stations, but here they work on a rotational basis.

However, in 1979, a baby's cry was heard on the continent of eternal cold. Argentine Emilio Marco Palma became the first person to be born in Antarctica.



The world's first "Antarctician" was born at the Argentine station "Esperanza". His pregnant mother, Maria Silvia de Palma, was brought to the station specifically to give birth to a child. But why the Argentine authorities needed to expose the woman to serious threats is not very clear. Either it was a PR stunt, or Argentina wanted to strengthen its rights to part of Antarctica.



One way or another, Emilio is fine. In this photo, he is already an adult.

Although, if you compare it to the Norwegian Solveig Gunbjørg Jacobsen, the first child born in Antarctica was born in 1913 on South Georgia Island. But not everyone considers the island to be part of Antarctica, so it's "not a big deal".

Jacobsen and Palma are not the last "Antarctica residents". In total, about ten children have already been born on the continent of eternal cold.

Antarctica - a tourist attraction

We are used to the idea that Antarctica is the abode of stern scientists with beards. In fact, the continent has long become a tourist attraction.

Tourists began visiting the continent and its surrounding waters back in the 60s of the last century. At first, these were sea cruises: people simply gazed from the deck of ships at the majestic icebergs.



Later, tourist routes appeared that involved landing directly on the mainland. As a rule, tourists' acquaintance with Antarctica is limited to visiting coastal oases like the Schirmacher Oasis.

As you can easily guess, this is not a cheap pleasure. If you can't even afford Abkhazia, then you'll have to forget about Antarctica. A trip there will cost several tens of thousands of dollars

There are polar nights and days in Antarctica

If there are polar nights and days in the North Pole area, then it is logical to assume that there are also polar nights and days in the South Pole area, because Antarctica is one large circumpolar zone.



Polar nights on the continent last from April to August. During this time, the sun does not rise above the horizon. The polar day lasts from September to March. During this period, the sun does not set below the horizon.

Polar nights and days in Antarctica occur due to the tilt of the earth's axis by 23.5 degrees. This means that during the year one of the Earth's poles is tilted either towards the Sun or away from it.

Antarctica is a paradise for meteorite seekers

It's very simple. Almost the entire continent is snow-white plains. No forests, rivers, or grassy ravines. It's hard for meteorites to get lost here.



Because of the very dry climate, metal meteorites are less susceptible to corrosion, which has a positive effect on their preservation.

In addition, for obvious reasons, there are very few seekers of celestial wanderers here. So, a meteorite hunter, especially if he has a metal detector at hand, will have a real treat in Antarctica.

There is a non-freezing lake in Antarctica

We are talking about a lake with the poetic name Don Juan, which is located in the McMurdo Dry Valleys.



This is a tiny body of water, actually just a large puddle, with an area of ​​0.03 km². At the moment, Don Juan is almost dry, water remains only in a few hollows ????



The lake does not freeze even at -53 °C. This natural wonder has a logical explanation - salt. The McMurdo Dry Valleys have an extremely dry climate. Meltwater formed from the melting of nearby glaciers quickly evaporates, and the minerals dissolved in it, including salts, remain in the lake.

The salt content in Don Juan reaches 40.2%. For comparison: in the famous Dead Sea this figure is 34.7%.

There are fleas in Antarctica, but no reptiles

Antarctica is one big desert. But even in the harshest desert there is a place for life. Antarctica is no exception.

Readers immediately thought of penguins. Yes, they are the main inhabitants of the continent. There are four species of them here. The bird kingdom is also represented by several species of seabirds such as Arctic terns and skuas.



Royal penguin.

Crucian dolphins live in coastal waters, and various species of pinnipeds such as leopard seals crawl ashore. There are no polar bears here. They live in the Arctic ????

But most of all there are arthropods, as many as 130 species. True, they are represented mainly by such literally creatures as lice, ticks and fleas. As you might guess, these are parasites of birds.

On the continent of eternal cold there was a place for penguins, seals, lice and fleas. But there are no reptiles, like amphibians, here at all.

Dinosaurs once lived in Antarctica

It is hard to imagine now, but once upon a time in place of the ice there was a rustling taiga and rustling lush thickets of ferns, in which not only fleas and lice lived, but also larger animals. For example, ankylosaurs.



Something like this.

They lived in Antarctica in the Cretaceous period. They were large herbivorous lizards covered in thick horny plates. They grew such armor for a reason. The future continent of eternal cold was home to predatory dinosaurs, among other things.

For example, in the Jurassic period, the life of the local fauna was poisoned by the cryolophosaurus. It was a huge predator like a tyrannosaurus. It lived in Antarctica 199.3-182.7 million years ago.



We can only guess how dinosaurs would have evolved in Antarctica. Maybe they would have acquired thick fur and become warm-blooded. The Chicxulub meteorite put an end to the dinosaurs' history. And then Antarctica finally froze and became covered with a thick crust of ice. This happened about 34 million years ago.