What are the wonders of Antarctica?
1. Milky white sky
"Milky white sky" is a weather phenomenon in polar regions and one of the natural wonders of Antarctica. It is formed by the interaction between polar low temperature and cold air. When sunlight hits the mirror-like ice, it will immediately reflect to the low-altitude clouds, and countless tiny snow particles in the low-altitude clouds scatter the light like thousands of small mirrors, and then reflect it to the ice on the ground. As a result of this back and forth reflection, a dazzling milky light is produced, forming a long milky white sky with white fog. At this time, there is a seamless space between heaven and earth, and people, vehicles and planes seem to blend into thick milky milk, and all the scenery can be seen, and the direction is difficult to distinguish. People's line of sight will have an illusion, and they can't tell the close view from the distant view, and they can't tell the size of the scene. In severe cases, it can make people dizzy and even lose consciousness and die.
The milky white sky is an enemy of polar explorers, scientists and polar aircrafts. If you encounter it, it is very dangerous. The skier who is skiing will suddenly fall down, the moving vehicle will suddenly turn over and cause trouble, and the flying plane will lose control and crash. Such tragic events are common in the history of Antarctic exploration and investigation. In 1958, at Elsvaughn base, a helicopter pilot suddenly lost control and crashed to death because of this terrible bad weather. In 1971, an American who flew an LC——13 Hercules plane met the milky sky 2 kilometers away from Treadlier, suddenly lost contact and his whereabouts have been unknown.
Although the milky white sky is dangerous to human activities in Antarctica, it can be avoided as long as targeted training and safety precautions are taken in advance. Once you encounter it, you will detour to avoid it; People and vehicles engaged in outdoor activities should stay where they are, keep warm and wait patiently for the milky white sky to disappear, or rescuers will come to rescue them.
2. Extreme day and night
Extreme day and night are one of the wonders of Antarctica. It gives people a richer reverie about this mysterious land. The so-called extreme day means that the sun never sets and the sky is always bright. This phenomenon is also called white night. The so-called extreme night is the opposite of extreme day. The sun never comes out and the sky is always dark. In the high latitudes of Antarctica, there is no life rhythm of "sunrise and sunset", and there is no 24-hour day and night alternation. The time of alternating day and night changes with the increase of latitude. The higher the latitude, the longer the extreme day and night. At 9 degrees south latitude, that is, at the South Pole, the alternation of day and night is half a year, that is to say, the alternation of day and night there is a whole year, and half a year is a continuous day and half a year is a continuous night, and one day there is equivalent to a year in other continents. If you leave the South Pole, the lower the latitude, it will no longer be a half-year day or a half-year night, and the time of extreme day and night will gradually shorten. At 8 south latitude, there are also days outside the extreme day and night when the day and night change within 24 hours a day. If you are at the end of the extreme day, at first, the night time is very short, then the night time is getting longer and longer, until finally it is all night, and the extreme night begins. In the Antarctic circle (66 3' south latitude), only one whole day (24 hours) in a year is full of day and one whole day is full of night. China Antarctic Great Wall Station (62 3' south latitude) is located outside the Antarctic circle. At one or two o'clock in the middle of the night in December, the sky is still bright, and people with good eyesight can read and write. This natural phenomenon of extreme day and night also appears in the other pole of the earth, but it appears at the opposite time to the South Pole. If the North Pole is in extreme day, the South Pole is extremely night, and vice versa.
The formation of extreme day and night is caused by the earth's rotation around its own inclined axis when it revolves around the sun in an elliptical orbit. It turns out that when the earth rotates, the axis of the earth forms an inclination angle of about 23.5 with its vertical line, so there are six months when the earth revolves, and one of the poles always faces the sun, all during the day; The other pole is far away from the sun, and it is all night. This magical natural phenomenon of South and North Pole is not found in other continents.
3. Antarctic volcano
If fire and water are incompatible, ice and fire are even more incompatible. However, in Antarctica, glaciers and volcanoes exist at the same time, which sounds a bit incredible. There are two active volcanoes on the Antarctic continent, namely, the volcano on Deception Island and the volcano on Elapus Island on Ross Island. Deception Island volcano erupted in February, 1969, which instantly reduced the scientific research station there to ashes. Until now, people are still worried about it.
4. Antarctic Oasis
The Antarctic continent is covered with ice and snow all year round, and nothing grows. Why is there an oasis? There is something strange about this.
The so-called "oasis" is not a common place of lush trees and flowers, but refers to the exposed rock areas on the Antarctic continent without ice and snow cover. Because Antarctic researchers live and work in the white world of ice and snow for many years, the monotonous, boring and boring environment makes them yearn for the colorful world. When they find places that are not covered with ice and snow, they can't help but feel cordial, so they call these places the oasis of Antarctica. The Antarctic oasis accounts for about 5% of the Antarctic area, including dry valleys, lakes, volcanoes and peaks. Bangor Oasis, McMurdo Oasis and Antarctic Peninsula Oasis are the most famous.
With regard to the origin and cause of formation of oases, scientists believe that oases are all located in volcanic active areas, so they are related to volcanoes. For example, McMurdo Oasis is near the famous Mount Erebus, and volcanic eruption and associated geothermal activities are important reasons for the formation of oases. Of course, the formation of oasis is also related to solar radiation and the color of rocks. For example, the Antarctic Peninsula Oasis is located outside the polar circle, with long sunshine time and high temperature. In addition, it is basically a reddish-brown igneous area, which has the best conditions for the formation of oasis. Oasis is a valuable window for scientific research, which has important scientific value for revealing this mysterious continent.
5. Snow blindness
There is a magical "white light" on the Antarctic continent. This white light has killed many brave explorers. According to some articles, when people see this strong white light, their eyes can't see anything. As a result, the galloping skier fell down on the snow because of blindness, and the driver of the vehicle or plane often caused accidents, even the car cover was destroyed.
In p>1958, over the Ellsworth base in Antarctica, the pilot of a helicopter suddenly encountered this white light, and his eyes suddenly went blind. The plane lost control and crashed into the snow field. Chilean Antarctic explorer Caare? Radahl, once went out to work, accidentally didn't wear sunglasses and met white light. He felt a light entity moving towards him, first rosy, then flesh-colored. At this time, his eyes were very painful, as if someone had sprinkled a handful of lime into his eyes, and then he could not see anything. Fortunately, his companions found him and took him back to the base. It took three days for my eyesight to recover.
Mountaineers and scientific expedition members who are active in the snow-covered areas of alpine glaciers are a little careless and forget to wear sunglasses, and their eyes are often stung by the reflection of snow, and even they are temporarily blind. This phenomenon is called "snow blindness" in medicine.
Snow blindness is a disease in which the retina of human eyes is temporarily blind after being stimulated by strong light. Generally, after a few days' rest, your eyesight will recover on its own. People who have been snow blind will get snow blindness again if they don't pay attention. The symptoms of snow blindness will be more serious again, so you must not be careless. Repeated snow blindness gradually weakens people's eyesight, causing long-term eye diseases, and even blindness forever in severe cases.
So, who is the culprit of snow blindness? It turns out that snow has a high reflectivity to sunlight. The so-called reflectivity refers to the ability of any object surface to reflect sunlight. This reflective ability is usually expressed as a percentage. For example, the reflectivity of an object is 45%, which means that 45% of the solar radiation received by the surface of the object is reflected. The reflectivity of snow is extremely high, and the reflectivity of pure new snow surface can be as high as 95%. In other words, 95% of solar radiation is re-reflected by snow surface. At this time, the snow surface is almost close to the sun's light. How can the retina of the naked eye withstand the stimulation of such strong light?
On the vast snowfield in Antarctica, the snow surface in some places is slightly sunken, like the concave surface of a searchlight. In such a place, white light may appear. The snow surface with white light is of course more concentrated and intense than the sunlight reflected by ordinary snow surface. Under normal circumstances, the snow surface does not directly reflect sunlight into people's eyes like a mirror, but stimulates the eyes through the scattering of the snow surface. The human eye will also get snow blindness after being stimulated by this scattered light for a long time. Therefore, sometimes even on cloudy days, people who have been moving on the snow for a long time without sunglasses will temporarily lose their eyes.
6. Extremely cold
The Antarctic is the coldest place in the world, and it can be called the "world cold pole". The average temperature near the South Pole is MINUS 49 degrees Celsius, and it can reach MINUS 8 degrees Celsius in cold season.
There are no four seasons in Antarctica, namely warm season and cold season. Even in the warm season from November to March, the average monthly temperature in the Antarctic inland is between MINUS 34 and MINUS 2 degrees Celsius. As for the cold season from April to October every year, the temperature in the Antarctic inland is generally between MINUS 4 and MINUS 7 degrees Celsius.
Such cold weather is a terrible threat to human beings and all life. In the Antarctic, cases of frostbite and disability due to cold are frequent. The "Antarctic Survival Guide" specially compiled by the National Science Foundation of the United States for Antarctic expedition members specifically warned: "Today's Antarctic operations, facial frostbite (tissue frostbite) is the most common, and hands, feet and other exposed parts of the skin will also be frostbitten."
We should not be indifferent to the extreme cold in Antarctica. Why is the Antarctic so cold? This is because the Antarctic ice sheet is like a giant mirror, reflecting 9% of the heat radiated by the sun back into space. In the cold season of Antarctica, the sun rarely shows up, and the Antarctic earth absorbs very little heat. But in the warm season, although the sun lingers on the horizon all day, the snow-white ice sheet surface refuses to accept the heat of the sun. As a result, the Antarctic is a desolate scene with nine days of cold and frozen land all year round.
7. Killing wind
There is a saying among Antarctic expedition members: the cold in Antarctica may not kill people, but the wind in Antarctica kills people. It sounds incredible that wind energy kills people. Is it that serious? You may ask such a question. However, those who have experienced severe storms all talk about the change of wind color.
Antarctic sand invades the "wind pole" of the world, and some people call Antarctica "the hometown of snowstorms". The cold Antarctic ice sheet is the maternity bed for breeding storms. It is like a machine that makes cold air, cooling the air with the body of ice and snow all the time, and breeding storms. Because the Antarctic continent is a plateau whose central part is uplifted and inclined to all sides, once the heavy cold air swoops down all around along the smooth surface of the Antarctic plateau, it suddenly becomes violent and dark, and a terrible polar storm will exert its power. At this time, snow and ice are rolling with sand from the slippery ice slope, just like an invisible waterfall, like a rushing torrent. People in the storm are just like a leaf and a stone in the rapid running water, and they can't stand still. A Japanese expedition member was blown into an icicle in a snowstorm and lost his life.
so how big is the Antarctic wind? What we usually call a 12-level typhoon has a wind speed of 32.6 m/s, which is big enough, right? However, the strong winds in Antarctica often exceed the 12-level typhoon. In the Antarctic Peninsula, Ross Island and the Antarctic continent, the wind speed often reaches more than 55.6 m/s, and sometimes even reaches 83.3 m/s!
In the scientific stations of various countries in Antarctica, storms are often encountered. Especially in the cold and dark winter, the howling wind destroyed houses, knocked down communication towers, swept away vehicles, and even turned a science station into ruins. Therefore, in order to investigate the safety of personnel, scientific stations in Antarctic countries have strict regulations, and it is absolutely forbidden to go out when the wind is strong, and all outdoor activities are not allowed. Usually, when going out, two people must form a group and give each person a mountaineering bag, which contains high-frequency phones, food, duck down sleeping bags, sponge pads, shovels and other items to maintain personal survival. Around the Antarctic scientific research stations in various countries, there are "shelters" of different sizes. There are food, drinks, fuel, communication equipment, small generators, heating stoves, sleeping bags and other daily necessities. Scientists visiting abroad can hide in the nearest shelter once they encounter a sudden snowstorm and can't get back to their station for a while. The door of the refuge is unlocked, regardless of nationality. "Antarctic people" can enter the refuge of any country for accommodation, and just leave a message of thanks when they leave.
In order to ensure that the investigators don't get lost, stakes must be buried and thick ropes must be drawn on the roads between the main buildings of the science station. In case of a snowstorm, the team members can walk with ropes to prevent them from being blown away by the snowstorm. So the Antarctic expedition members called these ropes "Antarctic life-saving ropes".
8. Ice cracks
Our planet is a blue planet in the vast universe, and the magical water of life endows it with the most beautiful appearance. However, water at the two poles of the earth can't bear the extreme cold of the polar regions, and it condenses into a white world.
If we have the opportunity to fly over the Antarctic, we will find that the Antarctic continent is a plateau that rises in the middle and slopes slowly around. The huge and deep ice layer is like a big silver pot cover, which is upside down on the Antarctic land, so it is also called the Antarctic ice sheet. The thickness of the Antarctic ice sheet is quite amazing, with an average thickness of 2, meters, and the thickest place is 4,8 meters. Especially when the Antarctic winter comes, the continental ice sheet is connected with the fixed sea ice in the surrounding ocean, forming a white ice sheet of 33 million square kilometers, covering an area more than the entire African continent.
Because the Antarctic ice sheet is so big and so thick, its mass is certainly considerable. On the vast ice sheet, most of the land is buried under the deep ice, except for a few towering peaks with a sharp peak and steep ridge. In fact, the crust of the Antarctic continent was so heavy that it sank by 6 ~ 1 meters.
The highest point of the Antarctic ice sheet is about 51 degrees south latitude and 75 degrees east longitude, and it is at an altitude of 4,2 meters, from which it leans around. Due to gravity, the movement of the ice sheet to the bottom of the arc cracks the ice sheet, and the ice sheet is densely covered with countless ice cracks hidden under the snow and invisible to the naked eye.
These ice cracks that are densely distributed in the plains are more terrible than snowstorms. These ice cracks, which are thousands of meters deep and change from white to blue, are filled with white gas, like opened magic bottles. The team members call them "the gates of hell", that is, if they fall, they will never be saved. The most dangerous thing is that there is a thin ice layer called ice bridge on some ice cracks. People on the ice can't see whether there are ice cracks below, and only when people or vehicles pass by will they collapse.
During the sampling and monitoring inspection of Grove Mountain, two team members went out on snowmobiles. When the motorcycle suddenly sank while driving, the players in the back seat hurriedly propped up the ice with their feet, while the players in the front seat subconsciously slammed the throttle. When they just rushed onto the ice, an ice seam wider than the body collapsed behind them. Facing the white-faced looming hole behind them, the two expedition members who made a turn between life and death broke out in a cold sweat in the cold wind of MINUS 3 degrees in Antarctica.