Antarctica Unit 3

Flying above the edge of the ice shelf. This is an example of what can break and form into icebergs.

What's next

• WORK - Answer the Postcard from Antarctica question sheet and hand it in

• Research and human interaction

The true South Pole: the post needs to be moved some tens of meters every year due to ice motion. In the background the dome hosting the base is visible

McMurdo, the main American base, is also the biggest Antarctic base, holding up to 3000 persons in summer. MacTown, as it's locally known, is ugly.

Mt Erebus, the only active volcano of Antarctica, also the largest, and the most typical landmark of McMurdo.

C130s parked on the airstrip. There can be as many as 10 of those, ferrying people and equipment back and forth between Christchurch (NZ), McMurdo, South Pole

Research – view videos and answer question sheet

• ..\..\..\..\..\My Videos\Geography\Antartica\cc11_icecores.flv

• ..\..\..\..\..\My Videos\Geography\Antartica\Video Australian Antarctic Division.flv

• ..\..\..\..\..\My Videos\Geography\Antartica\Beneath the Frozen World - Cousteau in Antarctica.flv

Problems

• Whaling• Global Warming• Human impact

Construct a graph showing how whaling changed in Antarctica

Work – hand in the graph and the questions

• Looking at the table and the graph you have drawn what do you notice?– When were most whales killed (years)?– What type of whale was mainly killed?– Whaling has not stopped but the type has changed why?– Why did the type of whales killed change over the years?

– Any other comments?

Global Warming - Antarctica’s role as the world’s ‘weather engine’.

• Cold Antarctic air moves north and is replaced by southward moving air, which cools as it moves south. In this way, Antarctica regulates the world’s air temperature and its wind patterns.

• The Southern Ocean is one of the few places on Earth where carbon dioxide is moved from the atmosphere and carried to the depths of the ocean.

• The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) is the world’s biggest ocean current and the only one to circle the globe. It distributes vast amounts of heat, water, salt and carbon dioxide to all of the world’s oceans, influencing the climates of all the world’s land masses.

Thinner to thicker

The hole in the Ozone Layer = the lavender part

Air temperatures increases Sea ice melts

Ocean absorbs sunlightOcean releases heat to atmosphere

Why Antarctica is melting

In March 2000, an 1100-sqkm iceberg broke off from the ice shelf and then rotated in the ocean currents, trapping sea ice near to shore. The build-up in sea ice in the Ross Sea increased the distance between the rich waters of the seas and the penguincolonies on land. Fewer Adelie penguin chicks survived into the following year and the emperor penguins at Cape Crozier failed to produce any chicks at all. Icebergs break from the edges of ice shelves continually in a process known as calving. This particular iceberg was the largest floatingobject ever recorded and, though it may have been produced partially.

Air New Zealand Flight 901 (TE901) was a scheduled Antarctic sightseeing flight from Auckland New Zealand. The Antarctic sightseeing flights were operated with McDonnell Douglas DC10 30 aircraft and began in February 1977, with this being the 14th flight. On the 28/11/1979 the flight crashed in Antarctica, killing all 237 passengers and 20 crewmembers aboard.

Choose one of the following

1. Roald Amundsen2. Sir Ernest Shackleton3. Robert Falcon Scott4. Douglas Mawson• Create a presentation about their most

famous exploration of Antarctica.