Operation Deep Freeze
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| Activities in Antarctica During the 20th Century | |
|---|---|
| International agreements | |
| Antarctic Treaty System | |
| British Commonwealth activities | |
| Scott's 1st expedition (1901-04) | |
| Shackleton's 1st expedition (1907-09) | |
| Scott's 2nd expedition (1910-13) | |
| Shackleton's 2nd expedition (1914-17) | |
| Shackleton's 3rd expedition (1921-22) | |
| Mawson's expedition (1929-31) | |
| The Graham Land Expedition (1934-37) | |
| Operation Tabarin (1943-45) | |
| Fuch's expedition (1955-58) | |
| French activities | |
| Charcot's 1st expedition (1903-05) | |
| Charcot's 2nd expedition (1908-10) | |
| German activities | |
| Drygalski's expedition (1901-03) | |
| Filchner's expedition (1911-12) | |
| The New Swabia Expedition (1938-39) | |
| Norwegian activities | |
| Amundsen's expedition (1910-12) | |
| U.S. activities | |
| Operation Highjump (1946-47) | |
| Operation Windmill (1947-48) | |
| Ronne's expedition (1947-48) | |
| Operation Deep Freeze (1955-56) | |
The impetus behind these expeditions was the International Geophysical Year 1957–58. IGY, as it was known, was a collaboration effort between forty nations to carry out earth science studies from the North Pole to the South Pole and at points in between. The United States, along with Great Britain, France, Japan, Norway, Chile, Argentina, and the U.S.S.R. agreed to go the South Pole—the least explored area on Earth. Their goal: to advance world knowledge of Antarctic hydrography and weather systems, glacial movements, and marine life. The U.S. Navy was charged with supporting the U.S. scientists for their portion of the IGY studies.
The U.S. Navy already had a record of earlier exploration in Antarctica. As early as 1839, Captain Charles Wilkes led the first U.S. Naval expedition into Antarctic waters. In 1929, Admiral Richard E. Byrd established a naval base at Little America I, led an expedition to explore further inland, and conducted the first flight over the South Pole. From 1934–35, the second Byrd Expedition explored much further inland and also "wintered over". The third Byrd Expedition in 1940 charted the Ross Sea.
After World War II, from 1946–47, Byrd was instrumental in the Navy's Operation Highjump that charted most of the Antarctic coastline. In 1948 Commander Finn Ronne led an expedition that photographed over 450,000 square miles (1.1 million km²) by air. Then, in 1954–55, the icebreaker USS Atka (AGB-3) made a scouting expedition for future landing sites and bays.
Operation Deep Freeze I would prepare a permanent research station and pave the way for more exhaustive research in later Deep Freeze operations. The expedition transpired over the Antarctic summer of November 1955 to April 1956.
The subsequent military support missions to Antarctica, including those conducted today by the 139th Expeditionary Air Wing of the New York Air National Guard, the U.S. Coast Guard icebreakers, the Military Airlift Command and the Military Sealift Command, are also known collectively as Operation Deep Freeze, which is overseen from Christchurch, New Zealand, by an outpost of the U.S. Air Force called Detachment 13.
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External links
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