Undergraduate researcher Erin Whorton and mountaineer Susan Detweiler use a hand tool to drill holes into the side of Taylor Glacier. Researchers must climb the glacier to place instruments that will record its temperature, movement and melting. Credit: Kristan Hutchison, National Science Foundation

Under an executive order, NSF coordinates and supports U.S. scientific research in Antarctica, a complex task that involves thousands of researchers and many federal agencies. NSF also supports a variety of complex research programs in the Arctic. These missions would be impossible without the aid of a large and varied fleet of aircraft.

Aviation and scientific exploration have progressed together—both historically and logistically.

On December 17, 1903—exactly the same day in history that the Wright Brothers were taking their first halting steps to launch the age of powered flight—the first human beings stepped into the Dry Valleys, the perpetually wind-swept, ice-free areas of Antarctica that today are the focus of scientific curiosity about life in extreme environments. They arrived on foot. Today's scientists working in the Dry Valleys generally arrive via helicopter.

If the Wrights changed the world by opening the skies to human activity, Richard Byrd did no less in opening up the southernmost continent to aviation. His landmark flight to the South Pole in 1929 has made possible spectacular scientific discoveries. As a direct result of Byrd’s milestone, scientists for the past 50 years have enjoyed relatively ready access to Antarctica.

Access Brings Discoveries

The access granted by aircraft has produced discoveries not only about life in the Dry Valleys, but also about the existence and nature of the so-called “ozone hole” over the southern polar region. Their insights about the hole produced a public and political awareness out of which grew policies that may, over time, virtually eliminate the chemical emissions that created the hole (or tear) in the Earth’s protective layer. The policies are expected, within a relatively short time, to allow the damage to heal permanently.

Airlift capacity also enables construction, which in turn enables science. The ability to airlift massive amounts of cargo to the South Pole is allowing the United States to build a new and scientifically advanced station there that will continue to advance astronomer’s knowledge of the nature of the universe, it’s origins and its future.

For example the DASI (Degree Angular Scale Interferometer) telescope peers out into the farthest reaches of the universe, and therefore, "back in time," to produce images of the universe as it would have appeared in its infancy.

Thanks to the pioneering work of Richard Evelyn Byrd, which opened the door to polar aircraft operations in the post-World War II period, more than 90 percent of all scientific literature about Antarctica has been published in the last half-century.

A Natural Marriage

The Twin Otter aircraft, a workhorse in Antarctica, performs missions ranging from aerial surveys of subglacial lakes to acting as an “air ambulance.” Credit: Peter West, National Science Foundation

“Polar aviation and science go hand-in-hand,” according to retired Navy Capt. Brian Shoemaker, who once commanded Naval Support Force Antarctica, which included the Navy squadron that once supported NSF science in Antarctica.

The sheer size of the Polar regions makes aircraft vital for conducting science, Shoemaker notes. Although a great deal of research can be carried out from ships or by vehicle, he adds, “once you start going inland in Antarctica you don’t have any roads. And the situation is similar in the Arctic; you can take ships only so far into the ice pack.”

Shoemaker has interviewed former Polar fliers under an NSF grant to develop an oral history of polar exploration.

“Over the years that marriage has helped to make much of the research in the Arctic and the Antarctic possible,” he notes.

Many of those who flew in the early days of Polar exploration, and Shoemaker himself, were influenced by the experience of working with scientists to study science themselves.

As a helicopter pilot in Antarctica, Shoemaker often was pressed into service to help scientists conduct research. He remembers assisting Anthony Gow, now with the U.S. Army’s Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in New Hampshire, to conduct surveys of the Koelletz Glacier in Antarctica. Shoemaker enjoyed the experience so much that it prompted him to pursue a scientific education.

“Because of that, I went to post-graduate school and went back to the Arctic,” said Shoemaker, who eventually went on to command the Naval Arctic Research Laboratory as well as Naval Support Force Antarctica. “All of that was because of introduction to science that I had in the field.”