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Poland to reopen research station at South Pole

03.11.2021 23:30
A team of geophysicists from the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN) is embarking for Antarctica to reopen the country’s research station at the South Pole after a hiatus of more than four decades, public broadcaster Polish Radio’s IAR news agency reported on Wednesday.
Audio
A team of geophysicists from the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN) is embarking for Antarctica to reopen Polands research station in the South Pole.
A team of geophysicists from the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN) is embarking for Antarctica to reopen Poland’s research station in the South Pole.Pixabay license - Image by Michelle Raponi from Pixabay

The A.B. Dobrowolski Station, established by the Russians and taken over by Poland in 1959, has been inactive since 1979, yet its location in the Bunger Oasis region of the East Antarctic makes it uniquely suitable for comprehensive geophysical research, according to scientists. 

“It’s a unique place on Earth, where you can observe the framework of our planet’s inner core in a way that is unaffected by human activity or by seismic waves induced by the ocean,” said the head of the Polish expedition, Prof. Marek Lewandowski. 

He told Polish Radio that the mission’s goal would be to reopen the A.B. Dobrowolski Station and equip it with solar-powered, automatic measuring apparatus.

The station will thus be able to conduct its own calculations and send them to Warsaw, Lewandowski explained.  

Following a two-month ship voyage, four experienced geophysicists are expected to arrive in the East Antarctic in early January.

For the next two months, they will be carrying out research, before returning to Poland in the spring. 

All four members of the expedition have already taken part in scientific missions to similar regions of the world, the IAR news agency reported.

(pm/gs)

Source: IAR

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