onto the ship from the station they need to hurry winter begins tomorrow. used to be the soviet union. station. now it only works during the summer. in the southern hemisphere someone starts in december and ends in much. so seasonal operations are over. geological samples are gathered during the summer a loaded into containers. full water is drained from the station and windows are boarded up and filled in with insulation. is given even the slightest chance to sneak in it will be impossible to dig it out.

the diesel generator was the last to be shutdown no one can survive without heat. takes just a few hours to complete. the station is ready for winter. comfortable flight people to make feel. good to see good to see you back here they told us you would come you're here and fortune is smiling upon us again everything's going to be great.

i'm going to be eighty five in april now i only go to the doctor. and antarctica. i'm drawn towards it my wife isn't even aware of these expeditions in the last few years. rushes expeditions to antarctica from cape town south africa while the ship stays in port for a few days the team members enjoy some time off. many of them want to take a tour to the cape of good hope. unfortunately there's not enough space on the bus so the polar explorers decide to draw lots to determine who gets to go. in the soviet era to get to antarctica it wasn't enough to just be lucky you needed

a relevant experience with drift ice in the arctic as well as recommendations there was no other way to reach the southernmost continent today it's enough to send your resume to the arctic and antarctic research institute along with a clean bill of health. just two days ago both the new comers and both are heading to antarctica for the first time they get to spend the whole winter together at the nova lot of gas station. did me. i heard about it. but i just put it on the back burner at the time it wasn't what i was dreaming about constantly. i wasn't even thinking about antarctica six months ago. i was pretty scared about two days before we were meant to leave. i didn't feel that way but when you actually realize it's here when the data set and your dream

is ready to come true it's tough. what's next i don't know if i like it i'll keep doing it but if. they will both flying to antarctica from cape town. the landing strips can only operate for short periods. the weather is too unreliable and the distance too great. for example even in early autumn the temperature at the station falls to sixty degrees below zero skids can get no traction when the snow is that cold. in a month's time the academic field will deliver a year's worth of food and fuel for the station. we'll spend the winter the ship is a floating headquarters. of the seasonal expedition. and the head of the winter team. right now i spend less time at home.

of course my family is waiting for me back home but i think they get fed up with me after a while but. they are used to living with me just the way it is. gave me one toilet roll he told me it would be enough until i get home i said for a year and he answered when i say home i mean. those who are experienced are already used to it the newcomers have this mix of romanticism and pragmatism. i used to be a bureaucrat. seriously but at some point i just started to feel better antarctica was the only thing that was true and real. from some petersburg and. from fall of the i'm going to spend the whole year at the

progress research station. time to clear things up and answer the main question who am i what changes await us probably happened. this is antarctica. kind of uncomfortable after the ship right. was one of the pioneers of russian antarctica there was nothing here except a rock before the first generation of explorers with plenty of experience in the north pole landed here on the southern continent. i don't know how low. it was but to russian stations from the ground up he spent almost every winter here our first

joy decks position was number nineteen. this is a good keeping up with tradition of photographing each winter team it's really good. come to check up on the progress station after it's reconstruction it's recently been named the capital of the russian expedition. are you happy i can see that compared to other stations here this place is having. the most important event in the life of a station is stuff rotation. everybody. twenty five people will be spending this winter at the progress station. i'm johnny. the head of the station is like a ship's captain he is responsible for everything without his permission no one can

leave the station a little later they'll be given a mandatory briefing although many of them don't need it this is not their first winter here. hello there. so who knows our place is dear i do. ok doctor so. you know your place is. david doctor says. doctor to. take this one it will be your room. all stations are laid out in rough. the same way they have. galley. the first expedition ship as a result. and everyone takes their routine

tasks. this is absolutely a second home. you don't have to feel that it's a temporary. when you're here you have to feel a year is a long time. it's not so easy to live here for a year. yet i'm waiting on my partner he's probably busy with science right now. today the whole station is focused on the same job. brought in by helicopter from the i could. together the team is made up of a few scientists a chef. and others responsible for maintaining the research station it's easy to see who's already spent a year here. there are no women here why should i shave. it's

really difficult to spend a year with just. my never smoked before but i started to became the head of the station because they were always complaining. someone with their mouth open or someone doesn't wash their socks or someone snores or someone said something inappropriate about their wife or mother complaints every single day. women do not spend winter at the russian stations married couples were brought here several times as an experiment but it didn't work out. they sent an engineer his wife was a cook it was hard work. to care or have a bags and lots of meat. of course she couldn't do it so he had to draw more he was doing and help her. he couldn't do his job because of that because he had to help

her. and that's even touching the deeper psychological issues. there are two cooks here the weather may change but lunch can never be postponed. here. steak with onions and mushrooms. frighten beef liver. sausages. i always say guys why do you love sausages so much look we've got steak i love francaise liver oh these cutlets what is it with sausages. some know what they do is they put all the good stuff on one plates and then come back with another plate and take two more sausages it doesn't matter. after consulting with the cook the station has to buy food for example instead of

buying lemons it's better to get limes they stay fresh longer experience has taught them ways to keep goods fresh for a whole year. eggs can be preserved for a whole year if you turn them every ten days that way the yolk won't dry up and go bad space should be left between bags to keep onions but it's impossible to say how long a cabbage can stay fresh if that one time i peeled it all the way to the center and i wrapped each one in paper after like they used to in old time but it didn't help it kept going off i wrapped each cabbage head but there were no changes so i don't know that is why it stays in its string bag now if it starts rotting and eat it quickly. antartica teaches hills and breaks but it trains you as well so i'm much more modest now.

but this is my sixth winter here it's been nine years in antarctica already they ask me all the time why do you go there you idiot you saw it once ok twice there's nothing special about it. people change that's true they do. first of all when they go back home they're already dreaming of returning to here again. you might think there could be nothing more monumental and timeless than the view of this landscape. but it is only temporary and over three days the view will change at least three times.

the. place it was a. very hard to make a. once again long there is a place like that that would that make their lives. a little. bit let's. just say. what if.

i took. six. the books the book.

the book . dramas that can't be ignored to the. stories others refuse to notice. the faces change lights never. told picture of today's blog pundits from around the globe.

look to. just a few days remain for the summer team to hand over to their winter colleagues former bureaucrat johnny spent a year studying magnate ology really wanted to come to the antarctic every station has its own magnetic room there are no metallic objects in such rooms the temperature is kept stable at approximately twenty five degrees celsius a computer constantly records changes and time has to be accurate to the nano second clocks must be adjusted in a very special way. for three days we can only take notes there's no time to make changes. dreamed about and talk to several years for example if we take

a comp in russia it will show us north that way but if you take it here it will show north that way even though it's that way if we follow the compass as we used to do it in russia we won't end up in india. but in chile south america she. as a student he proposed his own geological theory it was important to go to antarctica to collect the data he needed. i didn't find anything new for. here there are no influence like t.v. or anything like this. you have to sit and think. simply sitting and thinking you should learn. to keep his instruments in a corner of the same room his job is to monitor high altitude conditions. to be

sent to an institute in st petersburg and the equipment needs regular adjustment. in fact every. specifics such details are handed down to each new generation of polar explorer. information to a console at the station. is very important we make charts for aircraft like helicopters fly for instance similar balloons are released all over the world at midnight g.m.t. russian polar explorers of long invented new ways to make the process more efficient such as how to make them easier to release. it is so short but we can still set up the balloon like this there's about fifty meters of rope here how to make it go. in a mixture of kerosene and benzene that. we came up with it makes it fly

higher it can fly up to thirty kilometers. without it it will only go as high as twenty two. other countries don't care so much. less. and how to make it faster they're inflated with hydrogen. there's a rope down there it's all reference point i can check the top point of the balloon by using that there we go. today none of the scientists remember who actually came up with these ideas. from arctic experience it was our own atmospheric scientists who invented them. not every antarctic station has its own atmospheric scientist but all of them have a meteorologist he doesn't get the chance to get eight hours of sleep because he has to submit weather data every six months and he has to go to the weather station

every day. has a sort of utilitarian value. let's take the weather day as an example you know if we have all the data and the prediction and work out. and there will be no information from that anymore and i think you. are used to. generally almost all of the scientific. comes down to monitoring investigations and observing different processes. doesn't play the main role here. we.

have to make sure we have a claim here. at the program. but the polar explorers don't like it. used to going to the remote. seems to taste better. than. water here is the same after distillation and because of the lack of minerals. from dental problems. better to fill it. table and forget to take. any more. pull my teeth out all the time here i've lost four in this room alone

it's my sacrifice. station. but thankfully this month. medical emergencies. even started to study english set up a computer here help me he installed a ton of different programs everything i've done. usually i don't have time for anything or to think. about anything seriously but here we have an opportunity to stop and think it's the first step was the most important thing to me. after a month settled into station life which works to

a strict. one meteorologist one narrowing just one seismologist physicist we still have plenty of work to do no one will do it for you . kinks are worked out i was really impressed by that. swing and word. means the way that he won't wrench it out of your hand and fling it open. all houses are placed in a room with a little tilt from east to west the wind here blows from east to west that's why all of the roads and main trails have rails and ropes so you can hold onto them if it's windy. i called our rooms suites and they burst out laughing. they said they were called cabins. well ok then the cabin is

a cabin. after a month alexei has a little more experience and can do his research. to investigate the climate he has to make a range of observations of the sky researching lunar reflections. and solar phenomena today is the last day to check the technical details with the help of his predecessor. you know you have to change the filters here because of the bright moon so be easy take your time things have to be arranged in a proper way. tomorrow he'll leave the rest of the old crew and the new will begin their winter tour of duty. we have a new group of specialists here now all of them are young how are they going to get along with each other i don't know.

how old are you twenty. i'm the youngest engineer here i'm twenty three i'm the youngest one here. or here by two months. these last few days before winter always the busiest is when the men have to stock up a year's worth of infantry they work all day long. so yeah so there's a great deal to do and plenty of containers to unload. all of them are waiting for the last helicopter. in my heart i already feel good here. the only thing is to get along with the new guys that will be. take a month to get acquainted with and get used to them be shortly after that i'll consider the beginning of winter. after fifty years of a russian presence in antarctica the definition of

a polar explorer has changed. there are things i have seen in the movies and the things we have here now are completely different but we sit here now talking about today's watermelon which was not so tasty and then we retired to our european style rooms some of this difference with the lives of those who built it all up from the very beginning and conquered nature here were completely different. ok alexander good luck to you. traditionally the last helicopter to leave will circle the station. the ship leaving antarctica will sound its horn three times signaling the start of winter. before you may still remember the feeling of the helicopter made its last farewell circling was off mark riley was the beginning of winter and only thirty two people were left i felt kind of sad what. better than

to fall off. then the long pole and nights begin along with inevitable depression because of six months absence of some exhausting snowstorms loan letters home and the desire to see friends and family but even after all that many will still dream about coming back fortunately there's plenty of work here in antarctica for many generations to come. together and unsolved mystery for me. that is an interesting question. which is why does this place attract me so when i sold mine which if you know what that blowing already. precious three goodbye horns. the antarctic winter has begun.

live. live. live. live live live. her mother live.

the speech. she gave. her her her mother will. ultimately be limitlessly good luck her mother just see a look at. her. son of a little.

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