Winter at the Concordia station in Antarctica
The long Antarctic winter is turning to spring at the Franco-Italian Concordia research station, which has resisted the brutal forces of nature about 1200 km inland on top of an icy plateau 3000 m above sea level. During winter, the Sun doesn’t rise above the horizon for about three months, and temperatures can drop down to -80°C.
This video shows the harsh but beautiful landscape around the station on one of the last sunny days in May and then how the darkness engulfed Concordia with its 12-strong winter-over team. Finally the Sun returned on 10 August — a memorable moment for the men and women who keep the station running and conduct the scientific work in those difficult, almost space-like conditions.
The video was shot by Olivier Delanoe and it includes excerpts from the letters sent by Antonio Litterio to ESA’s Concordia blog.
yoo they snagged my keys (*–_–)
That’s so beautiful
What would you eat there?
I would love to go work in Antartica.
L'Antartide è incredibile, video mirabiliante
Hello, thank you for this video. I have a question – is there a midnight sun at Concordia station, in the summer? IE – is the Sun's disk visible above the horizon for 24 hours or more? Thank you.
The coldest temperature I’ve experience is -45°C with -50°C windchill in Winnipeg. You dont want to go outside.
Did I see 3 suns at the end of video?
Imagine how the stars would look there.
I would like to stay a winter there at least once. With internet it would be great. I would just like to house sit while the scientists were away 😆