An iceport is a more-or-less permanent indentation in the front of an

ice shelf An ice shelf is a large floating platform of ice that forms where a glacier or ice sheet flows down to a coastline and onto the ocean surface. Ice shelves are only found in Antarctica, Greenland, Northern Canada, and the Russian Arctic. The ...

, that can serve as a natural ice harbour. Though useful, they are not always reliable, as calving of surrounding ice shelves can render an iceport temporarily unstable and unusable.

Historical and present use of iceports

Iceports have played a critical role in Antarctic exploration. For example, the

Bay of Whales The Bay of Whales was a natural ice harbour, or iceport, indenting the front of the Ross Ice Shelf just north of Roosevelt Island, Antarctica. It is the southernmost point of open ocean not only of the Ross Sea, but worldwide. The Ross Sea ex ...

(discovered and named by

Ernest Shackleton Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of ...

in the '' Nimrod'' in 1908) served as the base for several important

Antarctic expeditions The Antarctic ( or , American English also or ; commonly ) is a polar region around Earth's South Pole, opposite the Arctic region around the North Pole. The Antarctic comprises the continent of Antarctica, the Kerguelen Plateau and other ...

, including: * 1910-1912:

Amundsen's South Pole expedition The first ever expedition to reach the geographic Southern Pole was led by the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen. He and four others arrived at the pole on 14 December 1911, five weeks ahead of a British party led by Robert Falcon Scott as p ...

, led by

Roald Amundsen Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen (, ; ; 16 July 1872 – ) was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He was a key figure of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Born in Borge, Østfold, Norway, Amundsen beg ...

* 1928-1930:

Richard Evelyn Byrd Richard Evelyn Byrd Jr. (October 25, 1888 – March 11, 1957) was an American naval officer and explorer. He was a recipient of the Medal of Honor, the highest honor for valor given by the United States, and was a pioneering American aviator, p ...

- First expedition * 1933-1935:

- Second expedition * 1939-1941:

United States Antarctic Service Expedition The United States Antarctic Service Expedition (1939–1941), often referred to as Byrd’s Third Antarctic Expedition, was an expedition jointly sponsored by the United States Navy, State Department, Department of the Interior and The Treasur ...

, led by

Norsel Iceport was used by the Norwegian-British-Swedish Antarctic Expedition (NBSAE) to moor and unload the expedition ship in 1949. The NBSAE established

Maudheim Station Queen Maud Land ( no, Dronning Maud Land) is a roughly region of Antarctica claimed by Norway as a dependent territory. It borders the claimed British Antarctic Territory 20° west and the Australian Antarctic Territory 45° east. In add ...

about 1 mile south of the iceport. The term ''iceport'' was first suggested by the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names (US-ACAN) in 1956 to denote "ice shelf embayments, subject to configuration changes, which may offer anchorage or possible access to the upper surface of an ice shelf via ice ramps along one or more sides of the feature". Prior to the invention of the

ice pier An ice pier or ice wharf is a man-made structure used to assist the unloading of ships in Antarctica. It is constructed by pumping seawater into a contained area and allowing the water to freeze. By repeating this procedure several times, additio ...

, U.S. ships participating in

Operation Deep Freeze Operation Deep Freeze (OpDFrz or ODF) is codename for a series of United States missions to Antarctica, beginning with "Operation Deep Freeze I" in 1955–56, followed by "Operation Deep Freeze II", "Operation Deep Freeze III", and so on. (There w ...

discharged cargo at temporary iceports in

McMurdo Sound McMurdo Sound is a sound in Antarctica. It is the southernmost navigable body of water in the world, and is about from the South Pole. Captain James Clark Ross discovered the sound in February 1841, and named it after Lt. Archibald McMurdo ...

. At that time, freighters and tankers arriving with supplies and fuel were forced to dock as far away as 16 km from the harbor. Ships would moor alongside seasonal

pack ice Drift ice, also called brash ice, is sea ice that is not attached to the shoreline or any other fixed object (shoals, grounded icebergs, etc.).Leppäranta, M. 2011. The Drift of Sea Ice. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. Unlike fast ice, which is "fasten ...

, where longshoremen would offload cargo onto large sleds. Snowcats and

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most commo ...

s would then be used to tow the freight over ice to McMurdo Station, a difficult and potentially dangerous operation.

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

engineers constructed the first floating ice pier at McMurdo Station, Antarctica’s southernmost

sea port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ha ...

, in 1973."Unique ice pier provides harbor for ships,"
Antarctic Sun. January 8, 2006; McMurdo Station, Antarctica. Since that time, the use of iceports has declined but not been completely eliminated.

Locations of Antarctic iceports

Iceports in

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest cont ...

include: * Atka Iceport () * Erskine Iceport () * Godel Iceport () * Norsel Iceport () *

()

References

External links

{{Antarctica topics Ports and harbors of Antarctica

Historical and present use of iceports

Locations of Antarctic iceports

See also

References

External links