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Join us on this captivating journey to understand the untold stories that surround the enigmatic Antarctica.
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00:00We've all dreamed of visiting the Arctic and witnessing the natural wonders of polar bears frolicking on ice flows or
00:07the aurora borealis dancing across the sky.
00:10Well, sorry to break it to you, but you won't find any tourists flocking to Antarctica anytime soon.
00:16Why, you may ask? Let's dive into it.
00:19First off, where is Antarctica?
00:22It's located in the Southern Hemisphere, specifically at the South Pole.
00:26The Southern Ocean surrounds it, and most of the continent is covered by ice, making it one of the most
00:32remote and frigid places on Earth.
00:34Now, have you ever met someone who's visited Antarctica?
00:38Probably not. It's one of the least visited places on the planet, and only a handful of lucky explorers have
00:45seen its interior, which is mostly made up of glaciers and ice fields.
00:49But trust me when I say the wildlife and scenery are out of this world.
00:55Why shouldn't you travel to Antarctica?
00:58Well, for starters, the environment is incredibly fragile and can be easily damaged.
01:04Plus, there are no native human populations on the continent, so your travels would essentially be like visiting an uninhabited
01:11island.
01:12And let's not forget that it's also one of the most expensive destinations to travel to.
01:17Despite all that, Antarctica is not exactly guarded like a fortress, but there is an international agreement called the Antarctic
01:25Treaty.
01:26This treaty was negotiated to prevent any unwanted activity on the continent and bans some forms of testing done there
01:33by member states.
01:35But the primary reason we can't just waltz into Antarctica is that it has a delicate ecosystem that needs protection.
01:43The treaty states that Antarctica should be used for peaceful purposes only and should be free from any human activity
01:50that could harm the environment.
01:52Scientists are still learning about the continent's unique ecosystem, and our activity and machines could disrupt the delicate balance that
02:00exists there.
02:02If you're still itching to go to Antarctica, getting permission isn't exactly a walk in the park.
02:08U.S. citizens, for example, need to complete a special form and send it to the Office of Ocean and
02:14Polar Affairs.
02:15And once you're there, you'll need to follow some strict guidelines to protect the environment,
02:20like not disturbing any wildlife or taking souvenirs like rocks, plants, or animals.
02:25Now, technically, can you live in Antarctica?
02:29While there are no laws banning people from living there permanently,
02:33it's a very inhospitable environment and unsuitable for human habitation.
02:38Temperatures can reach negative 76 degrees Fahrenheit and below,
02:42making it nearly impossible for anyone to survive without the proper equipment and experience.
02:48Plus, the nearest piece of land is over 1,000 miles away,
02:52making any inhabitants completely cut off from the rest of the world.
02:57Who knows?
02:58Maybe one day we'll get the chance to visit this unique and fascinating continent.
03:02But until then, let's admire it from afar.
03:07Let's now talk a bit about the discovery of Antarctica.
03:11Unlike other places that were already inhabited,
03:14Antarctica never had a native human population.
03:17Ancient Greek philosophers had an idea about the continent and called it Ant-Arctos,
03:23meaning opposite the bear.
03:25The bears, it refers to, are not the polar ones, though,
03:28but rather the great and little bear constellations,
03:32which are only observable in the northern hemisphere.
03:34As a result, the term signifies the opposite of the land of the bear.
03:42Whaling and sealing voyages in the late 1700s and early 1800s would venture further south
03:48when rounding Cape Horn at the tip of South America.
03:51It was known that going further south often meant stronger winds,
03:56but also the risk of hitting floating ice of all sizes
03:59and of winds and seas that could prove dangerous to the ship and crew.
04:05Captain James Cook was the first to cross the Antarctic Circle on January 17, 1773 in the Ross Sea region.
04:13He reached a point further north a year later,
04:16and though he didn't site land, he came to within 50 miles
04:20and saw deposits of rock held in icebergs indicating that a more southerly land existed.
04:27The first sighting of Antarctica is widely acknowledged to have taken place in January of 1820,
04:33during the voyage of two ships under the command of Captain Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen
04:39as part of a two-year exploratory expedition around the world to discover new lands.
04:44The captain's ships were the first to have crossed the Antarctic Circle since Cook.
04:50The first undisputed landing on Antarctica didn't happen until much later,
04:55on January 24, 1895, at Cape Adare during the whaling voyage of the ship Antarctic led by Henrik Bull.
05:04A small boat with six or possibly seven men on board rode ashore during calm conditions.
05:12You might not believe it, but Antarctica is actually a desert.
05:16With all that ice, you'd think it'd be like a winter wonderland with snowball fights and hot cocoa all day
05:23long.
05:23When we think of deserts, we picture camels and cacti and people struggling to find water.
05:29But in Antarctica, it's a whole different story.
05:33The struggle isn't to find water, it's to find anything that's not covered in ice.
05:38And the average rainfall has been just over 0.4 inches in the past 30 years.
05:43That's like a few drops of rain compared to what we're used to.
05:48So technically, it's not the dunes or sizzling heat that makes a desert, well, a desert.
05:54It's the lack of precipitation.
05:56But don't worry.
05:57If you ever find yourself lost in Antarctica, you won't have to worry about getting thirsty.
06:03Just make sure you bring a jacket and some mittens, because it's cold enough to make you into a popsicle.
06:09Not only is Antarctica one of the driest places on Earth, but it's also the coldest, the windiest, and the
06:16highest.
06:16Talk about overachieving.
06:18The penguins and scientists down in Antarctica have at times found themselves in a bit of a pickle when it
06:25comes to time.
06:26You see, unlike the rest of us on this big blue planet, there is no Antarctica time zone.
06:32All the lines of longitude meet at a single point at the South Pole, making it a bit of a
06:38head-scratcher when trying to figure out what time it is.
06:42Now, you might be thinking, but how do the scientists and researchers keep track of time down there?
06:48Good question.
06:49They typically stick to the time zone of the country they departed from.
06:53However, with stations from all over the world on the Antarctic Peninsula, things can get a little wacky.
07:00Imagine trying to coordinate with your neighboring countries without accidentally waking them up in the middle of the night.
07:07You might think that not much could survive in a place where the temperature is extremely cold, the sun barely
07:13shows up, and the wind could blow you away faster than a tumbleweed.
07:18Well, as in many places on Earth, life found a way in Antarctica, too.
07:23Believe it or not, this frozen continent is buzzing with activity.
07:27It's home to billions of krill, which in turn attract lots of seals and more penguins than you can shake
07:34a fish at.
07:36But don't let their cute and cuddly appearance fool you.
07:39Penguins are the ultimate swimmers, with streamlined bodies that would make Olympic medal winners jealous.
07:45They come ashore to breed and chill, but their real talent is stealing pebbles from each other and forming mathematically
07:53precise huddles to stay warm.
07:55Antarctica is also home to the largest species of penguin on Earth.
08:00It's called the emperor penguin.
08:02Sure, these creatures are flightless birds, but that doesn't mean they can't jump.
08:06In fact, some of them can leap up to 120 inches.
08:10And let's not forget about the seals, with their furry bodies and special songs.
08:16These marine mammals are protected by the Antarctic Treaty, and they're thriving in the cool waters of the Southern Ocean,
08:22too.
08:23But the real stars of the show are the whales.
08:27During the Antarctic summer, these huge creatures show up in droves to chow down on the abundant krill.
08:34Antarctica is the most remote continent on the planet.
08:38It has 90% of the world's ice, but it's considered a desert because the annual rainfall is only about
08:458 inches.
08:47You'd probably never think it was a desert if you look at it, since it's white and full of wildlife.
08:54But Antarctica is not only what it appears to be on the surface.
08:58There is so much hidden beneath it, and even above it.
09:03Atlantis has long been a mystery for humankind.
09:07Did it ever exist?
09:08And if yes, where was it located?
09:12One of the theories supports that the Atlantean civilization could have thrived and flourished in the Antarctic continent,
09:19when it was still uncovered by ice.
09:22Due to the Earth's cyclical eras, this is the periods of ice and interglacial periods.
09:29It was believed that Antarctica was actually a tropical forest.
09:33And, well, a recent Google Earth picture found some interesting ruins,
09:38buried deep within a lake bed on the icy continent.
09:42It's unclear to which civilization these remains belong to,
09:46but some theorists believe that it could perfectly be Atlantis.
09:51And these frozen Antarctic lakes are holding much more under them.
09:56In the 1970s, scientists were surprised to find large lakes under the ice plaques in the frozen continent.
10:04Over 400 lake beds are believed to exist under layers of ice.
10:09Lake Vostok, for instance, the largest subglacial lake over there,
10:13is buried beneath two miles of thick ice.
10:17There are pristine blue ice caves hidden under there as well.
10:21The water in these lakes remains liquid due to the small levels of geothermal heat from the Earth's core.
10:28And some scientists believe that some lakes are around 15 million years old.
10:34Talk about the old days, huh?
10:37Now, amongst the unique phenomenon that occur in the continent,
10:42let's say Antarctica is home to an extremely weird waterfall.
10:46The year was 1911, when Australian geologists wondered about the so-called bloodfalls.
10:54He was extremely puzzled by this red stream of liquid pouring from a small hillside amongst the Antarctic ice.
11:02After years of studying it,
11:04it was understood what caused the redness was the high iron content in the water.
11:09The last piece of the puzzle came when scientists discovered that there was an underground lake
11:14with water full of oxidized iron nearby,
11:17which was what caused the bloodfall to exist in the first place.
11:24And speaking of puzzles, this image might be quite puzzling.
11:28After all, why on Earth would anyone need to take cash to Antarctica?
11:33Well, a little history first.
11:36Back in 1956, the U.S. founded McMurdo Research Station,
11:42which is the biggest science hub in the continent to date.
11:45At its peak, the McMurdo Station hosts from 200 to 1,000 scientists.
11:51And these people need money to buy coffee, pizza, and other things to meet their daily needs.
11:58That's when Wells Fargo decided to install an ATM there.
12:02Oh, and they even set a Guinness World Record this way.
12:06The Wells Fargo ATM at McMurdo Station is the most southern one in the world.
12:11And it's the loneliest ATM in the world as well,
12:15as there isn't another one for hundreds and hundreds of miles.
12:21The freezing temperatures in Antarctica can make the continent hostile to human life.
12:26Actually, Antarctica is the coldest, driest, and windiest continent on our planet.
12:32The average temperature along the coast is around 14 degrees Fahrenheit.
12:37But as you head towards the Antarctic hinterlands, it gets even colder than that.
12:44The interior of the continent can register temperatures of around negative 71 degrees Fahrenheit.
12:50On the bright side, these freezing conditions can account for some mesmerizing phenomena,
12:56such as ice bubbles.
12:58These bubbles frozen inside some Antarctic lakes are bubbles of methane gas.
13:04The gas released from the melting of glaciers ends up freezing midway
13:08and makes for a beautiful and exotic scene.
13:12I guess methane never looked this pretty before, did it?
13:16A few years ago, scientists were taken aback by a giant hole
13:20the size of the Netherlands in one Antarctic lake.
13:24For scale, that's more or less the size of Lake Michigan.
13:29These holes are called polynyas, and they are a natural phenomenon in the continent.
13:35However, this one is the biggest scientists have ever seen since the 1970s.
13:41So you'll understand, polynyas are massive holes in a sea of ice.
13:46Most of them occur along the continent's coast,
13:49but this new one was found in the Weddell Sea, much farther from the shore.
13:54Scientists are still trying to understand how that happened
13:57and what its implications are for the climate in the region.
14:02There's one feature in the continent that looks completely man-made
14:06and has even sparked several theories around the world regarding its origins.
14:10I mean, this formation looks exactly like other man-made pyramids, doesn't it?
14:16The only difference is that this is actually a natural rock formation
14:20and has existed for a very long time.
14:24It was first found during an expedition in the 1910s
14:27and was kept secret ever since.
14:29It was nicknamed Pyramid, but its correct scientific name is Nunatak,
14:35which is simply a peak of rock sticking out above a glacier or an ice sheet.
14:40There are other famous peaks that look pyramid-shaped,
14:44such as the Matterhorn in Switzerland.
14:46So no, this really isn't a human construction.
14:49We're sure of it.
14:51And the list of fascinating discoveries on the ice continent goes on.
14:56An artificial intelligence program was analyzing a set of data on Antarctica
15:01when it came across a stunning discovery.
15:03There may be up to 300,000 undiscovered meteorites
15:08to be found in the icy field of the continent.
15:11The truth is, meteorites have been falling on the continent
15:15for millions of years.
15:17But it was only 110 years ago that the first one was found.
15:21And guess what?
15:23Recently, researchers found a Martian meteorite in East Antarctica.
15:26It was the biggest one found in the last 25 years,
15:30and it weighed about 165 pounds.
15:34Now, usually fire and ice are rather a tricky combination.
15:38So I'm guessing you wouldn't say that Antarctica hosts an active volcano, right?
15:43But it does.
15:45The volcano, known as Mount Erebus,
15:47is the southernmost active volcano in the world
15:50with liquid magma and lava boiling for eons.
15:54Actually, Mount Erebus has been active for over a million years,
15:58and it's Antarctica's second-highest volcano
16:01with a height of 12,000 feet.
16:06We've mentioned before that Antarctica wasn't always icy,
16:10but could you imagine a huge rainforest covering the entire continent?
16:14This isn't science fiction.
16:16It's actually true.
16:17Leaf impressions and fossilized wood
16:20clearly show signs of tropical trees in the region.
16:24Fossil research has also revealed something magnificent.
16:28Antarctica is home to the oldest worm in the world.
16:32According to National Geographic,
16:35sperm fossils found in Antarctica
16:37reveal a long-extinct species of worm
16:40that is around 50 million years old.
16:43Scientists claim that this discovery
16:45is beyond important to studying some evolutionary relationships
16:48and say that this was only possible
16:50due to the freezing of such samples
16:53for thousands of years.
16:56Antarctica is a continent rich in biodiversity.
17:00Penguins, polar bears, and seals
17:03are just some of the animals we know that exist down there.
17:06But there is also a rare and fascinating species of fish
17:11that inhabits Antarctic waters.
17:14Popularly known as the see-through fish,
17:16this species is as bizarre as it is beautiful.
17:19This fish had to adapt
17:22to survive the cold water temperature in Antarctica,
17:25so much so that it evolved into a unique being.
17:28As well as a transparent body,
17:31this fish has transparent blood,
17:33making it completely see-through.
17:35This is because they lack the protein hemoglobin,
17:38which gives blood its red color.
17:40Pretty neat, huh?
17:42When you think of Antarctica,
17:45you probably think of icebergs, right?
17:47So here are some fun facts about it.
17:50Did you know that icebergs have a lifespan
17:52of about 3,000 years?
17:55And that together with Greenland,
17:57Antarctica is one of the world's primary sources of icebergs.
18:02Icebergs can reach 600 to 700 feet
18:05below the surface of the water,
18:07and around 90% of an iceberg is hidden underwater.
18:10That's where the expression
18:12tip of the iceberg comes from.
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