My Antarctica experience of 1970s

Parmjit Singh Sehra

India became involved in scientific research in Antarctica as a result of an agreement with the Soviet Union for joint meteorological exploration of the upper atmosphere from the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station (TERLS), Trivandrum, and the Soviet Antarctic station, Molodezhnaya.

Under the agreement, I participated in the 17th Soviet Antarctic Expedition from 1971 to 1973, becoming the first Indian to spend the winter in the South Pole, and to circumnavigate and explore the continent.

Since India’s Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and the Soviet Hydrometeorological Service (HMS) signed the agreement in 1970, there had been regular weekly soundings with M-100 meteorological rockets from the Molodezhnaya station in Antarctica and Thumba in Kerala.

I was working as a research scientist at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad, when I was sent to the continent by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). I spent more than 18 months in Antarctica.

I also visited all the other Soviet Antarctic stations — Bellingshausen, Mirny, Vostok and Novolozarevskaya — while also locating the site of a new Soviet station, Russkaya, on the shore of Amundsen sea. Mirny to Vostok is a distance of about 1,500 km which was covered by us in about two months’ time. We used tractor-driven and dog sledges in extremely harsh conditions. It was a thrilling experience full of daring adventures.

I also visited the New Zealand station, Scott Base, as well as the American Antarctic station McMurdo Sound and the Amundsen-Scott South Pole station, located at the geographic South Pole.

I was awarded the Soviet Antarctic Medal, Ribbon and Polar Watch by the USSR, and the New Zealand Antarctic Society also honoured me.

While I was in Antarctica, sixty M-100 meteorological rockets were launched from Molodezhnaya. Sixteen of these carried an additional wind sensor ‘chaff’ for determining the mesospheric winds. Most of the rocket flights were successful, with the M-100 rocket carrying a payload of 66.65 kg up to an altitude of about 95 km.

This was the first meteorological study of the upper atmospheric winds and temperatures ever made in Antarctica. The results indicated that the most active period in south polar regions was winter and early spring, marked by large disruptions in both the wind and thermal structures.

My mission created tremendous interest in India for further exploration of Antarctica. Based upon the research, I wrote my PhD thesis entitled ‘Atmospheric Structure: Exploration over Antarctica and Interhemispheric Comparison’, for which I was awarded a doctoral degree by the Gujarat University, Ahmedabad, in 1977.

I had written to the then Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, that India should also launch Antarctic expeditions and open permanent research bases.

Antarctica Day is observed on December 1 and this year marks Indian research station Dakshin Gangotri’s 40th anniversary. The celebrations are being organised at the National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research in Goa. It’s an occasion to cherish and I won’t miss it.

— The writer is a former ISRO scientist and retired from PAU, Ludhiana

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