The new Russian wintering complex “Vostok” in Antarctica will significantly improve the living and working conditions of polar explorers. Director of the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI) Alexander Makarov stated this in a commentary to RT.
“The new wintering complex “Vostok” will significantly change life and living conditions. The comfort of your stay will certainly increase significantly. In this case, wintering will be similar to staying at an orbital station. The feeling of space will change, there will be a lot of light and modern equipment, many household processes will be automated,” he said.
According to Alexander Makarov, the station “will have new cabins for polar explorers and high-quality public spaces.”
“And simply life at the new station will have a positive effect on the emotional state of polar explorers. In addition, the Internet and mobile communications make it possible to freely communicate with loved ones and friends. Now all stations also have television, including Russian channels. All this allows polar explorers to feel less disconnected from home and the rest of the world,” noted the director of the AARI.
Earlier, on January 28, the presidents of Russia and Belarus Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko took part in the opening of a new wintering complex at the Vostok station via video link.
The Russian leader noted that until recently, “the conditions at the station were very modest, ascetic, one might say, far from the modern level of comfort.”
“The last major renovation was here more than 40 years ago. The first buildings, as far as I know, have long been buried under the snow, and even slightly later ones are partially or completely immersed up to 5 m in the snow. Now the situation has changed, the station’s capabilities have increased by an order of magnitude. Today it is one of the most modern and well-equipped in Antarctica,” Vladimir Putin emphasized.
He also said that Russia and Belarus will work together to study the Antarctic.
“I am convinced that the new station will strengthen the cooperation of scientists from different countries, will become an open platform for solving pressing problems in the field of studying nature, the environment and, of course, for promoting joint scientific and innovative programs within the framework of the Union State of Russia and Belarus... We will definitely to work together, as the participants of the 16th Belarusian and 69th Russian Antarctic expeditions are working together now, shoulder to shoulder,” Vladimir Putin noted.
In turn, Alexander Lukashenko called Russia “the leader in Antarctic research” and thanked Moscow for assisting Belarusian specialists in conducting Antarctic research.
“I would also like to thank our Russian friends, who all this time have helped and continue to help Belarusian scientists with accommodation at their stations, support research, share scientific data, and provide equipment. I know that our equipment also works there. I was given information: in 2018-2020, an ultraviolet photometer designed by a Belarusian university was put into operation here,” said the Belarusian leader.
Double and triple redundancy
Let us remember that the Vostok station was founded in 1957 on the ice dome of Antarctica at an altitude of almost 3.5 thousand meters. Living conditions at the station are considered one of the most difficult at the South Pole. The average air temperature in summer is -35.9 °C, in winter -66.7 °C. Moreover, in July 1983, the planet’s absolute temperature record was recorded there: -89.2 °C.
In 1974 and 1982, the station was reconstructed, but by the end of the 2010s it became obvious that the complex needed to be replaced: the oldest buildings had long been under a thick layer of snow, and more modern ones were partially or completely immersed in snow to a depth of 5 m.
In 2019, the project for a new wintering complex was presented at a meeting of the board of trustees of the Russian Geographical Society, and a year later, control assembly of the facility was completed at the Gatchina Experimental Plant of Building Structures. All equipment of the new complex was produced in Russia.
The new wintering complex “Vostok” in Antarctica has been put into pilot operation
After this, the vessels “Cape Dezhnev”, “Yaroslav the Mudry”, “Captain Khlebnikov” and “Andrey Osipov” delivered the modules to the shores of Antarctica in December 2021. Later, during the sleigh-caterpillar voyage, the modules were transported from the Progress station to the assembly site - to Vostok. As Alexander Kozlov, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment of Russia, noted then, the total weight of the structure delivered to Antarctica reaches 6.8 thousand tons.
As reported on the AARI website, the new wintering complex consists of five modules: two service and living quarters, a service building with diesel generator sets and a water purification and storage system, a warehouse with a backup diesel generator and a garage.
The length of the complex is 140 m, width - 13.5 m, maximum height - 17.5 m. The total area of the premises is 1911 sq. m. m. The station stands on 36 supports 3 m high, which will allow it to remain free of snow for many years.
The station is powered by four diesel generators with a capacity of 200 kW each. Two more backup generators are located separately from the station. In the future, it is planned to test several types of solar panels that can be used during the four-month polar day. In the future, the station may have a solar power plant.
New energy saving technologies were used in the design of the wintering complex, they say at AARI. In particular, with the help of a heat recovery system from diesel exhaust gases, air is heated for heating the premises. In turn, ventilation includes a recuperator, which heats the air entering the station at the expense of the already exhausted air. At the same time, the station body is “wrapped” in mineral wool insulation up to 95 cm thick, and the facade is made of composite panels resistant to extreme frosts.
The new station is designed to comfortably accommodate up to 15 people during the winter and up to 35 when an expedition is working there. To ensure personnel safety, “all systems have double or triple redundancy,” according to AARI materials.
The complex is also equipped with a modern medical unit and a wardroom with billiards, a cinema room, a gym and a sauna.
As Alexey Podberezkin, director of the Center for Military-Political Studies at MGIMO, noted, Russia has extensive experience in constructing such facilities. As an example, he cited the construction of the Russian military base “Arctic Trefoil”.
“Judging by the bases that we built in the north, Russia has the capabilities to create the most modern facilities of this class. They are completely autonomous and provided with everything necessary. I am sure that the new Antarctic complex is also built at a high level,” the specialist said in a commentary to RT.
“Reasons for restructuring the climate system”
According to Alexander Makarov, the new station “will have modern laboratories and equipment.”
“As in our other new projects, for example on the ice-resistant North Pole platform, the laboratories will be made on a modular basis with the possibility of re-equipment for current research tasks and technologies,” he noted in an interview with RT.
One of the tasks of the station will be the study of subglacial Lake Vostok, Makarov added.
“We are looking forward to the start of the project to study the subglacial Lake Vostok, which is an analogue of the subglacial seas on the planets and moons of the Solar System. This project can significantly enrich not only the scientific but also the technological base. In 2012, our scientists successfully carried out the first opening of the subglacial Lake Vostok. This became a real sensation in the scientific world. Now a technology is being developed to penetrate the lake, with which it is possible to conduct an analysis without disturbing its unique natural environment,” said the head of the AARI.
View of the Vostok Research Station near the South Geomagnetic Pole in East Antarctica, 1984
RIA News
© P. Astakhov
Alexander Makarov notes that “scientific work at the Vostok station is of the utmost global importance and will definitely continue for the next two decades.”
“The ancient ice of Antarctica will help identify the reasons for the restructuring of the climate system that occurred on Earth about 1 million years ago. We will be able to develop an understanding of the role of greenhouse gases in global climate change, both due to natural causes and under the influence of human activities. Analysis of past climate changes will make it possible to calculate how life on the planet may develop in the coming millennia,” he emphasized.
The commissioning of a new wintering complex at the Antarctic Vostok station will allow Russia to maintain its leading position in the study of the icy continent, the head of the department of political analysis and socio-psychological processes of the Russian Economic University said in a conversation with RT. Plekhanov Andrey Koshkin.
“There are research teams from leading countries in Antarctica. And we, as a great power, cannot lag behind in this area. Moreover, we have vast experience in studying Antarctica and developing the Arctic. After the commissioning of the new complex, we are now definitely not inferior to anyone in this area,” the analyst concluded.