Soviet drifting ice station depicted on a 1955 stamp.
Adrifting ice station is a temporary or semi-permanent facility built on anice floe. During theCold War theSoviet Union and theUnited States maintained a number of stations in theArctic Ocean on floes such asFletcher's Ice Island for research andespionage, the latter of which were often little more than quickly constructed shacks. Extracting personnel from these stations proved difficult and in the case of the United States, employed early versions of theFulton surface-to-air recovery system.
Soviet and Russian-staffed drifting ice stations areresearch stations built on the ice of the high latitudes of the Arctic Ocean. They are important contributors toexploration of theArctic. The stations are named "North Pole" (NP;Russian:Северный полюс,romanized: Severny polyus,СП), followed by an ordinal number:North Pole-1, etc. NP drift stations carry out the program of complex year-round research in the fields ofoceanology, ice studies,meteorology,aerology,geophysics,hydrochemistry, hydrophysics, andmarine biology. On average, an NP station is the host for 600 to 650 ocean depth measurements, 3500 to 3900 complex meteorology measurements, 1200 to 1300 temperature measurements and sea water probes forchemical analysis, and 600 to 650research balloon launches.[citation needed]Magnetic,ionosphere, ice and other observations are also carried out there. Regular measurements of the ice floe coordinates provide the data on the direction and speed of its drift.
The modern NP drifting ice station resembles a small settlement with housing for polar explorers and special buildings for the scientific equipment. Usually an NP station begins operations in April and continues for two or three years until theice floe reaches theGreenland Sea. Polar explorers are replaced yearly. Since 1937 some 800 people were drifting at NP stations.
There are two groups of NP stations:
stations, drifting on thepack ice (i.e. relatively thin and short-lived ice): NP-1 through NP-5, NP-7 through NP-17, NP-20, NP-21
stations, drifting on ice islands (glacier fragments, that were split from the shore): NP-6, NP-18, NP-19, NP-22.
The idea to use thedrift ice for the exploration of nature in the high latitudes of the Arctic Ocean came fromFridtjof Nansen, who fulfilled it onFram between 1893 and 1896. The first stations to use drift ice as means of scientific exploration of the Arctic originated in theSoviet Union in 1937, when the first such station in the world, North Pole-1, started operations.[1]
Since 1954 Soviet NP stations worked continuously, with one to three such stations operating simultaneously each year. The total distance drifted between 1937 and 1973 was over 80,000 kilometres. North Pole-22 is particularly notable for its record drift, lasting nine years. On 28 June 1972 the ice floe withNorth Pole-19 passed over the North Pole for the first time ever.
During such long-term observations by NP stations numerous important discoveries inphysical geography were made such as valuable conclusions on regularities and the connection between processes in the polar region of theEarth'shydrosphere andatmosphere and the deep waterLomonosov Ridge,[2] which crosses the Arctic Ocean, other large features of the ocean bottom's relief, the discovery of two systems of the drift (circular and "wash-out"), and the fact ofcyclones' active penetration into theCentral Arctic.
The last Soviet NP station, North Pole-31, was closed in July 1991.
In the post-Soviet era, Russian exploration of the Arctic by drifting ice stations was suspended for twelve years. The year 2003 was notable for Russia's return into the Arctic. As of 2006[update], three NP stations had carried out scientific measurements and research since then: "NP-32" through "NP-34".[citation needed] The latter was closed on 25 May 2006.[citation needed]
Since the mid-2000s it became difficult to find a suitable ice floe to station camp on,[5][6] due toglobal warming, and several stations had to be evacuated prematurely because of unexpectedly fast thawing of the ice,[4] so in 2008 an idea to replace the ice camps with a driftingresearch vessel as a station core was proposed.[5] After almost a decade of deliberation, a contract of building the station vessel was awarded toAdmiralty Shipyard inSaint Petersburg in 2017.[7] This will take a form of a large self-propelled ice resistantbarge of ~10000 tons displacement, getting to the initial point of the mission by itself or with a help of anicebreaker and continuing to drift with the surrounding ice.[6] The barge, intended to function autonomously for 2–3 years, but equipped to be supplied by air or passing icebreakers, and equipped with the required research equipment, is expected to be commissioned in 2020.[needs update][6]
^Calvert, James, Vice Admiral USN Ret. (1996) [1960].Surface at the Pole. Annapolis, Maryland: Bluejacket Books. p. 86.ISBN1-55750-119-X.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Romanov, I.P.; Konstantinov, Yu. B.; Kornilov, N.A. (1997),"North Pole" Drifting Stations (1937–1991), Saint Petersburg: Gidrometeoizdat, archived fromthe original on 2007-09-30,Condensed English version edited by V.F. Radionov and F. Fetterer
