Here’s Hoping That History Won’t Repeat

Antarctica, Lore, Legend & Stories, Travel

I stay pretty tuned in to all things Antarctic. I subscribe to several RSS feeds that look for various terms related to Antarctica. This means that over the last few weeks I have become sick of seeing headlines about the latest Antarctic movie “Whiteout” which is based on a graphic novel and set in Antarctica and has something to do with a U.S. marshal investigating a murder. I knew that the “Whiteout” hype had gone mainstream when my mom asked me if I had heard of it. From the Miami Herald: 

There’s something analogous between the Spam-filled Moonpie and the marketing campaign for “Whiteout,” an Antarctica-set thriller whose commercials and trailers suggested an icebound horror film.

Here I am…polluting the internet with more “Whiteout” rhetoric.

One of the things that caught my attention as I have been scanning Antarctic headlines was this story about Qantas offering sightseeing flights over Antarctica:

Qantas A380 Selected For Sightseeing Flights To Antarctica

Fri, 18 Sep ‘09
Passengers Will Spend 4 Hours Over The Antarctic Ice

A Qantas Airbus A380 super jumbo will undertake a unique sightseeing flight to Antarctica – the first commercial flight by an A380 over the south polar region, and the only aircraft permitted to do so on New Year’s Eve.

The flight, organized by Melbourne-based Antarctica Sightseeing Flights, a division of Australian travel company Croydon Travel, will originate in Sydney and fly via Melbourne to reach Antarctica. Passengers will be over the “ice” at midnight and be the first in the world to see the light of the new year.

The chartered A380 will fly figure-eight patterns above the breathtaking polar terrain for up to four hours before heading back to Melbourne and Sydney.

Two other Antarctic flights are also planned for the southern summer – a second A380 service direct from Sydney on 24 January and a Boeing 747-400 from Melbourne on Valentine’s Day, 14 February. All flights are operated by senior Qantas pilots, with the captain in command having previously operated Antarctica sightseeing flights[keep the bold part in mind - it's relevant to something later in my article].

It sounds a bit silly to me. Sightseeing flights in a small airplane where every seat is a window seat makes a bit more sense, but this is just ridiculous. I suppose if you’re someone who just has to see Antarctica, this is a good way to do it relatively cheap and a turnaround flight probably isn’t going to cause one to succumb to polar madness. Regardless of my opinion the sightseeing flights probably have quite the appeal to some people. The flights might even appear banal until you consider what happened on the last sightseeing flight over Antarctica. In November 1979 flight 901 departed Auckland, NZ on a sightseeing flight of Antarctica with 237 passengers and 20 crew members. The captain and co-pilot had not flown the Antarctic flight before, but the flight was considered to be straightforward and they were both experienced pilots. All 257 people on board died when the plane crashed into Mt. Erebus. The information on the flight recorder tapes showed there had been no emergency in the cockpit of the aircraft. Attention was then focussed on the possibility of pilot error, pointing to the inexperience of the two pilots in flying in the Antarctic.

The recovery effort involved over 60 people from nearby McMurdo Station. There are several grim accounts of the recovery effort – imagine working at high-altitude, in the cold and your job is picking up bits and pieces of New Zealand’s largest single tragedy. No thanks!

Will @ September 18, 2009