welcome to antarctica it's remote mysterious and unique and so it's long been a place for researchers and explorers venturing out into the frozen wasteland in search of adventure and scientific knowledge but for the average person it's a largely unknown landmass glimpsed second hand only through images and videos the apparently restricted access surrounding antarctica has led many to believe that the continent is off limits which has inspired more than a few conspiracy theories but is the icy south truly a forbidden zone and if so are there good reasons for that this is unveiled and today we're exploring the extraordinary claim that you can't visit antarctica do you need the big questions answered are you constantly curious then why not subscribe to unveiled for more clips like this one and ring the bell for more thought-provoking content with a name that literally means opposite of the arctic antarctica is the world's southernmost continent and the fifth largest at around NUMBER_TOKEN million square miles roughly NUMBER_TOKEN percent of it is covered by ice and it's certainly a land of extremes having been measured as the highest driest iciest coldest and windiest place on earth while antarctica is a relatively recent discovery on the world map tales of a frozen southern land actually stretch back to around NUMBER_TOKEN a.d stories originating from the pacific island of raritanga tell of an explorer named uite rangiora who sailed south and discovered a large and frozen land all that time ago european explorers came close to discovering antarctica several times in the following centuries with the portuguese ferdinand magellans sailing close by in NUMBER_TOKEN and britain's james cook traversing nearby waters in the NUMBER_TOKENth century neither spotted the elusive continent however despite theories at the time about terra australis incognita a mythical southern land who actually spotted antarctica first is still somewhat of a contentious issue three sailors all in NUMBER_TOKEN may have glimpsed it fabian gottlie von bellinghausen an officer in the imperial russian navy cited a large icing landmass on january NUMBER_TOKENth of that year there are some claims though that one edward bransfield an officer in the royal navy may have truly seen it first three days later on january NUMBER_TOKENth and then months after that in november NUMBER_TOKEN an american named nathaniel palmer also spotted the mainland it's perhaps partly because it took so long to find such a large place that mystery still surrounds antarctica especially as in the years and decades after NUMBER_TOKEN so many explorers risk life and limb to study it and lay claim to its possible riches to cut an exceptionally long story incredibly short by NUMBER_TOKEN seven nations france the uk new zealand norway australia chile and argentina had officially claimed slices of antarctica for their own while many others explored without any legitimate territorial rights even nazi germany tried to get into antarctica in NUMBER_TOKEN the world knew that this spectacular continent held a lot of scientific promise it was studied in depth as part of the international geophysical year or igy between NUMBER_TOKEN and NUMBER_TOKEN and then became subject to the now crucial antarctic treaty which was signed in NUMBER_TOKEN and came into effect in NUMBER_TOKEN. the overriding
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