page_title: Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station
section_title: Media and events
hierarchical_section_title: Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station / Media and events
caption_attribution_description: English: Aerial view of the Amundsen-Scott South Pole scientific research station Français&#160;: Vue aérienne de la station de recherche scientifique Amundsen-Scott Pôle Sud vers 1983. Cette image est issue du Wikipedia anglais.
context_page_description: The Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station is a United States scientific research station at the South Pole, the southernmost place on the Earth. The station is located on the high plateau of Antarctica at an elevation of 2,835 metres above sea level and is administered by the Division of Polar Programs within the National Science Foundation under the United States Antarctic Program. It is named in honor of Norwegian Roald Amundsen and Englishman Robert F. Scott, who led separate teams that raced to become the first to the South Pole in the early 1900s.
  The original Amundsen–Scott Station was built by Navy Seabees for the Federal government of the United States during November 1956, as a part of its commitment to the scientific goals of the International Geophysical Year, an international effort lasting from January 1957 through June 1958, to study, among other things, the geophysics of the polar regions of Earth.
  Before November 1956, there was no permanent human structure at the South Pole, and practically no human presence in the interior of Antarctica at all. The few scientific stations in Antarctica were located near its seacoast.
context_section_description: In 1991, Michael Palin visited the base on the 8th and final episode of his BBC Television documentary, Pole to Pole.
  On January 10, 1995, NASA, PBS, and NSF collaborated for the first live television broadcast from the South Pole, titled Spaceship South Pole. During this interactive broadcast, students from several schools in the United States asked the scientists at the station questions about their work and conditions at the pole.
  In 1999, CBS News correspondent Jerry Bowen reported on camera in a talkback with anchors from the Saturday edition of CBS This Morning.
  In 1999, the winter-over physician, Jerri Nielsen, found that she had breast cancer. She had to rely on self-administered chemotherapy, using supplies from a daring July cargo drop, then was picked up in an equally dangerous mid-October landing.
  On May 11, 2000, astrophysicist Rodney Marks became ill while walking between the remote observatory and the base. He became increasingly sick over 36 hours, three times returning increasingly distressed to the station's doctor. Advice was sought by satellite, but Marks died on May 12, 2000 with his condition undiagnosed. The National Science Foundation issued a statement that Rodney Marks had "apparently died of natural causes, but the specific cause of death had yet to be determined". The exact cause of Marks' death could not be determined until his body was removed from Amundsen–Scott Station and flown off Antarctica for an autopsy. Marks' death was due to methanol poisoning, and the case received media attention as the "first South Pole murder", although there is no evidence that Marks died as the result of the act of another person.
  On 26 April 2001, Kenn Borek Air used a DHC-6 Twin Otter aircraft to rescue Dr. Ronald Shemenski from Amundsen–Scott. This was the first ever rescue from the South Pole during polar winter. To achieve the range necessary for this flight, the Twin Otter was equipped with a special ferry tank.
  In January 2007, the station was visited by a group of high-level Russian officials, including FSB chiefs Nikolai Patrushev and Vladimir Pronichev. The expedition, led by polar explorer Artur Chilingarov, started from Chile on two Mi-8 helicopters and landed at the South Pole.
  On September 6, 2007, The National Geographic Channel's television show Man Made aired an episode on the construction of their new facility.
  On the November 9, 2007 edition of NBC's Today, show co-anchor Ann Curry made a satellite telephone call which was broadcast live from the South Pole.
  On Christmas 2007, two employees at the base got into a drunken fight and had to be evacuated.
  On July 11, 2011, the winter-over communications technician fell ill and was diagnosed with appendicitis. An emergency open appendectomy was performed by the station doctors with several winter-overs assisting during the surgery.
  The 2011 BBC TV programme Frozen Planet discusses the base and shows footage of the inside and outside of the elevated station in the "Last Frontier Episode".
  During the 2011 winter-over season, station manager Renee-Nicole Douceur experienced a stroke on August 27, resulting in loss of vision and cognitive function. Because the Amundsen–Scott base lacks diagnostic medical equipment such as an MRI or CT scan machine, station doctors were unable to fully evaluate the damage done by the stroke or the chance of recurrence. Physicians on site recommended a medevac flight as soon as possible for Douceur, but offsite doctors hired by Raytheon Polar Services (the company contracted to run the base) and the National Science Foundation disagreed with the severity of the situation. The National Science Foundation, which is the final authority on all flights and assumes all financial responsibility for the flights, denied the request for medevac, saying the weather was still too hazardous. Plans were made to evacuate Douceur on the first flight available. Douceur and her niece, believing Douceur's condition to be grave and believing an earlier medevac flight possible, contacted Senator Jeanne Shaheen for assistance; as the NSF c
caption: An aerial view of the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station taken in about 1983. The central dome is shown along with the arches, with various storage buildings, and other auxiliary buildings such as garages and hangars.
exif: {}