Indian scientists traverse shortest path to South Pole

Braving temperatures as low as minus 54 degrees Celsius and navigating jagged sharp ice hills, India's first scientific expedition team to the South Pole took a different but short route to reach the earth's southernmost point — in just eight days.

The path has never been tried before by any other country, the scientists said.

The team led by Rasik Ravindra, director of the National Centre for Antarctic and Ocean Research (NCAOR), had left Maitri, India's second permanent research station on the Antarctica, on Nov 13, 2010 and planted the Indian flag at South Pole on Nov 22.

The eight-member team travelled 2,350 km distance (one side) between Maitri, and South Pole in arctic trucks braving the difficult weather conditions and traversing the tough terrain with snow-capped sharp razor-edged hills of 1-2 metre height.

According to Ravindra, they were asked by the Norwegian and US scientists to take a usually travelled curved route but the team decided to rather take a straight and short route to reach the southernmost tip.

The team, consisting of a geologist, glaciologist, geophysicist and a meteorologist as well as vehicle engineers, collected valuable data to study the impact of global warming on Antarctica.

The expedition travelled on four specialised arctic truck vehicles, which did face some problems due to the intense cold. — IANS.

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