Camilla Nichol
Chief Executive
UK Antarctic Heritage Trust
It is almost 250 years since Captain James Cook set out from
Whitby in search of the southern continent. Since then and even before, man has
had a fascination with the great white continent – it has presented the
greatest challenges of endurance, survival, science and exploration.
[Fig 1. Captain Scott at the South Pole]
The UK Antarctic Heritage Trust was established in 1993 with
ambitions to ensure the legacy of past human endeavour in Antarctica was
secured for future generations. This work continues today through the
management of six historic sites on the Antarctic Peninsula and through our
support of others Polar heritage organisations across the world.
The six sites we care for represent different periods in
British Antarctic involvement and science on the Antarctic Peninsula since 1944.
They are designated under the Antarctic Treaty and we are obligated to protect
them from damage, removal or destruction.
[Fig 2 Base A, Port Lockroy, Goudier Island, Antarctica
1944-62]
Conserving Antarctic
Huts
Managing historic sites in general is complicated, time
consuming, resource intensive and requires expertise, judgement and compromise.
Managing heritage in Antarctica is all of those things tenfold! These wooden huts are placed 9,000 miles away
from the UK in the middle of a frozen wasteland on harshest continent on earth.
You can only access them via ship, and getting to them can be difficult and at
times impossible.
Port Lockroy is the most visited site in Antarctica. As well
as the museum, Port Lockroy also has a functioning Post Office and gift shop. The
museum and its artefacts tell the story of those who lived and worked in this
isolated wilderness.
[Fig 3 museum display
at Port Lockroy]
The other sites are significantly harder to get to and are
unsupervised. This means that conserving them can be much more problematic. We
do what we can to stabilise the structures and make sure that they are
weatherproof as possible to prevent them from deteriorating and to help protect
the artefacts within. We want to keep them standing so that they can be around
for future generations because all of these sites are irreplaceable and once
lost will be gone forever.
The Challenges
There are a number of challenges we need to overcome to get
this work done each season. Working in such cold conditions means that work is
inevitably slower, fatigue can set in more quickly, fingers become clumsier and
solvents will cure glacially slowly. So progress is never achieved at speed and
a season’s work can sometimes seem paltry.
[Fig 4 Annual maintenance of the windows at Port Lockroy]
Despite the Antarctic’s incredibly low rainfall, damp is a
significant problem and mould in the more northerly sites can be a problem.
Similarly, achieving good ventilation to dry out timbers comes at the expense
of weathertightness, as any gap will be severely exploited by wind driven snow
and ice particles during the winter resulting in build-up of ice inside the
buildings.
[Fig 5 Build-up of windblown snow in Base W, Detaille
Island]
The long daylight hours and the strong UV levels in
Antarctica also are a severe problem for many artefacts and the damaging
effects of UV are soon apparent.
Normal museum pests are, mercifully, not such a problem, but
other wildlife can prove destructive – gentoo penguins nest very close to, on
and under buildings and are not shy about where they leave their waste. Fur
seals can be both dangerous and clumsy, are curious, and often force their way
inside structures.
[Fig 6 a common museum pest in Antarctica]
Who is it for?
The primary audience for our heritage sites are the tourists
who visit, however we champion Antarctic heritage through many other forums so
that it can inspire people all over the world with the stories of exploration
and heroism that have come from Antarctica.
Port Lockroy gets around 18,000 visitors a year. The other
sites, due to their precarious locations are visited by many fewer people.
[Fig 7 Visitors at Port Lockroy]
Most people will never visit our museums, however, the
stories they carry can resonate with people all over the world. Through our
grants programme we support polar exhibitions and galleries across the world
and engage with people online through a plethora of digital media. We share
stories of the buildings, the animals, and the people who lived there.
So, Antarctic conservation is certainly fraught with
difficulties, but needs to be conducted with the same rigour, thoughtfulness
and insight as any conservation project in more temperate climes.
Find out more about us, our work and our grants programme at
www.ukaht.org.
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