SOVIET BASE NEAR POLE

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28080, 22 September 1956, Page 13

SOVIET BASE NEAR POLE

World Record In Cold Weather

MOSCOW, By Airmail, REUTER. Soviet scientists preparing for the Internationa] Geophysical Year have just reported a world record in cold weather from their meteorological post in the hinterland of Antarctica, “the Sixth Continent.”

One day in August the Centigrade reading at the Pionerskaya Scientific Station was 66 decimal eight degrees below zero (120.2 degrees Fahrenheit below freezing)—fully four degrees Centigrade lower than a reading on July 3, which was the lowest recorded for 22 years. In spite of severe frosts accompanied by biting wind with a ..velocity of seven metres per second (about 105 miles an hour), those .manning the station are in good health and cheerful spirits, states an official report. The Antarctic Expedition which is part of Russia’s contribution to the International Geophysical Year includes the establishment of several bases in the Antarctic Continent. One is an outer settlement called Mirny on the Knox Coast, and two others are in the heart of the continent closer to the South Pole. The Soviet Academy of Sciences is sending out a big new research party in October to relieve the present staff of the expedition, which travelled there last year to prepare for the international programme. Arrangements are nearly complete for the diesel-electric ships Ob and Lena to sail from Leningrad on a long voyage. Both will set course for the Mirny camp to land a relief staff led by Alexander Treshnikov, who holds the title of a Hero of the Soviet Union. The two ships will carry a cargo of extra camp equipment, scientific apparatus, food reserves, and winter clothing, as well as collapsible bunga-j lows and building materials to be used in the construction of the. inner Soviet scientific bases of Vostok, near the South Geometric Pole, and Soyietskaya. near the “pole of relative inaccessibility. The region is named “the pole of relative inaccessibility” because it is the part of the Antarctic continent farthest removed from the coastline and up to now completely unexplored. It has the world's lowest mean temperature.

Exploratory Voyages

A sea-going party will make extensive exploratory voyages in the Ob to the waters west of Mirny and the area of the Indian Ocean adjoining the Antarctic. The Soviet Antarctic Expedition’s members will be cooperating with the scientists of Britain, the United States, France, Argentina, Norway, Australia, Japan, Chile, and other nations taking part in the International Geophysical Year activities.

Simultaneously with the Soviet progress reports from Antarctica her scientists have announced a novel project in Soviet Armenia, where, in the Ararat Plains, a solar electric station is being set up. This development, described in the Soviet journal, “Literaturnaya Gazeta,” involves the construction of a perfect circle of mirrors enclosing a tower 40 metres (131 feet) high. The diameter of the circls will be almost one kilometre (nearly half a mile). The wer will support a revolving tank, the water in which will be heated by solar energy to boiling point at a pressure’ of up to 30 atmospheres. Steam from the boiler will be channelled through pipes to a 1200 • kilowatt turbine. The 1293 mirrors of this solar electric station will be mounted on special carriages which will be propelled round the tower on railway lines by auto matic “trains.” Special mechanism will keep the mirrors turning always towards the sun, whose rays they will reflect on to the surface of the watei tank, or boiler, in the central tower. The plant will be brought into operation by the sun itself as soon as ii rises. Its rays, lighting on photo-elec-tric cells, will actuate relays controlling the mirror-trains and focussing the mirrors constantly sunwards Scientists consider the site chosen as specially suitable for a solar electric station, as the region enjoys about 2600 hours of sunshine a year.