An Australian aviation crew has carried out a daring midwinter mission to rescue a U.S. expedition member from McMurdo Station in Antarctica, in freezing temperatures and total darkness.
Skytraders said the “extraordinary” mission took place last Friday after a request for urgent medical evacuation.
After an initial weather delay, the airline landed its Airbus A319 – dubbed Snowbird 1 – at extreme conditions including temperatures of -43 °C.
The patient was safely transferred onto the aircraft and flown to Christchurch, New Zealand, where he received treatment and is now recovering well.
Skytraders deputy chief executive Duncan Mackay explained the aircraft was converted into a specialised medevac configuration within 24 hours of the call.
Takeoff was then delayed 12 hours, awaiting a favourable weather window. The plane eventually departed from Hobart in the early hours of Friday morning and landed at the U.S. research station on Ross Island.
No details were given about the patient other than he is now recovering well.
Mackay told the Australian newspaper that this operation was the closest a civilian airliner had flown so near to the winter solstice, dated 21 June. “Skytraders has conducted winter medevacs before, but never this close to the winter solstice,” he said. The mission required an enormous amount of experience and familiarity with the conditions to land an airliner on an ice runway in total darkness at -43 °C.
Captain Al Wallach stated the success reflected the specialist expertise of the crew, which included flight crews, meteorologists, operational planners, runway teams, and medical personnel. “Every Antarctic mission demands absolute precision, but winter operations raise the complexity significantly,” he said. “The conditions we encountered were right on the edge of even the most specialised aircraft capability.”
Skytraders performed a similar mission in March 2020 when the U.S. requested help evacuating a member of the U.S. Antarctic Program, with temperatures slightly warmer at -30 °C.
