___________________________________________________________________________________________
Editor’s Note: I was blogging away and used the UN Map of the World in one of my posts. This lead me to th observation that Antartica is not shown on this map! Mankind has been aware of this “lost continent” for quite a while…always a frozen and mysterious land. Wikipedia provides the information below:
Antarctica is Earth‘s southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest continent, being about 40% larger than Europe, and has an area of 14,200,000 km2 (5,500,000 sq mi). Most of Antarctica is covered by the Antarctic ice sheet, with an average thickness of 1.9 km (1.2 mi).
Antarctica is, on average, the coldest, driest, and windiest of the continents, and it has the highest average elevation. It is mainly a polar desert, with annual precipitation of over 200 mm (8 in) along the coast and far less inland. About 70% of the world’s freshwater reserves are frozen in Antarctica, which, if melted, would raise global sea levels by almost 60 metres (200 ft). Antarctica holds the record for the lowest measured temperature on Earth, −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F). The coastal regions can reach temperatures over 10 °C (50 °F) in the summer. Native species of animals include mites, nematodes, penguins, seals and tardigrades. Where vegetation occurs, it is mostly in the form of lichen or moss.
The ice shelves of Antarctica were probably first seen in 1820, during a Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and Mikhail Lazarev. The decades that followed saw further exploration by French, American, and British expeditions. The first confirmed landing was by a Norwegian team in 1895. In the early 20th century, there were a few expeditions into the interior of the continent. British explorers were the first to reach the magnetic South Pole in 1909, and the geographic South Pole was first reached in 1911 by Norwegian explorers.
Why is this land controlled jointly by 30 nations? Why do airlines NOT have flight paths which cross over Antartica? Sure, it’s cold and forbidding, yet it’s also a L-O-N-G way to fly to Australia! The Airline ETOPS (Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance Standards) rules prevent planes flying too far away from runways, yet there are flights to the coastline of Antacrtica which comply with these rules.
Hmmm, what about UFO and pyramids seen in Antarctica? Please check out the links below addressing this topic:
https://www.livescience.com/61926-snow-antarctica-google-ufo.html
Finally, are there more clues in the very name Ant-artic-a? The prefix of “ant-” implies either the “beginning” or “end” of something, or “against, or “opposite” of something. If the North Pole is called “artic” meaning that area of Earth, then the South Pole would be the opposite, or…antartica. Both areas are extremely forbidding and cold…thgus, the evolution of the word “artic”.
This is not an exhaustive investigation of Antactica, yet may serve to cause questions in your own mind. I look forward to learning more about this unknown place. Please feel free to share what you learn on my blog! Thank You!
Rose Rambles... 