U.S. May Try to Rescue Sick Doctor at South Pole

As winter darkness falls across Antarctica and temperatures plunge to 90 degrees below zero, the National Science Foundation is racing to mobilize the rescue of an ailing doctor at the South Pole before it is too cold for anyone to safely land or take off from the world’s most remote human outpost.

NSF officials said Wednesday they were preparing to evacuate Dr. Ronald S. Shemenski, 59, the station physician, who recently passed a gallstone and suffered associated pancreatitis. Although he appears to be recovering, he still may need major surgery.

“NSF is deeply concerned about Dr. Shemenski’s condition,” said Rita Colwell, the agency’s director. “We are in the process of examining a range of options to determine the very best means of ensuring his health and safety.”

Three ski-equipped LC-130 aircraft were expected to fly today from Stratton Air National Guard Base in upstate New York to Christchurch, New Zealand, and then to McMurdo Station on the coast of Antarctica, as NSF and Air Force officials weighed the risks of a rescue mission to the center of the polar plateau, another 800 miles away.

Normally, the darkness and low temperatures--well below the freezing point of hydraulic fluid--leave the station crew cut off from the outside world from March to late October every year.

The propeller aircraft operated by the 109th Airlift Wing of the New York Air National Guard, based in Scotia, N.Y., are the only large planes in the world able to land safely on the South Pole’s snow runway.

But they cannot operate at temperatures lower than minus 66 degrees Fahrenheit, when it becomes so cold that electrical cables shatter and metal parts crack. Aviation fuel turns to jelly. The low temperature at the South Pole today was expected to hover at minus 65 degrees.

With no conventional air traffic control, only rudimentary weather forecasts, and no runway lights, air operations at the South Pole are considered risky even during the daylight months of the polar summer. With little warning, fliers in winter can find themselves blinded in the swirling fog of ice crystals and snow that produces whiteouts. “It is like flying inside a ping-pong ball,” one Air National Guard pilot said. The only landing option under those circumstances is a controlled crash.

The combination of cold and darkness make air operations even more hazardous, said Air National Guard spokesman Maj. Robert Bullock. “We are looking at temperature, visibility, ceiling and we are looking at illumination of the airfield,” he said.

It may be several days before the Air Force decides whether to attempt the evacuation flight to the Pole. The weather could force Shemenski to stick it out in Antarctica with only aid from his co-workers.

“We have a very small window remaining to see if we can fly in and bring him out,” said Erick Chiang, the NSF executive responsible for polar research support. “It could very well be that [the Air Force] could come back and say the window is closed and that the risks are too great.”

It is the second time in as many years that a physician at the U.S. Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station has developed a potentially fatal medical condition that set in motion a perilous emergency rescue mission at a time when extreme low temperatures routinely isolate its crew of scientists and support staff.

In October 1999, Dr. Jerri Nielsen diagnosed herself with breast cancer after the South Pole station began its winter isolation. After treating herself for months, she was evacuated from the South Pole station and airlifted to the United States for more intensive care as soon as temperatures warmed enough for the aircraft to land and take off safely. It was one of the earliest recorded flights to the South Pole.

Like Nielsen and other participants in the U.S. Antarctic program, Shemenski had to pass an unusually rigorous physical exam to qualify for service.

Senior NSF officials said they had no reason to question the quality of the medical screening program but acknowledged there is heightened concern over the medical and psychological well-being of those who volunteer to work in Antarctica.

Last year, an astronomer working at the South Pole died of a heart attack and an electrical technician died at McMurdo. In 1997, a researcher wintering there died of heart failure.

In all, 50 people are spending the austral winter at the South Pole this year, the largest group to ever spend the season there. The station, which is in the middle of a massive eight-year renovation project, was designed to hold about half that number comfortably when it opened in 1975.

The staff at the station are variously employed in maintaining the science facilities at the Pole, including some of the world’s most sophisticated radio telescopes. More than a quarter of the crew are construction workers building the new station facilities.