The establishment of two of the stations warrants par- 
ticular mention here. They are the Amundsen-Scott Sta- 
tion at the South Pole and Byrd Station, which lies six 
hundred and forty-seven miles southwest of Little America. 
The successful establishment of these two stations by Op- 
eration Deepfreeze II under Admiral Dufek’s command 
was one of the great logistic achievements in the long his- 
tory of polar exploration. 
The establishment of the South Pole Station was accom- 
plished by air dropping materials from the great Air Force 
Globemasters. Some eight hundred tons of materials were 
dropped for the establishment of the station, including a 
14,000-pound tractor. Only the personnel and limited 
amounts of equipment were flown in and landed by ski- 
equipped planes. 
The techniques used in establishing Byrd Station were 
equally impressive. Globemaster air drops were also im- 
portant here, but the main mission was carried out by great 
tractor train operations, which included crossing a danger- 
ously crevassed area more than seven miles in width. It 
took five weeks for the special Army Transportation Corps 
teamed with Navy personnel to “bridge” this crevassed 
zone and establish a well-marked route. 
Of the other nations in the Antarctic operations, the 
Soviet Union has the most ambitious program next to ours. 
Their main base at Mirny is the largest and best-equipped — 
station in Antarctica. On December 16, 1957, they estab- 
lished a second major base at the South Geomagnetic Pole 
and they still hope to establish a station at the so-called 
“pole of inaccessibility” or the geographic center of the 
continent, approximately four hundred miles from the 
South Pole at longitude 63° E. In addition to these main 
Zod 
