El Domo de la Base Admunsen Scott será retirado pronto

El Domo de la Base Admunsen Scott será retirado pronto, según declaraciones de Kristan Hutchison, del Antarctic Sun, quien ha manifestado que el material que se extraiga será reciclado y posiblemente se lo emplee en un museo de California.
Gran parte de las instalaciones que albergaba el antiguo icono del Polo Sur, ya han sido trasladadas a la nueva Base que se está construyendo, la cual se espera que esté concluida para el año 2007.
ANTAWA


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By Kristan Hutchison, Antarctic Sun staff
After more than 30 years at the South Pole, the landmark aluminum dome may retire to Southern California.
The original plan was to recycle the dome, which is the equivalent of 2.6 million aluminum soda cans, but a veterans group is interested in using the structure in conjunction with the CEC/Seabee Museum in Port Hueneme, Calif.
"I think it's worth the effort from a number of perspectives," said Bill Hilderbrand, president of the CEC/Seabee Historical Foundation, keeping alive the history of the military construction battalion that built the dome. "Number one, to kind of recognize the Seabees who went down to Antarctica and what they did."
The dome has to be removed anyway. Under the 1991 environmental protocols of the Antarctic Treaty, the U.S. Antarctic Program must remove any structures from the continent after they are no longer in use. Several large buildings at McMurdo Station have been torn down and shipped to the U.S. as trash in recent years, but the dome will be the largest ever removed from the South Pole.
Several of the modular buildings the dome sheltered were removed this winter. The functions they housed - including the kitchen and dining area, fire station, medical, and the greenhouse - have already moved into the new South Pole station, which is scheduled for completion in 2007. The weight room and fresh foods storage were taken out in Jan. 2004.
"The dome looks big and empty now," said Brien Barnett, a winter prep cook at the Pole and former Sun staffer. "There's this gigantic hole to your right."