Ariel Waldman

Medivac, in the U.S.

Antarctic program and most Antarctic programs, you are not allowed to go to Antarctica if you're pregnant.

If you're even remotely a little pregnant, that's not a thing.

You can't do that.

So...

That's one thing.

So no one's having babies and stuff in Antarctica regularly.

However, there have been stories of other countries who have explicitly flown women down there to have babies so that they can claim, oh, we own this part of Antarctica.

Of course, that's not recognized.

That's not recommended.

And they're doing it as a stunt.

And they're doing it in the middle of summer when it's easy to get flights in and out.

But medical emergencies, they can happen in the summer, they can happen in the winter.

They're much more serious in the winter because it's complete darkness.

There's a flight gap where everyone who's in Antarctica wintering over, there's no flights in or out for several months because of how difficult it is.

The weather gets way worse and it's complete darkness.

But over the years, there have been instances where there's been a serious enough case where either the New Zealand Air Force or the US Air Force had to fly down in the middle of winter and medevac someone out.

Thankfully, all those missions were successful, but they're really harrowing because

not only do you have someone in a medical emergency situation, but you have a whole crew that's sacrificing their life to get them out.

So they try to minimize that as much as possible.