Antarctica is the Earth’s southernmost and fifth largest continent, where temperatures can fall as low as -90C. Anywhere between 1,000 and 5,000 scientists reside there at various research facilities, carrying out their own experiments. However, one group decided to take things one step further.
Amazon Prime’s “Antarctica – An Adventure Of A Different Nature” revealed how in 1991, a group spotted a small hole in the ice sheet above a pond where they were working.
Two divers then headed below the frozen desert.
Video footage shows them exploring underwater ice glaciers, as one of the divers repeatedly states: “It’s amazing.”
The narrator then reveals what they witnessed.
He says: “We’re inside a moving glacier.
“No other film like this exists because no one has seen caverns like this before.
“Here, scientists would expect only rock-hard ice.
“So Antarctica reminds us again that we have scarcely begun to understand our planet.”
However, although it is the first discovery of its kind, it is not the first time researchers have dived below the waters of the icy continent.
It was revealed during the same series how a team dug six feet into the ice to take a look at the marine life of the South Pole.
The series explained: “The ice is six feet deep.
“This is where Antarctica hides its colour and complexity, in forests of tiny plants called algae grow in the ice like a greenhouse.
“Millions of krill, which are like small shrimp, eat the algae.
“Fish eat the krill and seals eat the fish.”
The cameras panned around the deep waters, revealing a habitat beaming with life, before the narrator revealed how important this dive was.
He detailed: “This chain of life is so isolated and balanced it gives scientists clues to the health of the whole planet.
“Diving here is agony for the first 20 minutes, after that, it becomes dangerous.”
The divers then surfaced again and were helped out of the water.
