Latest Extreme points of Earth Stories

SEATTLE -- A U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker is headed to the Arctic to map the sea floor off Alaska, as Russia, Denmark and Canada assert their claims in the polar region, which has potential oil and gas reserves.The lead scientist on the expedition scoffs at the political implications."We're basically just doing science," said Larry Mayer, director of the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New Hampshire. "There's no flag-dropping on this trip," he said...

Russian explorers dived deep below the North Pole in a submersible on Thursday and planted a national flag on the seabed to stake a symbolic claim to the energy riches of the Arctic. A mechanical arm dropped a specially made rust-proof titanium flag onto the Arctic seabed at a depth of 4,261 meters (13,980 ft), Itar-Tass news agency quoted expedition officials as saying.Russia wants to extend right up to the North Pole the territory it controls in the Arctic, believed to hold vast reserves of...

MOSCOW -- An ambitious Russian naval expedition that set off for the North Pole to explore the bottom of the Arctic Ocean and stake Moscow's claim to oil and natural gas riches under the seabed ground to a sudden halt Wednesday when a ship broke down.The research ship Akademik Fyodorov suffered engine failure a day after it sailed from the northern port of Murmansk and was drifting in the Barents Sea about 60 nautical miles from the shore, state-run Rossiya television reported.The Rossiya...

By Story By William Mullen, Chicago Tribune Jul. 2--CAPE EVANS, Antarctica -- The dark, silent interiors of the three wooden huts are still pungent from the smoke of seal-blubber fires that once warmed men now long dead. Their dishes, pots, pans and scientific paraphernalia are scattered across tables and counters, and tins and boxes of their food still sit on shelves. Isolated from one another, strung out along 23 miles of Ross Island's bleak Antarctic coastline, the abandoned huts for...

WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- A U.S. team plans to drive from the Antarctic coast to the South Pole later this year to demonstrate the viability of alternative energy sources to replace fossil fuels, a spokesman said Monday.The 1,000-mile journey to the South Pole will take 10 days using alternative fuel vehicles driven along a U.S.-developed ice highway, said Nick Baggarly, executive director of the "Zero South" expedition.The expedition would "demonstrate the viability of these...

A robotic probe designed to draw an underwater three-dimensional map showing the biological and geochemical composition of an ice-bound Antarctica lake may prove to be the ideal tool to search for life on other planets or moons where ice is known to exist.Peter Doran, associate professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago, is the lead investigator in a three-year, $2.3 million dollar study funded by NASA to build the probe that will map Antarctica's...

What better way to engage students in science than to apply lessons learned from fieldwork? This is the philosophy of Alaska teachers participating in the Arctic Expedition for K-12 Teachers, a program organized by the International Arctic Research Center (IARC) at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and a handful of international agencies. For 33 days teachers from Alaska, Canada, France, Germany, Russia, Sweden and England will take atmospheric measurements, collect ice cores, install ice...

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A study of a $2-$4 billion project to top up the shrinking Dead Sea with water from the Red Sea could start in the coming months, a World Bank official said on Tuesday.France, the United States, the Netherlands and Japan have signaled their willingness to help fund a $15 million feasibility study of how to reverse a 25 meter (82 ft) fall in the level of the Dead Sea in the past century."We are working with a number of other donors," Vahid Alavian, in charge of...

By Tali CaspiEIN GEDI, Israel (Reuters) - These days, a cart takes visitors from Israel's Ein Gedi resort to the edge of the Dead Sea.Twenty years ago, tourists stepped right onto the shore.The Dead Sea, the lowest point on the Earth's surface, is shrinking as its salty waters rapidly dry up.With no clear solution to the problem, environmentalists and tourist businesses are worried."Every time I come here the beach is further and further away. One day there will only be a puddle...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Photographer Joan Myers spent months exploring Antarctica and recording its stark beauty. An exhibit of her photos opens Thursday at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History."I have seen part of the planet that few have seen, and I have had the time to walk and photograph and feel our world without its veneer of human activity. Antarctica cannot be tamed," Myers wrote in her journal of the time she spent there."Wondrous Cold: An Antarctic...