Scott Base

Well, I think it was a totally different experience, but I ran a marathon down there when I was down there for work as part of the army many years ago.

But we just ran the marathon on the road that basically went from Scott Base to the airfield, which is obviously all just... ice but um i guess it was like hard packed by the um tracked vehicles and i was just going to say like i wonder if your course they're going to like basically just use track vehicles to like kind of roll around no it's already it's

not that kind of it's not that kind of no and so um yeah it's just gonna and that's why I mean, ideally, I'd love to go down there and give 9 hours 20 a bit of a rattle.

You'd need a good surface.

Today's guest has worked in a place where none of that is possible and where the heat of conflict doesn't take the chill out of the air.

matty jordan is a civil and construction engineer from perth western australia and he has spent more than 500 days in antarctica across 11 expeditions and seven and a half years with antarctica new zealand most of that is a project manager on the scott base redevelopment and in 2023 this is like my worst nightmare he wintered over at scott base with 16 other people 118 days with no sunlight, no flights in, no flights out, and the same faces at every single meal.

He's also the most followed Antarctican in the world.

He has a community of around 2.5 million people, more than a billion views, and coverage everywhere from the Guardian and Newsweek to MIT Technology Review, ABC Australia, and the New Zealand Herald.

I'm a little disappointed that you're not in Antarctica right now because I really wanted to see some penguins.

Yeah, well, it's actually, the season has started.

So down at Scott Base and around McMurdo Station, just south of New Zealand where I used to work, They kicked off this week.

So the first set of new folks heading down for the 2026, 2027 summer have just arrived, but unfortunately August is a bit too early to say any of the penguins around the research station.

Yes, I have been down in Antarctica for the last three weeks.

I've been working there at Scott Base and also trying to do some training for a cycling race called Five Passes.

Now, it is quite hard to train for a four-stage road cycling race whilst on a frozen continent, but thankfully Scott Base has a gym and it has an indoor bike.

So, So I was able to do some training, but I had my own challenges as well, such as how to get food that I really like to eat and having planned enough kind of protein shakes and those kind of boring things.

However, whilst I was battling my own, you know, third... third world, first world, very much first world problems, I had an idea, which was around me were so many interesting, sporty, strong, capable women.

And I thought to myself, I'm What are these girls doing? How are they overcoming the challenge of living and working in Antarctica and keeping themselves active and healthy? So this episode, you are going to join me as we meet some of the incredible women that are calling Scott Base home, either for the whole season or just for a few weeks, or who have called it home over winter.

Pretty exciting.

So first off, we are going to meet a field trainer.

Well, what they're actually doing is they've built their own rival base called Scott-Udminson.

We've got Scott Base.

They built Scott-Udminson in 1995.

And they've actually built it on New Zealand Ross Shelf.

A trip that turned into a lifelong mission to share the wonders of Antarctica with the world.

He's gone from working in civil engineering to helping deliver scientific projects at Scott Base and has built an audience of millions through his photography, videos and storytelling.

I caught up with Matty after our recent Antarctic adventure together to talk about what keeps drawing him south, what it's really like to live and work on the ice and why he believes getting people interested in Antarctica is vital to protecting it.

Welcome to the show, Matty.

So that was another thing.

The University of Canterbury here in Christchurch run a program called the Postgraduate Certificate in Antarctic Studies.

And when I was applying, it actually included a two-week trip down to Scott Base to get involved in some science and some research.

They don't do the trip to Antarctica anymore, but they're still running the program.

Because I did a few things down the South Pole.

I climbed, uh, the highest mountain, Mount Vinson, uh, which is o- uh, over on the other side of, from Scott Base.

And then, uh, we flew up and then, um, trekked up to the South Pole.

And the guy, the other couple on the, on the flight with us...

Yeah, I'm gonna look up to see which are possible.

I'm unfortunately, or fortunately, depends how you look at it, um, my day job, I work for Antarctica New Zealand, so I'm off to Scott Base-

Oh, wow

... for two weeks to work, and then spend quite a lot of time on the indoor bike in the gym at Scott Base.

It's not so much what I observed.

Um, going to Scott Base in particular, the temperatures are very, are very cold.

Um, and, you know, one or two degrees warming, um, isn't causing massive collapse of, uh, glaciers or ice sheets there.

I mean, it is starting to do that in the Antarctic Peninsula, which is further north, um, and it has a much warmer climate, more around freezing level.

Um, there is more open sea in front of Scott Base, um, now than there used to be.

I haven't been to Scott Base in the recent years to see that, but I certainly understand and, and have seen photos of that happening.

Um, but the science is telling us-

Obviously we- Sorry, I interrupted you there.