CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand — The last U.S. Air Force transport aircraft journeyed home on March 7 after a busy summer in Christchurch. From this New Zealand city, the Air Force made frequent flights to Antarctica in support of the National Science Foundation program there.
This year’s summer program was notable for two reasons.
Firstly, the Air Force utilized a new aircraft platform – in addition to usual Lockheed Martin LC-130H Hercules “skibirds” and Boeing C-17A Globemaster IIIs – to fly to one of the world’s most remote spots.
Lt. Col. Jack Smith, Commander of the 304th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, Antarctic Operations, explained to Defense News why these C-130Hs of the Nevada Air National Guard put in an appearance, performing around ten missions to the frozen continent.
“There’s a C-17 gap season, from about the 5th of December through the third week of January, where we don’t operate because the runway gets too soft,” he said. “But the C-130 can start operating earlier because they’re smaller and lighter, so that they have an option to move passengers north and south during those gap periods.”
While the C-17 can carry much more cargo, Smith explained the C-130Hs out of Reno are cheaper to operate too. “It’s a small airplane, less fuel.” They are also more efficient than the LC-130, the world’s largest ski-equipped aircraft. In fact, that plane’s skis so badly affect aircraft aerodynamics that they consume 25% more fuel compared to a C-130H.
The second new aspect to this year’s Operation Deep Freeze – the name given to Antarctic support operations that started in 1955 – was the effort to rebuild a pier at McMurdo Station where ships offload cargo and supplies. This saw the C-17s carrying heavy cargo such as cranes and big drilling rigs, explained Smith.
Navy Seabees are in charge of rebuilding this vital pier, which previously shattered in half and will take two years to construct. Bulk supplies and fuel arrive by icebreaker ships. Last year the U.S. moved 90 million pounds of cargo to the continent, of which 85 million arrived by sea.
Air Force aircraft brave harsh conditions to fly personnel, equipment and supplies to Antarctica. Describing the challenges of flying in this frigid environment, Smith said the weather was definitely the biggest headache. Conditions at McMurdo can change rapidly, or an aircraft may develop technical hitches.
This results in “boomerangs”, where an aircraft in midflight returns to Christchurch. “They reach a point, we call it a point of safe return, you get to that point and you have to make a decision based on the weather forecast,” Smith said.
The summer season lasts from the start of October through to early March. Smith explained, “So the LC-130s will be here pretty much that whole time operating, and they’re mostly doing intra-theater airlift,” shuttling between McMurdo Station and other ski ways in the south. Meanwhile, Smith said of the C-17s, “Our focus is Christchurch to and from McMurdo.”
He said there can also be communication challenges. “HF [high-frequency] radios may or may not work once you get pretty far south. So radio issues, getting weather forecast updates, sometimes can be a challenge.” Spatial disorientation is also possible if pilots cannot identify the horizon.
The only airfield where the heavy C-17s can land at is Phoenix at McMurdo, this being made from compacted ice. However, is landing and taking off on an ice runway challenging? “It’s not that different, to be honest,” Smith said. “It’s similar to a wet runway – so if the runway here in Christchurch is wet, that’s pretty similar to what we experience at Phoenix.”
Occasionally the aircraft might airdrop emergency supplies to the South Pole, but that did not happen on the summer rotation just completed.
A Hercules takes around 8 hours to reach Antarctica, compared to 5 hours for a C-17. Therefore, an average Globemaster mission to Antarctica and back is 16-18 hours. A typical C-17A flight crew is four pilots, four loadmasters and two flying crew chiefs. Smith said these flights also help upgrade and qualify crews.
C-17s performed 24 missions in October-November 2024, plus another eight in early 2025. One aircraft will also return to New Zealand do a couple of midwinter missions in August, when darkness rules in the deep south. At the peak, 5-8 Air Force flights south occur per week, including the Hercules.
Smith’s squadron is part of the 62nd Airlift Wing stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash. The formation, and the LC-130s and C-130Hs, fall under jurisdiction of the Hickam, Hawaii-based Joint Task Force – Support Forces Antarctica while supporting Operation Deep Freeze.
Smith commanded 38 personnel on the C-17A side of the operation this year. The Air Force only selects qualified instructor pilots and instructor loadmasters for these missions. “We want people who are already pretty experienced with C-17 operations, and then we allow home station squadrons to nominate who they send.”
Because so many personnel wish to participate, it is regarded as a commander’s incentive program. “They use it as kind of a reward to their top performers within their squadrons back home. So we build a team out of all the high performers each rotation from back at McChord. So it makes my job easy – I have a bunch of really, really talented folks working out here,” Smith enthused.
The New York Air National Guard’s ten ski-equipped LC-130H Hercules are getting long in the tooth, and a replacement is needed. According to an Air Force source, the replacement will likely be based on the C-130J. However, regular Air Force C-130Js cannot fly to Antarctica because American models do not possess wing fuel tanks.
New Zealand is not restricted in this way. The country’s air force has already flown its new C-130J-30s to Antarctica, because these have a longer-range fuel capacity thanks to wing tanks.
The Pentagon may be changing priorities for the military, but there is little chance of the Air Force’s role in Operation Deep Freeze being affected.
For scientists working in Antarctica, there is absolutely no other way of getting urgent supplies. This was illustrated when Smith, in one of the final flights of the season, captained an emergency C-17 mission to medically evacuate someone from McMurdo.
Gordon Arthur is an Asia correspondent for Defense News. After a 20-year stint working in Hong Kong, he now resides in New Zealand. He has attended military exercises and defense exhibitions in about 20 countries around the Asia-Pacific region.
