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The Antarctic base where the hole in the ozone layer was first discovered is
to be closed in two years’ time. The British Antarctic Survey will close two
bases in 1995: Faraday, on the Antarctic Peninsula and Signy in the South
Orkney Islands.

The ozone hole was discovered a decade ago by Joe Farman from measurements
taken at Faraday and Halley bases. The ozone measurements at Faraday, which
go back to 1957, are the longest continuous record. Faraday is also used as
a weather station. Signy is used by biologists. Farman, who retired from the
survey in 1991, says: ‘It is very sad. Once you have stopped you can never
re-create them.’

Barry Heywood, BAS’s deputy director, says that the bases were being
mothballed because the survey would have to spend £5 million
on each one to meet health and safety standards.

Ozone measurements will continue at the Halley base, on the Antarctic
mainland, he says. He maintains that measurements taken from the mainland
will be more useful. Faraday ‘keeps dipping in and out of the ozone hole
while Halley is in the centre of the hole’, he says. Farman disagrees: ‘It
is more interesting to see what is happening at the edge of the hole.’

Heywood argues that the ozone measurements are ‘the least valuable of the
data’ collected at Faraday. ‘I don’t see it as a serious loss. It is far
better to concentrate on Halley.’ He adds: ‘The chances are we won’t be
opening up Faraday again.’

The BAS hopes to replace Faraday with an automatic weather station. The
survey has set up a technical committee to examine how many of the
measurements that are currently taken at Faraday can be automated, says
Heywood. It may be possible to automate some of the magnetic measurements in
the ionosphere, for example.

Heywood says that the biologists at Signy ‘view with excitement’ their move
to the mainland. He says it gives them a chance to test theories they have
developed about the survival strategies of plants and to find out if they
apply in the harsher environment of the mainland. Signy will be kept open
for research during the summer.

Earlier this year the BAS was heavily criticised by the National Audit
Office for overspending on four of its major programmes (This Week, 3
April).

‘We are having to make hard decisions about which is the most important
research. But there will be no reduction in quality or quantity,’ says
Heywood.