Antarctic Single Frames

Antarctic Single Frame Records are a collection of aerial photographs over Antarctica from the United States Antarctic Resource Center (USARC) and the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) dating from 1946 to 2000. The Antarctic Single Frame Records collection includes black-and-white, natural color and color infrared images with a photographic scale ranging from 1:1,000 to 1:64,000. U.S. Antarctic Single Frames The U.S. Navy began flying Antarctic trimetrogon photography with Operation Highjump in 1946 followed by Operation Windmill in 1947. Then in 1955 the U.S. Navy launched the first Operation Deep Freeze mission to Antarctica. This mission prepared the United States for the International Geophysical Year which was an international project to study earth sciences across the globe in 1957 and established scientific research in Antarctica. The U.S. Navy has acquired over 330,000 frames of Antarctic photography since 1946 with annual acquisitions since 1980. The USARC maintains this collection of Antarctic aerial photography. The majority of images in this collection are black-and-white trimetrogon aerial (TMA) photographs. TMA photography is a system of cameras positioned to take vertical, left oblique, and right oblique images simultaneously for use in topographic mapping. The TMA images are taken along a single flight line with the oblique cameras pointed at a depression angle of 30 degrees. Each of the three cameras has an angular field of view of 60 degrees, which provides a 180 degrees horizon to horizon coverage when the images are placed side-by-side. Not all flights were equipped with oblique cameras, and equipment malfunctions limited the availability of complete sets of photography. USGS EROS scanned the U.S. Antarctic film collection and collaborated with the Antarctic Geospatial Information Center (AGIC) to establish latitude and longitude coordinates for the single frame records. The AGIC, based out of the University of Minnesota, supports Antarctic research by providing geospatial information. This collaborative effort provides easy access to historical Antarctic photography. TMA mission number, roll number, and frame number are no longer needed to obtain images since the longitude and latitude coordinates have been provided. Antarctic Single Frame Records can be located by selecting an area or by entering geographic coordinates in EarthExplorer. The film sources in the USARC collection are affected by vinegar syndrome degradation and have been transferred to the National Archive and Records Administration (NARA) for permanent storage. British Antarctic Single Frames The USGS EROS, in cooperation with the BAS, has scanned a portion of their collection of Antarctic aerial photography making single frame records available to the public. The collaborative effort provides easy access to this British Antarctic photography. The BAS has supplied metadata, including latitude and longitude coordinates, for their film collection allowing the images to be searched by selecting an area or by entering geographic coordinates in EarthExplorer.