Location: 80°22′ S 77°22′ E.
Dome Argus lies near one end of a ridge about 60 km long and 10 km wide. The ice there is more than 3,000 m thick, overlaying the subglacial Gamburtsev Mountains.
The coldest place on Earth?
The world’s lowest temperature ever recorded was −89.2 °C in July 1983, at the Russian station Vostok, inland of Australia’s Casey station. Dome Argus is nearly 600 m higher in elevation than Vostok. This means there is a good chance that the automatic weather station at Dome Argus could record the world’s lowest surface temperature. The coldest temperature reached to date was −82.5 °C in July 2005.
Automatic weather station (AWS)
The automatic weather station at Dome Argus was set up as part of an Australian–Chinese collaboration in January 2005. No ground-based scientific investigation had been made at this site before the arrival of the Chinese over-snow traverse team.
The weather station measures:
- Wind speed
- Air temperature – with sensors mounted on mast arms at 1 m, 2 m and 4 m above the snow surface
- Snow temperature at 0.1 m, 1 m, 3 m and 10 m depth
- Atmospheric pressure
- Wind direction
- Incoming solar radiation
- Relative humidity
- Snow-fall rate.