Australian aviation crew carries out daring midwinter Antarctica rescue

Supplied: SkytradersPilot Al Wallach said conditions were 'right on the edge of even the most specialised aircraft capability'Mackay said his company believed it was the closest a civilian airliner had operated so close to winter solstice, which was on 21 June."Skytraders has conducted winter medevacs previously, but never this close to the winter solstice," he told the paper. He said "an enormous amount of experience and familiarity with the conditions" was needed to safely land an airliner on an ice runway in total darkness at -43°C.The pilot, Captain Al Wallach said the successful mission reflected the specialist expertise of the team's people, which included the flight crews, meteorologists, operational planers, runway teams and medical personnel. "Every Antarctic mission demands absolute precision, but winter operations raise the complexity significantly," he said "The conditions we encountered were right on the edge of even the most specialised aircraft capability."Skytraders carried out a similar mission in March 2020, when the US requested help evacuating a member of the US Antarctic Program also based in McMurdo, although temperatures were slightly warmer at -30°C.