Comprehensive characterization report on Winter Quarters Bay, McMurdo Station, Antarctica

• Main Authors: Crockett, A.B., White, G.J.
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; SEDIMENTS; REMEDIAL ACTION; WASTE DISPOSAL; ANTARCTICA; METALS; TANKS; MUNICIPAL WASTES; POLYCHLORINATED BIPHENYLS; HYDROCARBONS; FUELS; SURFACE WATERS; AQUATIC ECOSYSTEMS; Antarctic; McMurdo Station; Winter Quarters Bay; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: http://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/491395; https://www.osti.gov/biblio/491395; https://doi.org/10.2172/491395

Winter Quarters Bay is a small embayment located adjacent to the United States largest base in Antarctica, McMurdo Station. McMurdo Station, which is managed by the National Science Foundation`s Office of Polar Programs, was constructed in 1955, has been in constant use since that time, and has a population of about 1,000 persons during the summer and about 250 people for the winter. The bay offers shelter for ships and an ice dock is used during January and February to off load fuel and cargo. During earlier times, trash from the McMurdo Station was piled on the steep shoreline of the bay, doused with several thousand gallons of fuel and ignited. That practice has ceased and the site has been regraded to cover the waste. The bottom of the bay is littered with drums, equipment, tanks, tires, all sorts of metal objects, cables, etc., especially the southeastern side where dumping took place. The sediments are gravel in some places yet fine and fluid at other sites with coarse particles intermixed. The original benthic community is not well recorded but significant ecological changes have occurred. Sediments are contaminated with PCBs, metals, and hydrocarbon fuels. This report summarizes available information on Winter Quarters Bay and was originally intended to be used by workshop participants to become familiar with the bay prior to becoming updated with unpublished data by various Antarctic investigators. The proposed workshop was to assist the National Science Foundation in determining whether and how the bay should be remediated and to develop an integrated research plan if additional data were needed. However, plans changed, the workshop was never conducted, but the briefing report was prepared. Most of this report reviews and summarizes other published data. The only new data are those from the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory`s investigation into the distribution of organic contaminants in the bay and sediment toxicity testing.