Detour: Antarctica - Seven secrets from the bottom of the world

11 babies, a nuclear disaster and maybe a murder, a new Herald podcast uncovers forgotten stories from Antarctica.

In a major new Herald podcast series, Detour: Antarctica, Thomas Bywater goes in search of the white continent's hidden stories. In this accompanying text series, he reveals a few of his discoveries to whet your appetite for the podcast. You can read them all, and experience a very special visual presentation, by clicking here. To follow Detour: Antarctica, visit iHeartRadio, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Seven countries have made claims to footholds in the continent at the bottom of the world - New Zealand among them.

Although we might think we know Antarctica, it holds some surprising secrets.

Here are seven that could change the way you see it.

1: Kiwis on tour

The shortest gap separating Antarctica from any other part of the world is the Drake Passage. It's a 900km stretch of water, about the length of the North Island.

At the tip of Chilean Patagonia is Punta Arenas. Twinned with Christchurch, it is one of the five gateway cities to Antarctica.

Beyond these more recent connections, New Zealand has a far older relationship with this part of the world.

The ancient ancestors of the modern kiwi bird once stalked Antarctica.

Throughout Patagonia, temperate fiords and forests of southern beech trees are reminders of our shared past as Gondwanaland, some 300 million years ago.

It's not unlike a long-lost relative of Fiordland or the West Coast of South Island-Te Waipounamu. Patagonia even has its own native kiwi.

The South American rhea is the long-lost cousin of the kiwi and moa. Fossilised footprints of the ancient flightless birds can still be found on the Antarctic Peninsula.

The skull discovered on Livingston Island, Antarctica. Photo / International Journal of Circumpolar Health

2: Pointers to the past

The first recorded visits to Antarctica were within the past 200 years. But in 1973, an arrowhead was found on King George Island. A week later, a second was found.

Five-centuries-old stone artefacts of South American origin - older than Columbus - they pointed to an exciting idea that people could have been visiting the continent much earlier than thought.

That theory is bolstered by new research, including a University of Otago study of Mātauranga Māori last year that described a southern continent of ice.

Towing icebergs in Newfoundland. Photo / Wayne Power, JD Irving Ltd

3: Icebergs to Africa

During Cape Town's 2018 drought, one South African salvage company proposed a plan to tap into an unorthodox source of water.

Captain Nick Sloane, of Resolve Marine, suggested towing icebergs to the parched city.

It never happened, but it's an idea that's continued to surface as climate change intensifies worries about freshwater running out.

When you consider that two trillion tonnes of ice break off Antarctica each year, it becomes easier to imagine. Not to mention affordable. That's half of all freshwater used globally.

For 60 years, Antarctica has been governed by a set of international rules. These include a moratorium on taking minerals from the continent - sea ice too.

As countries such as South Africa and Australia, with large Antarctic programmes, continue to face challenges from climate change, might they begin looking south to solve them?

Emilio Marcos Palma was the first baby born in the Antarctic to parents Silvia and Jorge. Photo / Getty Images, Horacio Villalobos

4: Ice, ice babies

What happens if you become pregnant in Antarctica?

In New Zealand's Antarctic programme it means the end of your contract and a flight back to Christchurch. At most international bases, pregnancy disqualifies you from service.

That didn't stop 11 children from being born there between 1978 and 1984.

The first person born in Antarctica was Emilio Marcos Palma, on Argentina's Esperanza Base. The base still has a primary school for workers' families.

Younger brother Juan Luchio Palma says his brother is a "special person". His siblings took for granted the experience of living on the base in Antarctica, but grew up with constant reminders that they had a "hyper-famous" brother.

Forty-two years later, Emilio works as a software engineer in Barcelona.

The Russian 2015 team at Bellingshausen base including Oleg Beloguzov, top row second from left, and Sergei Savitsky, fourth from left. Photo / Vladimir Churun

5: Very cold cases

If Antarctica were a country, it would probably have the lowest crime rate on Earth.

With a seasonal summer population of about 5000, the average resident is highly educated and motivated. Mostly because everyone there has a specific role or purpose.

There isn't a single jail cell or police officer on the entire 14.2 million sq km landmass.

However, there is crime. Fraud, misclassified expenses and scientific plagiarism are regularly investigated by the US Antarctic Programme (USAP), but not serious crime.

So when Russia's Bellingshausen base reported a stabbing in October 2018 it was cause for alarm. The accused was confined to the base chapel until a plane could be arranged 10 days later.

Antarctica even has its own cold case.

In December 2000, it was determined that young scientist Rodney Marks had been poisoned at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole base. Following a coronial hearing in New Zealand, the investigation was abandoned in 2008 when none of Marks' colleagues could be summoned to testify.

PM3A Antarctica's nuclear power plant. Photo / US Navy, Atomic Energy Commission

6: The nuclear error

Antarctica's nuclear era was short-lived.

McMurdo Station's portable nuclear power unit was switched on in 1962. It was supposed to provide clean, unlimited nuclear power for years.

But after racking up almost 500 errors and being out of operation almost a third of the time, the USAP pulled the plug in 1972, deciding it was easier to run diesel generators.

Leaks found at the plant led to it being dubbed "Nukey Poo".

Due to the Antarctic Treaty's ban on nuclear waste, 350 tonnes of contaminated soil had to be shipped out of the continent through Lyttelton in a decade-long clean-up operation.

Four New Zealanders reported health issues related to exposure at McMurdo.

Adventurer Børge Ousland reaches the Ross Sea on the first Solo crossing of Antarctica. Photo / Antarctica NZ

7: Sliding flaws

Despite the club-like atmosphere of polar exploration, there are some sources of fierce rivalry. Nobody can agree who was the first person to ski solo and unsupported across Antarctica.

The most recent record attempt was Colin O'Brady in 2018. Claiming to have made the "impossible" first unsupported crossing of Antarctica, he was immediately beset by criticism from other polar explorers.

More than 50 petitioned him to renounce his claim. National Geographic writer Aaron Teasdale published a scathing essay titled "The problem with Colin O'Brady", outlining the feud.

Twenty-four years earlier, Borge Ousland skied across the entire continent using a snow kite. In 2011, Felicity Aston became the first unaided skier to cross Antarctica solo.

O'Brady still defends his 54-day record attempt, skiing solo and unsupported across the continent.

A Polar Expeditionary Classification System has since been devised to avoid future claims-related drama.

Detour: Antarctica is a New Zealand Herald podcast. You can follow the series on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.