Map of Antarctica
The Covid-19 crisis has hit the airline industry very hard and caused the loss of 46 million aviation-supported jobs. As such, I was retrenched as a flight simulator instructor because there were no longer many pilots left to be trained or checked.
I even closed down my 20-year-old flying website and retitled it to From the Skies to the Bar after I was successfully called to the Malaysian Bar about 5 months ago.
As I was beginning to write simple legal articles which can be very dry and boring if one is inexperienced, I received a request from Quora regarding the above question. Not sure if my followers are interested with this mundane question, I will nevertheless answer it here.
Antarctica
Antarctica or where the South Pole is located, is virtually uninhibited except by about 4500 researchers. It is an ice-covered land mass, roughly twice the size of Australia.
Unlike the North Pole where commercial passenger flights ply between Dubai and San Francisco, there are no commercially viable planes flying directly over the Antarctica.
This place is the coldest, driest and windiest of the seven continents. Only the wealthy tourists found it a novelty to visit this most remote destination during summer. An Antarctica 11-day air/sea cruise from Southern Chile will cost you around RM82,000 (USD19,595).
Sight Seeing Flights
If you are talking about sight-seeing, this is really a costly flight that operates about 5 times a year from a few cities in Australia. There is no landing at the destination and the lowest height you are permitted to descend to is 11,000 feet. This restriction was imposed after a New Zealand DC-10 flight crashed near Mount Erebus in 1979 due to navigation error and a ‘whiteout’, a condition where the horizon cannot be seen.
Overflying Antarctica
So, why don’t planes take shortcut and fly directly over Antarctica to save fuel like they do over the North Pole?
Well, at the moment, there is a lack of need to do so unlike the Artic polar routes where there are many cities between North America and Asia. Further, during an emergency, there are hardly any airports nearby to divert to.
Strict FAA regulations where every airline must ensure that there are sufficient anti-exposure suits, special crew training, enhanced radio facilities and anti-freeze fuel are amongst some of the impediments. As such, it is not cost effective to launch such a flight.
Conclusion
However, if you are a resident from Perth and wish to fly to Santiago in Chile, your route will definitely take you over the South Pole.
In view of the strict FAA requirements, it is uncertain if any airline will launch this uneconomical route using a Boeing 777X /787 or Airbus A350/A380.
If it ever come true, this will possibly be long after the Covid-19 pandemic when the airline industry recovers in 2025 or later.