Commonwealth Bay (Mawson's Huts)

Cape Denison on Commonwealth Bay in Antarctica is called the windiest place on Earth at sea level. The annual average wind speed is about 80 kilometres per hour, and winds regularly pass 240 kilometres per hour.

The wind is a katabatic wind, which is cold air flowing down the steep ice sheet toward the sea. Mawson's Huts stand here. Australian explorer Douglas Mawson built them for his expedition of 1911 to 1914, and he called the place the home of the blizzard. The huts are being cared for by Australian conservation teams so the early explorers' story is not lost.

Why is it so windy?

Cold, heavy air above the ice sheet slides downhill toward the coast. The slope gets steeper near the sea, and a cliff at Cape Denison speeds the air up even more. In summer there are calmer periods, but winter storms are strong and long and can start and end suddenly. The Guinness Book of World Records and the National Geographic Atlas both list the bay as the windiest place on Earth.

What are Mawson's Huts?

The huts were built in 1912 by the Australasian Antarctic Expedition. The main hut was only 7.3 metres square, but it housed 18 men in 1912, and seven men, including Mawson, stayed on for an unplanned second year in 1913. It is one of just six surviving sites from the Heroic Era of Antarctic exploration, and is protected as a historic site. The huts lie about 3,000 kilometres south of Hobart, Tasmania.

On the globe

The model shows the timber huts at Cape Denison on the windswept ice coast.