Volta
Science17 February 1988

King Sejong Station Opens

Korea’s first Antarctic station, King Sejong Station, was built on King George Island. In 2014 a second, Jang Bogo Station, was built on the Antarctic mainland.

Jang Bogo Station at Terra Nova Bay, with Mount Melbourne behind (2017)
Jang Bogo Station at Terra Nova Bay, with Mount Melbourne behind (2017)

Σρτ · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source

Korea joined the Antarctic Treaty in 1986 and on 17 February 1988 opened King Sejong Station on King George Island in the South Shetlands. The next year it became a consultative party, with a voice in the governance of Antarctica. In 2003 a station member died when a team set out by boat to search for missing colleagues.

On 12 February 2014 Jang Bogo Station opened at Terra Nova Bay on the Antarctic mainland. With the icebreaking research vessel Araon, the two stations study glaciers and climate change, meteorites and Antarctic life.

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States and rulers at the time
South Korea — President Chun Doo-hwan
Places
King Sejong Station

Before and after

Earlier
1987 Bombing of Korean Air Flight 858
Later
1988 1988 Seoul Olympics

Themes that include this event

  • Antarctic Exploration1773 – 2014

    From Cook crossing the Antarctic Circle in 1773 to the first sightings of the continent, Ross’s wall of ice, the race to the pole between Amundsen and Scott, Shackleton’s Endurance, the Antarctic Treaty and the ozone hole — two centuries of reaching for the frozen continent