CHRISTCHURCH – Many ladies who paintings at McMurdo Station, the principle United States analysis base in Antarctica, say the remoted setting and macho tradition have allowed sexual harassment and assault to flourish.
The National Science Foundation, which oversees the U.S. Antarctic Program, printed a record in 2022 during which 59% of ladies mentioned they’d skilled harassment or assault whilst at the ice.
But the issue is going past the harassment itself, The Associated Press discovered. In reviewing courtroom information and inner communications, and in interviews with greater than a dozen present and former workers, the AP uncovered a pattern of ladies who mentioned their claims of harassment or assault have been minimized by means of their employers, regularly resulting in them or others being installed additional risk.
Several Antarctic employees spoke publicly about their reviews to the AP for the primary time.
GRABBING A HAMMER
Mechanic Liz Monahon informed the AP a person at the bottom threatened her in 2021, however her employers did little to offer protection to her. So she grabbed a hammer and stored it on her at all occasions.
“If he came anywhere near me, I was going to start swinging at him,” Monahon mentioned. “I decided that I was going to survive.”
It seems the person had a prison report in New Zealand and had breached a coverage order sooner than he’d deployed, a pass judgement on later discovered. Workers mentioned they took issues into their very own arms and stored Monahon protected by means of sending her away from the bottom on a venture over the ocean ice. The guy later left Antarctica.
In a recorded interview, a human sources consultant informed Monahon that issues of the bottom’s ingesting tradition were occurring for years.
A PATTERN OF PROBLEMS
Monahon’s case wasn’t an anomaly. A meals employee in 2019 informed her bosses she’d been sexually assaulted by means of a coworker. Two months later, the lady was once fired.
In some other case, a lady who reported {that a} guy in a senior function had groped her mentioned she was once made to paintings along him once more.
Another girl mentioned she was once raped, however the incident was once later misclassified by means of the person’s employers as simply harassment.
AGENCIES RESPOND
The NSF mentioned it stepped forward protection in Antarctica ultimate yr. It now calls for Leidos, the top contractor, to right away record incidents of sexual assault and harassment. The NSF mentioned it additionally created an place of job to care for such court cases, supplied a confidential sufferer’s recommend, and established a 24-hour helpline.
Leidos informed Congress in December it might set up peepholes on dorm room doorways, prohibit get entry to to grasp keys that might open a couple of bedrooms, and give groups within the box an additional satellite tv for pc telephone.
But the court cases of violence didn’t forestall with the NSF record. Five months after its unencumber, a lady at McMurdo mentioned she’d been assaulted by means of a male colleague. His trial is scheduled for November.
Monahon mentioned she hopes her tale activates contractors in Antarctica to stand extra duty one day.