So here just facts: it was happened in 6th SAE in Novolazarevskaya station. Doctor on station was just single, so the assistant was a mechanic. It was at April 30, 1961. The operation take 2 hours. He take position that he saw own body and use mirror when open body - he make 12 cm cut through which he find appendix. After 5 days doctor feel good and after 7 days he take away wires which they use to sewing body. His name Leonid Rogozov. He publish the short note about in the Information Bulletin of Soviet Antarctic Expedition, no. 37, pp. 42-44, 1962. After this case it was happened another time but I have not information. In my laboratory was a real case - doctor do appendix operation during traverse Mirny-Dome C. It was in 29 SAE on the way back from Dome C to Mirny. At 13 February 1984 Valentin Gorbachev, radioengeneer and magnetician, felt bad and become clear that it is appendix. In snow traverse was a doctor Igor Mogirev, who spent a winter at Vostok station and agreed to take part in traverse as a cook and occasionally as a doctor . So they arrange clean room in the living sledge (balok ?) behind of tractor. As it was necessary to keep clean atmosphere they switch off diesel heater so during operation was very cold as outside was almost minus 50 degrees C. The stop of traverse for operation was on 999 km from Mirny inside Antarctica. The operation was successful - and after two days they begin to move toward Mirny. This fellow, V. Gorbachev now is 63 and happy. [Novolazarevskaya was at 70°S 11°E, set up in 1960-61 on rock in Queen Maud Land 50 miles inland from the ice edge. It was closed in 1992] The above info comes from Alex Zaitsev, the Russian exchange scientist who was one of our fellow 1977 winterovers. What he didn't say was that Vladimir Papitashvili (the current/2009 NSF Aeronomy & Astrophysics Sciences Program Director and one of the Pole summer science representatives) actually was an assistant in the 1984 surgery on the Mirny/Dome C traverse. That story just came out in a June 2009 New Scientist interview. Alex and Vladimir worked in the same geomag lab in the 1960's. |