Tara Polar Station goes round
The Fondation Tara Océan’s unique, mobile, drifting polar station was no more than an architect’s drawing last April, when construction started in Cherbourg. Today, piece by piece, she is taking up her position in the Arctic shipyard of Construction Mécanique de Normandie.
A gutted, rounded naval structure, flashes of blue-green light illuminate the sheet metal. The smell of hot metal wafts from the corners of the inch-thick aluminum bars, filling the humid air of Cherbourg, France. The screeching of the grinders blends with the muffled blows of the hammers. This metal symphony echoes across the high ceilings of the hangar, christened Nef Arctique last September during a visit by Prince Albert II of Monaco. It is here, in this wing of the Chantiers Mécaniques de Normandie, that the 4,500 parts of the Tara polar station, an expedition ship for the French polar strategy, have been assembled from top to bottom since April 2023. Four decks will eventually stack up to a total height of 11 meters, including 3.6 meters below the waterline. The first two bridges are already assembled. Workers are adding floors to the scaffolding above this oval structure in anticipation of the arrival of the other two bridges. The geode is installing the glass panels about twenty meters from the large entrance doors.
On deck number 2, the largest of all, Vincent Lebredonchel, site manager, shows us the sides: “This is where the waterline will be.” As the station drifts through the Arctic sea ice, it will be trapped in ice and snow. The pressure forces will be so great that “the structure of the station will have to be reinforced. It will be designed to meet Ice Class IA Super,” he explains, pointing to the frames, a marine carpentry term for the vertical pieces that, when joined together, take on the appearance of a rib cage. The space between each pair is 50 centimeters. “It’s tight,” he says over the clatter of machinery. On this deck, a dozen people lie on the frames, welding aluminum planks to seal the hull and horizontal reinforcements to keep the cold from warping them. Wrapped in balaclavas, they weld by the rope. Archlights illuminate their tinted visors in a crackle of fire.
In the Gautier shipyards of Saint-Malo in 1908, the frames of the Pourquoi Pas?, Jean-Baptiste Charcot’s polar expedition ship, were so close together that they almost touched. Charcot didn’t expect to get caught in the ice, but he was preparing to go to Antarctica for the winter with a sturdy ship. According to Serge Lambert of Les amis de Jean-Baptiste Charcot, a joke circulated among the workers: “Why are we putting planks on this ship if it’s already watertight by the juxtaposition of the frames?” Joking aside, the hull was lined in places, and the interior was filled with felt and even caulked. At Tara Polar Station, layers of rock wool and aluminum foil will provide the insulation. They begin lining the skeleton’s interior, reaching 30 centimeters in some places. The heat generated by the ship will be used to limit its fuel consumption during the 400 days of drift in the Arctic Ocean, which are part of the ship’s 2026-2027 schedule.
Beneath the aluminum plates on deck number 2, men and women join bulkheads and hook up water and fuel tanks. “Not easy to adapt to this shape, it’s the most complex ship I’ve dealt with in three years of working here,” explains Alexis, who has been working on this project since its inception. “But it’s a beautiful project.” Through half-open manholes, ventilation ducts run down into the holds. Surrounding the future engine room, against the curved walls, oxygen could run out. In the center of deck 1, a large vertical tube occupies the space. It crosses the station, a little like Le Français‘ main mast in 1903, except that here it is hollow and will be accessible from deck number 2. This central shaft will open up a view and an entrance beneath the surface of the ice, into the water. Laurent Marie, an ice diver, would later tell us that it’s a perfect situation to be able to “return to the warmth just after plunging into cold water.”
In the stern area of Deck 2, where notched shoes trample aluminum shavings and cuttings, dry and wet labs and microscopes will make up the workspace for the six scientists embarking on the polar night. “The boat will be packed with equipment, a veritable Noah’s Ark. In Charcot’s time, they all set off with equipment to the brim, wood, planks…,” notes Romain Troublé, director of the Fondation Tara Océan, during a visit to the construction site. “We’ll do research on the biomass of organisms in the food chain, from phytoplankton all the way up.” The polar station will also be equipped with echosounders to monitor the passage of fish and larger animals. Its future navigation zone is rarely visited. A few Russian, Chinese and German expeditions have drifted into the Arctic Ocean in the winter, but they mainly studied the physics of the ocean and the atmosphere.
The project has convinced researchers from CNRS and the French space agency, as well as the French Polar Institute and Olivier Poivre d’Arvor, the French ambassador for the poles. Emmanuel Macron’s government’s funding plan “France 2030” has provided 60% of the project’s funds, i.e. 13 million euros. The unique data could provide decisive scientific answers to understanding the Arctic Ocean during the 5th International Polar Year, scheduled for 2032-33. “The moratorium on no fishing in the Arctic must be transferred to domestic law, but I’d like to see it extended beyond the high seas in the future,” says Romain Troublé. The station is intended to be a place of international collaboration, with Canada and Germany, among others, as well as working groups of the Arctic Council.
At the construction site, this multi-curved scientific arch will receive its shaft line and propeller in a few weeks’ time. Launching is scheduled for autumn.
Camille Lin, Polar Journal AG
More on the subject :
