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The Most Extreme Volcano on Earth? | NOVA | PBS

NOVA PBS Official | August 6, 2026



Antarctica is an otherworldly land of extremes. But perhaps nothing there is as extreme as Mount Erebus, one of Antarctica’s two active volcanoes and the southernmost active volcano on Earth. Conveniently, Erebus’ summit is a mere 25 miles from McMurdo Station, Antarctica’s largest research base.

Originally published in 2020 on ‪‪‪‪@pbsterra 🇦🇶

Hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez join Jessie Crain, a National Science Foundation Antarctic research support manager, on an exhilarating helicopter trip from McMurdo to Erebus’ summit and then land on its flanks. At altitude in -30° F conditions, they embark on foot and see firsthand how breathtaking (literally) Erebus is — and why an active volcano in a land of ice is a scientific wonder. Together, Caitlin and Arlo discover Dr. Suess-like ice towers (gas-emitting fumaroles), learn how Erebus came to be, and how it’s a window into Earth’s climatic past. And they (Arlo especially) experience the challenges and dangers that researchers face while working at Antarctica’s most epic extreme.

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Written by NOVA PBS Official

Comments

This post currently has 42 comments.

  1. @daphnekivinen9482

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    I was at 11,000 ft. in the Wasatch Mountains. I did get a headache afterwhile. It was back in 2001 before the Winter Olympics. Beautiful country. I can't remember if I had difficulty breathing. That was the highest elevation I had ever been. I was detailing in Ogden at the time for one summer. It was a nice change.

  2. @arrjay2410

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    Minus 30 Celsius, cold day in January in Canada.
    I put a jacket on the dog, and off we go.
    Of course we don't spend a lot of time out in it, and we're dressed for it – as were you.

  3. @xr6lad

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    How can you have a documentary about this place AND NOT MENTION NZ’s worse air disaster when an Air NZ airliner hit the side of the mountain and killed over 240 people? Air New Zealand flight 901.

  4. @AvanaVana

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    6:35 if you’re going to try to communicate snowball earth to the general population, don’t say “scientists think that hundreds of millions of years ago, the world was covered in ice…[volcanoes] finally put out enough CO2 to heat up the planet again.” That makes it sound like prior to this, the earth was enveloped in some perpetual ice age since its inception. You say “again”, but the first sentence was already so staggering and misleading that I doubt people who don’t know would catch it or understand why you said “again” if you never said it was hot to begin with. A better way to phrase this would have been “for most of earth’s history, earth’s climate was a greenhouse, but hundreds of millions of years ago, the earth’s climate suddenly entered into a global ice age that covered the entire world in thick ice sheets”.

    But I want to thank you for the incredible footage from this trip and for putting yourselves through that to get this footage and interviews with the scientists. I never realized quite how tall Mt. Erebus was…this is incredibly tall for an island volcano basically starting at sea level. Volcanoes of this height tend to be located more on continental arcs that are already tall due to orogenic uplift and overthickened crust.

  5. @OliverBullock-f8v

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    my uncle wouldn't shut up about reading the book The Silent Dominion so I finally caved and bought it. he was act ually right. seeing the blueprint of the elites laid out like that is insane.

  6. @KabirDas-c5e

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    notice how the media always pushes the most div isive topics right when we should be uniting against the billionaires? i just finished reading the book The Silent Dominion and it exposes that exact tactic. you guys desperately need to read this.

  7. @LucasPapadellis-c1e

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    notice how the media always pushes the most divisive topics right when we should be uniting against the billionaires? i just finished reading the book The Silent Dominion and it exposes that exact tactic. you guys desperately need to read this.

  8. @AvaCouch-k9k

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    my uncle wouldn't shut up about reading the book The Silent Dominion so I finally caved and bought it. he was actually right. seeing the blueprint of the elites laid out like that is insane.

  9. @tugumejohn-z7u

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    my anxiety used to be so bad watching the news until reading the book The Silent Dominion cured it. once you see the playbook that the author exposes, the world stops looking chaotic.

  10. @HajrtAil-k3k6n

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    everyone who reads this comment trust me and order a copy of the book The Silent Dominion by Damian Cross. it explains how the elites control the narrative so perfectly that you'll never watch the news the same way again.

  11. @PujaThakur-i6e

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    everyone who reads this comment trust me and read the book called The Silent Dominion by Damian Cross, and thank me later. the domesticated mind concept is the truest thing ever written.

  12. @jameshatton4211

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    Does anyone know what the second biggest emission of carbon dioxide is volcanoes ARE actually number 1?
    Anybody? No?

    The Ocean. The Ocean is the second biggest emitter of carbon dioxide.

    Do you wanna know what humans are? We are like number 5 on the list and emit under 1% of all carbon dioxide world wide. There are things more and less than us that contribute to that whole 100% though and we are made to believe it's all our fault? 0.058 of a % FFS! Volcanoes and oceans are MOST of the carbon dioxide and we have zero control over either of them!

    The reason oceans are because they have a lot of biological creatures respiring and that means exchanging carbon dioxide out of the system and oxygen in to the system.
    The increase in carbon dioxide from the ocean is representative of its biomass. It's an indicator besides under water volcanic vents contaminating the stats.

    I'm not saying don't pollute I'm saying don't believe the climate hoax

  13. @uniseine

    August 6, 2026 at 9:08 am

    Did you know, like Antarctic fumerals, that each piece of Driftwood has its own personality, which is particularly noticeable if you're not catching very many fish.

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