» Antarctica is the coldest, windiest, driest continent on the plant. The weather, strong winds and brutal storms have been identical with Antarctic since its finding and continue to be a major challenge for modern explorers. The interior of Antarctic is typically higher, drier and colder.
» Antarctic climate is characterized by low temperature, high wind velocities, and frequent blizzards. Rapidly changing weather is typical of coastal locations, where temperatures for the warmest month average around freezing. Winter minimums drop as low as -40°F (-40°C). High altitude and continuous darkness in winter combine to make the interior of Antarctica the coldest place on earth. Summer temperatures are unlikely to be warmer than 0°F (-18°C); winter mean temperatures are -70°F (-57°C) and lower.
» Antarctica is colder than the Arctic even though during the course of the year it receives almost the same amount of sunlight. In fact, Antarctica receives a little more solar energy than the Arctic because the Earth is closest to the sun in December when Antarctica has 24 hours of sunlight .But the perpetual ice sheet covering the majority of the continent is highly reflective and doesn't absorb warmth. Attenuation of solar radiation energy is greatest at high latitudes where the path through the atmosphere is longest. Also, solar energy reaching the surface at high latitude is spread over a larger area because the surface is at a greater angle to the incoming radiation. Therefore the earth's surface at the poles is a heat sink when compared with that at the tropics. The poles simply lose more energy than they receive - they have a negative radiation balance. The net radiation is the balance between incoming energy absorbed by a surface and outgoing radiation that's emitted from the surface.
^ It is surrounded by ocean.
^ It is the windiest continent with the highest wind speed measured at d'Urville (327 km/h).
^ It is extremely high in altitude. Antarctica is the highest continent on the planet with an average altitude of 2500m.
^ It is covered almost entirely by ice and snow. Antarctica has 85% of the planets' ice, with ice over 4700m thick in some places.