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At an extremely remote Antarctic outpost, scientists have unearthed a pristine sample of our planet’s history.<\/p>\n
It’s an ice core 2,800 meters, or some 1.7 miles, long. But it’s not just the length that’s so significant. The ice contains preserved pockets of Earth<\/a>‘s air from some 1.2 million <\/em>years ago, if not more. Previous ice cores provided direct evidence of our planet’s climate and environment from up to 800,000 years ago.<\/p>\n So, this is a giant leap. The team drilled so deep they reached the continent’s bedrock.<\/p>\n “We have marked a historic moment for climate and environmental science,” Carlo Barbante, a polar scientist and coordinator of the ice core campaign called “Beyond EPICA – Oldest Ice,” said in a statement.<\/p>\n SEE ALSO:<\/span> If a scary asteroid will actually strike Earth, here’s how you’ll know<\/span> <\/a><\/p>\n An international group of researchers excavated the ice at Little Dome C Field Camp in Antarctica<\/a>, located 10,607\u00a0feet (3,233 meters) above sea level. They beamed radar down into the subsurface and used computer modeling of the ice flow to determine where this ancient ice was likely to be. And they were right.<\/p>\n This was no easy feat. Atop the Antarctic plateau, summers average minus-35 degrees Celsius, or minus-31 degrees Fahrenheit.<\/p>\n