Tourism
Small-scale tourism has existed since the 1950s. Since 1969, over 30,000 tourists have been to Antarctica. A total of 10,013 tourists visited in the 1998–1999 summer, up from the 9,604 who visited the previous year. Nearly all of them were passengers on 16 commercial (nongovernmental) ships and several yachts that made 116 trips during the summer. Most tourist trips last about two weeks.
As of 2006, several ships transport people to Antarctica to visit specific scenic locations. There are also sight-seeing overflights from Australia which fly nonstop over Antarctica and return, although overflights from New Zealand stopped after the fatal crash of Air New Zealand Flight 901 on Mount Erebus in late 1979.
Read more about this topic: Economy Of Antarctica
Famous quotes containing the word tourism:
“In the middle ages people were tourists because of their religion, whereas now they are tourists because tourism is their religion.”
—Robert Runcie (b. 1921)