A dormitory on the US Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. “Individuals are principally locked up in a base and so they can do what they need.” Proper: Rodney Marks was meticulous about lab security, in keeping with his supervisor. Photographs / Equipped
Kiwi investigative journalist Stephen Davis has spent 21 years attempting to resolve what many consider is the suspicious dying of an Australian scientist in Antarctica.
Journalist Stephen Davis has gone deep
into investigating a number of trendy mysteries. His digging into British Airways flight 149 that landed in Kuwait simply hours after the Iraqi invasion in 1990, inflicting its passengers to be held hostage, has resulted in new court docket motion on behalf of the passengers and is being made right into a Sky UK function movie. Below his The Secret Historical past of … banner, he has additionally investigated the catastrophe of the sinking of the Estonia, a ferry crossing the Baltic Sea.
In his newest investigation, Davis, a former Listener columnist, has launched a six-part podcast on the dying of Australian astrophysicist Rodney Marks in Could 2000 on the American-run Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. He paints an image of Antarctica because the Wild West, the place a wall of silence prevented a correct police investigation into what’s extensively thought of to be a younger scientist’s suspicious dying. He’s nonetheless not finished on discovering out precisely what occurred.
Rodney Marks died from methanol poisoning however the way it occurred has not been formally established. What have you ever discovered about his dying?
We’ve recognized prime suspects. There have been two individuals who, in police terminology, had the means, motive and alternative to homicide Marks. However to this point, they’ve refused to talk. Likewise, the police will now not remark.
Are you hopeful Marks’ killers shall be dropped at justice?
I’m not giving up. Some days I’m hopeful, some days, not. However should you’d requested me about my investigation into BA149, after a few years of pursuing, I assumed there was no likelihood of justice. And now, immediately, we appear to be getting some justice.
What else have you ever uncovered about Rodney Marks’ dying?
The opposite big a part of it, which I’m nonetheless investigating and gathering details about, is the cover-up. And on that, I’ve been working for years to acquire documentation on how the US authorities interfered with the investigation by protesting to the New Zealand authorities.
It grew to become clear there was a protracted cover-up by US authorities. New Zealand police investigating the dying had been obstructed at each flip, probably essential proof was destroyed and key witnesses weren’t interviewed, even once they prompt the potential for foul play.
There was behind-closed-doors strain on the NZ authorities over the police inquiry, particulars of which Wellington nonetheless refuses to launch, regardless of a number of OIA requests. A February 2001 memo I received 18 months in the past pertains to US Embassy [staff] going to see folks within the authorities in Wellington, clearly to protest. But it surely’s redacted on nationwide safety grounds. I’ve appealed to the Ombudsman however these things takes perpetually.
A lot of these on the South Pole US base on the time of Marks’ dying, together with his fiancée, have refused to talk. Who has come ahead since to speak about what occurred?
We received folks like Dave Zybowski, who was down there. And we additionally received Rodney’s supervisor, Dr Antony Stark at Harvard, to speak about it and eventually break the omerta on it. Stark says Marks was meticulous about lab security and wouldn’t have made such a mistake. The quantity of methanol swallowed was about a big glassful. He believes Marks was intentionally poisoned however the poisoner might not have supposed to kill him. Zybowski, who was there on the time, recalled his suspicion when he first learnt of Marks’ dying that anyone had “finished one thing”. He fully rejected the suggestion of suicide.
Zybowski additionally talks concerning the tradition of violence at the moment. Has it improved in any respect?
Zybowski instructed us the very first day he was down there, he was sitting in a canteen and he noticed anyone method anyone else and attempt to kill him with a hammer. However no, the heavy ingesting, violent tradition and dangerous behaviour haven’t improved within the 24 years since. In particular person circumstances folks attempt to do one thing about it, however individuals who have contacted me because the podcast make it very clear that not one of the points that we raised within the podcast have been resolved.
And the sexual assaults and rape of feminine employees that had been effectively publicised a few years in the past – has that modified in any respect?
Jennifer Sorensen was working as a meals steward on the US McMurdo Station in 2015 when a sexual relationship turned violent. She was raped, however when she reported it, her bosses determined after a quick investigation that she was the sufferer of sexual harassment and never sexual assault. Jennifer, who we interviewed within the podcast, and others will let you know it’s probably not modified in any respect. It’s nonetheless terrible.
And this pertains to the dearth of general governance of Antarctica?
Sure. The purpose is that it’s in no person’s curiosity in the intervening time beneath the Antarctic Treaty to have an general decision of the issue of dangerous behaviour. I imply, there’s no continent-wide police power, no established procedures for coping with dangerous incidents, due to jurisdictional points.
It’s an space the place international locations, together with New Zealand, have staked a declare however nobody is allowed to personal territories, in keeping with the Nineteen Fifties treaty. It’s a continent of no legal guidelines, actually, as a result of you possibly can’t introduce a legislation.
If a Kiwi died at McMurdo tomorrow, it nonetheless wouldn’t be correctly investigated.
You additionally speak concerning the impact on temper and behavior of spending six winter months on the South Pole.
What folks don’t realise is, down by the South Pole, it’s a desert. And, satirically sufficient, with all that ice about, there’s no water, you possibly can’t chip into the ice, and it’s near being like residing on one other planet. Actually, due to the environmental points, the stress and stuff, Nasa research what occurs to folks there, preparatory to, ultimately, a long-term mission to Mars.
Individuals in these environments really feel the necessity to drink alcohol. A few of them drink closely. And particularly within the winters, you possibly can’t management what goes on there. Individuals are principally locked up in a base and so they can do what they need.
About 50 folks keep over winter at Amundsen-Scott Station on the South Pole, lots of them seemingly affected by a situation generally known as “winter-over syndrome”, which has signs like sleep deprivation or insomnia, melancholy, disappointment, irritability and a decline in cognitive functioning.
That is your third podcast sequence: the primary was The Secret Historical past of Flight 149, in 2021, and The Secret Historical past of the Estonia, in 2023. How do you decide their success?
The variety of downloads for all three podcasts has simply handed the 2 million mark so I’m happy about that.
However to guage success, to begin with, as the results of the flight 149 story, the British authorities is now being sued. After my 149 ebook got here out, after which the podcast, a whole lot of legal professionals got here ahead to supply to work for the previous hostages and so they picked an excellent, courageous legislation agency, McCue Jury and Companions, which is now searching for a median of £170,000 ($355,000) per passenger.
For the Estonia story, we received the investigation reopened. New data was established. And once more, the suggestions from the individuals who suffered, the family of the victims, the survivors, lots of whom I’ve met, was tremendously optimistic.
There have been feedback, although, that a whole lot of your claims are conspiracy theories.
The world that we stay in now, the world of social media, is totally awash with conspiracy theories. And the truth that there are such a lot of conspiracy theorists on the market makes the lifetime of an investigative reporter much more tough, as a result of real reporting can simply be instantly characterised as simply one other conspiracy.
And that brings me to my subsequent query: your ideas on the state of journalism in New Zealand?
I’ve been a journalist for 51 of my 67 years, and I’m so glad that I had my journalistic profession within the 50-year interval simply gone, somewhat than beginning now, as a result of it’s a special job. I really feel very sorry for younger reporters going right into a world the place they may hardly have time to do something. They’ll have to jot down tales for the paper, they’ll must tweet, they must put stuff on-line …
We’re an awesome nation, however we’re very careless and we sort of assume, “Oh, it received’t occur right here.” For TV information and present affairs, the broadcasting answer has been clear for years, which was to make TVNZ a public broadcaster with a mandate just like the BBC, after which to have the business channel, which is Three. We may have finished this any time over the previous 20 years, and that may have been a passable answer.
As a substitute, we’ve gone alongside, thought of it often, and the top result’s the sort of destruction of most of our present affairs journalism, and I don’t assume it’s ever coming again.
And that carelessness – the quantity of people that instructed me there wouldn’t ever be the Maga insanity right here in NZ, however we’re being overwhelmed with falsehoods and conspiracy theories.
What’s saved you engaged on the Antarctica story for twenty years?
I’ve been investigating this story for 21 years. After I went all the way down to Antarctica in 2003, we weren’t getting wherever. However I don’t prefer to neglect about these items. I don’t like being lied to. And I don’t like conditions the place the authorities and governments use their energy to principally suppress the reality, and that’s what retains me going. I do know it sounds terribly idealistic, however I’ve been a reporter since I used to be 16 and I nonetheless consider in it as a lot because the day I began.
The Secret Historical past of Antarctica: Dying on the Ice, by Stephen Davis and produced by Anna Staufenberg, is accessible to obtain from podcast platforms together with Apple and Spotify.
