TROLL AIRFIELD

'Troll airfield' is a 3 km air strip located near the Norwegian Troll Antarctic research station. It was constructed on the ice shelf and opened for service February 2005 to facilitate logistics for the research in the area.
The Norwegian Polar Institute has invited 11 countries opertaing on Queen Maud Land into a cooperation on Dronning Maud Land Air Network Project (DROMLAN). Troll Airfield is a part of an air network with Cape Town in South Africa and the Russian Novolazarevskaya Station further north east of Troll. Passengers are flown in from the main land and then distributed by smaller aircraft on to their final destination.
The air strip has proven popular with its users helping to cut costs on Antarctic research. C-130 Hercules, P-3 Orion[1] and similar long range aircraft have regular flights. The runway does not limit the size of visiting aircraft. Troll airfield is only open to traffic associated with research. Commercial traffic is not served.
February 12 2005 a C-130H of the Norwegian 335 Squadron brought Queen Sonja of Norway to the Troll research station, landing at Troll airfield, making Queen Sonja the first queen to ever set foot on Antarctica [2].