From late March to the middle of August, scientists and others at Antarctica research stations were resigned to no air service during the months without sunlight. A C-17 Globemaster III changed all that in September by landing at McMurdo Station in complete darkness using night-vision goggles technology and reflective cones on the runway.

The mission was flown as part of Operation Deep Freeze, which is headquartered at Hickam Air Force base in Hawaii and provides air- and sealift support to the U.S. Antarctic Program and the National Science Foundation.

According to the Air Force News Agency, the C-17 is the jet built for night-vision operations. It shows all the aircraft’s operating parameters directly in front of the pilots on a piece of glass. This allows pilots to use night-vision goggles to survey the area.

For the flight into McMurdo Station, 64 high-intensity retro-reflective cones were placed on the runway edge. The unpowered cones reflect the plane’s wingtip light to the night-vision goggles when the plane comes in for landing. One pilot said the reflective cones could be seen by the naked eye two or three miles from the runway. It had been physically impossible to light the entire runway with powered light sources.

There were ten pilots on board the first landing on Pegasus Ice Runway, all of whom were certified to land on the ice in the dark using night-vision goggles and the cones.