Editing International Polar Year (section)

==The Second International Polar Year (1932–1933)==
[[File:1932 polaryear mixedperf nh 297.jpg|thumb|left|Soviet postage stamp commemorating the 1932–33 Polar Year]]
The International Meteorological Organization, the predecessor of the [[World Meteorological Organization]] (WMO), proposed and promoted the second IPY (1932–1933). Shortly after [[World War I]], mysterious behavior in [[telegraph]], radio and electric power and telephone lines convinced engineers and scientists of the fact that the electrical [[geophysics]] of the Earth needed more study. The availability of airplanes, motorized sea and land transport and new instruments like [[radiosondes]] enabled these phenomena to be investigated.

At an international conference of directors of meteorological services in Copenhagen in 1928 it was decided to undertake another intensive and coordinated international research effort focused on the polar regions during 1932–1933, the 50th anniversary of the First International Polar Year. It was also proposed to explicitly include in the plan for the second IPY the goal to investigate how observations in the polar regions could improve the accuracy of weather forecasts and the safety of air and sea transport.

Forty-four countries participated in the second IPY, which heralded advances in meteorology, magnetism, atmospheric science, and in the "mapping" of ionospheric phenomena that advanced radio science and technology. 27 observation stations were established in the Arctic, a vast amount of data was collected and a world data center was created under the organization that eventually came to be called the [[World Meteorological Organization]]. Due to the [[Great Depression]], the plan of erecting a network of stations in Antarctica had to be abandoned. Also, a great amount of data generated in this year was lost due to Second World War.