Flag of Antarctica
There is no official flag of Antarctica. Antarctica is not a nation and is not ruled by a single government or body, therefore no flag has been adopted for it. The Antarctic Treaty Organization has no flag, either.
Proposed designs
There have appeared in various sources several proposed designs, including one by Whitney Smith and one by Graham Bartram.
The Whitney Smith design uses the high-visibility color orange as its background (it is the international rescue color, it contrasts the best against snow, and to avoid any confusion, is unlike almost any other national flag on Earth). The emblem consists of several components. 'A' stands for Antarctica. The bottom segment of the globe repesents Antarctica's position on Earth, while the two hands holding up the globe segment repesents peaceful human use. The emblem is colored white to represent the snow and ice of Antarctica and is offset toward the hoist of the flag so as to maintain its integrity should the flag fray badly in the high winds prevalent upon the continent. However, there is no record of it ever being fabricated, let alone used in Antarctica.
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The Graham Bartram design uses the flag of the United Nations as its model. A plain white map of the continent on a blue background symbolizes neutrality (Mr. Bartram was well aware of the overlapping territorial claims of the United Kingdom, Chile, and Argentina when he designed the flag). This flag has actually been flown on the Antarctic continent as recently as 2002, when Ted Kaye (editor of Raven, the scholarly journal of the North American Vexillological Association) took several full-size copies of the flag on an Antarctic cruise. The bases of Brazil, Ukraine, and the U.K. all flew it from their flagpoles, making its raising "official". He presented a paper on the first flying of the Bartram design over Antarctica in Stockholm in 2003, at the 20th International Congress of Vexillology. It is perhaps the most popular flag for Antarctica, as seen in its abundancy on the Internet.
Territorial flags
The nations of the Antarctic Treaty use their own national flags at their respective Antarctic research bases, though the British territorial claim on Antarctica has its own flag, as does the French Southern Territories, which includes the French territorial claim.
The Argentine province of Tierra del Fuego includes the Argentine claim on Antarctica (25 degrees W to 74 degrees W). The flag was adopted in 1999 as the result of a competition.
The Magellan Region (Chilean Antarctica) includes the Chilean claim on the continent (53 degrees W to 90 degrees W). Punta Arenas is the 'capital' of this region.