Arriving at Signy

As we continued south, the temperatures dropped.  On 16th November the ship drew close to the South Orkney Islands, by which point the temperature had reached a chilly minus 6 degrees.  The first icebergs began to appear.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Waiting for the first one to pop up on the distant horizon is one of my favourite parts of travelling south and they began to appear late one evening.  The following morning I awoke at 3am to the sound of sea ice grinding along the side of the ship, which shudders and shakes as it pushes through the ice flows.   For good views of the ice you can stand on the heli deck.

 

Or on the bridge, where you get excellent views whilst enjoying the cosy warmth of the inside of the ship!

 

On the way down we stopped at Powell Island, another island in the South Orkneys, to conduct a survey of the condition of the ASPA (Antarctic Specially Protected Area) there.  This site is designated specifically for it's biological values and is also designated an IBA (important bird area) by Birdlife International.  People are not allowed to visit without a specific purpose, so I felt very privileged to be part of the small team that went ashore.

Powell Island is beautiful and it was good fun to be out in the small boats, amongst the icebergs and snow petrels which fly really close to investigate what we are up to.

We then arrived at Signy Island, where our team got off the ship.  Signy Research Station is only open during the summer season, and each year the ship waits offshore for 3-4 days, while the station is set up and all services are restarted.  

People on the ship, bound for other research stations, come ashore and help out with getting set up, including digging out patches of snow and ice, removing window shutters and moving food and cargo from the ship to the station. 

We have a tech team to get the services up and running. The generators and central heating boilers started well and we had heating and power within the first day.  On the second day we transferred fuel from the ship (enough for 5 years for the station) and got the reverse osmosis plant (which makes our fresh water for drinking from salt water) up and running.  Finally with all services up and running the ship left us on Thursday and headed on its way south down the Antarctic Peninsula to Rothera Research Station.  This left 5 of us on station ready to start our season.

Onboard the RRS Sir David Attenborough

We have now been sailing for three days, heading almost due south.  I am probably about as far from land as I have ever been on a ship before. 

The day we set off and the next morning were beautifully calm. 

 

Since then the waves have been getting bigger, the winds stronger and the temperature colder, as we head further south.  This morning the air temperature is down to 4 degrees. 

The current location of the RRS Sir David Attenborough can be found on the ship tracker here:

https://www.cruisemapper.com/?imo=9798222

The ships webcam can be found here (although it’s not always a very clear image):

https://www.bas.ac.uk/data/our-data/images/webcams/rrs-sir-david-attenborough-webcam/ 

Lots more information about the ship and its facilities can be found on this nice page here (if you go far enough down the page there is even a virtual ship tour):

https://www.bas.ac.uk/polar-operations/sites-and-facilities/facility/rrs-sir-david-attenborough/

Here are a few pictures of the inside of the ship.  This is the mess room (dining room) and the food hatch (the galley (kitchen)) lies behind it.  This is arguably the most important room on the ship!  It has full length glass windows down its whole length so we get a good view at mealtimes.  We are fed frequently and very well! 

Whilst on board, we are mostly left to do our own thing, but we do also spend time helping the crew with housekeeping tasks (peeling potatoes, hoovering, scrubbing etc).  We have a large bar and lounge.

The cabins are spacious.  The ship is not currently full so we have a cabin each and plenty of room.   

At the start of each Antarctic season, the ship, fully laden with food, supplies and science equipment for the research stations, sets sails from the UK and travels south to do a lap of all of the British Antarctic research stations.  At the end of the season it does the same, and in between it conducts Antarctic scientific research at sea.  It transports people to the research stations and resupplies the stations with all the food and equipment needed for the following year.  First stop this year is Signy research station on Sunday, where I will be getting off to do my work.