Pelagic Expeditions & Vinson of Antarctica visit Zavodovski Island deep in the S. Atlantic Feb 2023

The Vinson of Antarctica wrapped up her deep south season on February 18th 2023 upon the completion of our science support role on Zavodovski Island in the South Sandwich Island chain.This slideshow is of Skip's second voyage to the South Sandwich, having been there on Pelagic Australis in January 2020. On that occasion we had a multi-faceted science and film team managing to land on four of these remote islands, all with difficult landings. The one we could not land on at all was Zavodovski, the most northern of the group and which is a veritable fortress with no viable beaches to land on and only one weakness in the fringing cliff face, identified by Jerome Poncet on Damien II, decades ago. On that occasion it was too rough to even contemplate a landing and Dr. Tom Hart from Oxford Univeristy managed to do four drone flights from the vessel, to census the entire colony of penguins – quite a feat! But more information was needed, hence a return this January 2023.