“Noosfera” completed its fourth Antarctic season: it was a record-breaking one
12.05.2025 - 12:00
The icebreaker “Noosfera” successfully completed the fourth Antarctic season, which became a record in terms of the number of voyages and international cooperation.
On May 10, the ship returned to the port of Cape Town (South Africa) after almost five months of work, the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine reported.
During this time, the “Noosfera” team made a record five voyages to Antarctica, and crossed the most turbulent Drake Passage on the planet 10 times. In total, the ship traveled more than 20 thousand nautical miles (over 37 thousand km), which is almost equal to the length of the Earth’s equator.
The ship provided a change of shift of the annual 29th and 30th Ukrainian Antarctic expeditions, and also transported a seasonal expedition to and from the Vernadsky Station, which performed tasks during the Antarctic summer.
The icebreaker also made joint voyages with expeditions of the Antarctic programs of Poland, the USA, Spain and the Czech Republic. These flights, carried out at the expense of the above-mentioned states, gave Ukraine more opportunities to meet the needs of its own program, in particular, to deliver additional cargo and specialists to Vernadskyi.
In addition, a number of geological, oceanographic and meteorological studies were carried out from Noosphere. Thus, within the framework of the international project OCEAN:ICE, Ukrainian scientists first launched six argobuoys, which are already actively collecting information about currents in the Southern Ocean. Ukrainian scientists also carried out simultaneous radio sounding of the atmosphere from Vernadsky and Noosphere for the first time in order to learn more about the processes of cloud formation and precipitation in the area and their impact on the ocean, sea ice and melting glaciers.
At the same time, due to Russian aggression, Noosphere cannot yet return to its home port — Odesa. Therefore, it will currently be in the port of temporary deployment — Cape Town (South Africa).
