As the darkest day approaches in Antarctica, Winterers at three of the UK's research stations are preparing for Midwinter's Day celebrations. From the crafting of elaborate gifts, to now-traditional screenings of The Thing, they compare traditions and plans the teams have in the works. Joining this cross-Antarctic conference call are Carpenter Eloise Saville at Rothera Research Station, Electrical Technician David Reid at King Edward Point, and Station Leader Charlotte Rayner at Bird Island. Fro...
Jun 23, 2025•27 min•Season 5Ep. 2
As the UK's largest Antarctic base, Rothera Research Station, celebrates its 50th birthday, host Nadia Frontier assembles a portrait of Rothera past and present. This episode features four fascinating perspectives on heritage, community and the importance of change. Alysa Fisher offers an archivist's account of the station's early years - from the wartime beginnings of the UK's Antarctic presence, to the highly popular dogs who used to live at the station, as well as what bits of history can be ...
Jun 08, 2025•43 min•Season 5Ep. 1
Meet the ice road truckers of Antarctica: the Tractor Train Traverse team, who drive supplies and fuel huge distances across the frozen wilderness to help scientists work in the deep field. With no garage in sight - and, in fact, nothing much else - this hardy and skilled team have to maintain the vehicles as they travel, living and working together to traverse the Antarctic interior. Nadia talks to Nick Withey, Traverse Vehicle Engineering Manager, and mechanic and first time traverser Rory Fle...
Apr 21, 2025•22 min•Season 4Ep. 12
For medics dreaming of an adventure, there's nothing quite like being deployed for a season to Antarctica. The role of doctor on an Antarctic research station or research ship is a huge responsibility - in an emergency, external help could be days or weeks away. In this episode, Nadia speaks to Dr Nisha Mistry, who is currently working as the doctor on the polar ship RRS Sir David Attenborough, and Dr Rebecca Boys, was one of the doctors at Rothera Research Station in 2022. They talk about what ...
Apr 07, 2025•37 min•Season 4Ep. 11
From algae and moss, to mites and bacteria, Antarctica is teaming with life - a lot of it is just really small. Nadia chats to four Dutch researchers from the Gerritz Laboratory at Rothera Research Station, each looking for answers about Antarctica's smallest terrestrial and marine life. Mareike Bach talks about her fascinating search for sea ice algae, drilling into pancake ice from a cradle suspended from a ship. Dr Swan Sow maps microbial life in the Southern Ocean to understand how climate c...
Mar 24, 2025•43 min•Season 4Ep. 10
In this special International Women’s Day episode, host Nadia Frontier takes a look back at some of her most memorable conversations with women at the British Antarctic Survey. This episode celebrates the incredible women pushing boundaries, breaking stereotypes, and shaping the future of science in one of the world’s most extreme environments. Professor Dame Jane Francis reflects on her remarkable journey from early fieldwork in Antarctica to becoming the Director of BAS. Geologist Dr Jo Johnso...
Mar 08, 2025•31 min
Katie Wells' job is like walking into a nature documentary! As a marine biologist at King Edward Point Research Station on the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia, Katie's job is to monitor the abundant carnival of animals that call this island and the surrounding ocean home. Katie talks to Nadia about her experiences of the changing seasons and sights during the first year of her two-year deployment to South Georgia. From hikes across the island to monitor seabirds, to following the lives of ...
Mar 03, 2025•25 min•Season 4Ep. 9
Every iceberg starts life attached to an ice shelf - until a crack travels deep through the ice and it breaks away. Predicting the way ice shelves will crack is still a major uncertainty in climate models. Cue an epic fieldwork project to the Larsen C Ice Shelf - featuring 'suture ice', hot water drilling, and some clever use of fibre optic cables. What's it like to camp out in the middle of the icy wilderness? How do you deal with dietary requirements when you're eating field rations? What's it...
Feb 17, 2025•25 min•Season 4Ep. 8
Ever wondered what it’s like to do science on a ship travelling through Antarctica's Southern Ocean? In this episode, host Nadia Frontier is joined by early-career scientists Emily Rowlands, Laura Taylor, and Kat Turner, who are gearing up for the next BIOPOLE scientific mission on the RRS Sir David Attenborough. From getting used to life on board, to being put in charge of managing important ocean sampling, they chat about the excitement and challenges of working on polar science at sea. Togeth...
Feb 05, 2025•32 min•Season 4Ep. 7
Where better to study clouds than from a plane? Host Nadia Frontier speaks to British Antarctic Survey cloud physicist Floortje Van Den Heuvel about her fieldwork scouting the skies of Antarctica for cloud forming particles. The clouds over Antarctica aren't well represented in climate models, and Floor is on a mission to change that! Floor fell in love with the polar regions after working in the Arctic during her PhD, and has never looked back. She chats about the Southern Ocean Clouds project,...
Jan 21, 2025•28 min•Season 4Ep. 6
Adapting to life after Antarctica can be a strange (and sometimes difficult) transition. Whether it's adjusting back to the daily hustle of home life after being in a remote community, or coming down from the emotional highs and lows of life in the wildest environment on Earth, returning to normal can be a challenge. In this episode, host Nadia Frontier speaks with Dr Bav Sasi, a former medic at Rothera Research Station, about his research into the psychological and emotional effects of returnin...
Jan 06, 2025•27 min
Are you a professional in penguin bum lifting? Derren Fox’s love for penguins began long before he made the trek to the icy sub-Antarctic island of Signy, where he works as a Zoological Assistant. In this episode, Derren chats to Nadia from Signy Research Station, where he spends his days getting up close and personal with Adélie penguins. He’s joined by Peter Fretwell, a satellite-wielding penguin expert who studies emperor penguins across the vast, frozen continent. Together, they share some o...
Dec 23, 2024•29 min•Season 4Ep. 5
Paul Whitelaw started dreaming of a job in Antarctica when a BAS marine biologist visited as a lecturer during his degree. Only a few years later, Nadia speaks to Paul while he is monitoring seabirds at Rothera Research Station in Antarctica as part of his PhD. From dodging dive-bombing skuas to tracking hatching egg numbers, Paul's work includes monitoring the health of the substantial seabird populations in Antarctica. With 10% of the world's population of skua in the same bay as Rothera, Paul...
Dec 09, 2024•19 min•Season 4Ep. 4
Flying low over ice in a timed dance with satellites. Digging 52m of ice cores out on the frozen sea. This is a team tackling Antarctica's sea ice question from every angle! In this group interview, teams from the DEFIANT* and CRYOVEX* projects talk about their epic campaign to 'ground-truth' the data collected from two important satellites that monitor Antarctic sea ice - ESA's CryoSat-2 and NASA's ICESat-2. This calibration work makes sure we know more about how the thickness of Antarctica's s...
Nov 25, 2024•21 min•Season 4Ep. 3
Who's watching out for the creatures at the bottom of the Southern Ocean? Geneticist Professor Melody Clark and ecophysiologist Dr Simon Morley talk about their decades of work understanding the animals who have evolved to survive in the world's coldest waters. From antifreeze fish to nail-varnish-wearing limpets, and from the gut microbiome of sea cucumbers to anti-microbial resistance, Melody takes us on a whistle stop tour of some of the main characters she's been studying in Antarctica. Mean...
Nov 08, 2024•22 min•Season 4Ep. 2
The annual migration to the frozen continent begins! Host Nadia Frontier speaks to British Antarctic Survey pilots Vicky Auld and Olly Smith just before they begin ferrying aircraft down the spine of the Americas - from Canada to Punta Arenas on the tip of Chile, then on to Antarctica. From views of the Andes to the first glimpse of white mountains of the Antarctic Peninsula, Vicky and Olly talk through the epic journey and the big to do list on their arrival. They chat about the years they both...
Oct 21, 2024•30 min•Season 4Ep. 1
Sometimes you ease yourself into a new job - and sometimes you move straight to Antarctica for two winters. In the final episode of series 3, host Nadia Frontier takes a turn in the hot seat, opening up about her 'double winter' living at Rothera Research Station. Interviewed at King Edward Point by Louis Day (meet him in series 3, episode 1).
Aug 28, 2024•23 min•Season 3Ep. 14
Do you have to get past hundreds of fur seals to get to work? Ash Shinn does - but there's no fresh water, heating or toilets at Antarctic research stations without him. Ash apparently can't get enough of working in Antarctica. He's done a real tour of Antarctic Stations almost continuously since 2021 - he worked at BAS a through the winter at Rothera Research Station as a Mechanical Maintenance Technician, before going to New Zealand owned Scott Base, where temperatures plunged to -40°C. Host N...
Aug 14, 2024•17 min•Season 3Ep. 13
Have you ever wondered what it's like to go diving in the freezing ocean around Antarctica? Meet Jack Gordon and Mike Lindsell, Field Dive Officers at Rothera Research Station, who are no strangers to braving immersion down to -1.8°C during winter. Their job is to look after the safety of marine scientists as they study life deep in Antarctic waters. In this episode, host Nadia Frontier chats to Jack about his adventures during his 7th season South - from the highs of spotting local penguins, to...
Jul 31, 2024•23 min•Season 3Ep. 12
Vehicle mechanic Matthew McPherson chats to Nadia Frontier about fixing skidoos, his love for building snow tunnels and skiing. It's no surprise that Matthew's draw to Antarctica started with his fascination of snow. This episode was recorded live in the Rothera garage, a location where plant is maintained and specialists parts are machined on a metal lathe. Cover photograph of plant operator Angus and Vehicle Mechanic Matthew McPherson snow clearing the runway by Sam Hunt. This episode is produ...
Jul 10, 2024•17 min•Season 3Ep. 11
Welcome to the longest night of the dark Antarctic winter - and the biggest celebration in the polar calendar. Coming to you (almost) live from King Edward Point (KEP) Research Station on the sub-Antarctic Island of South Georgia, Nadia Frontier chats to five members of the team as they prepare their hand-made gifts, limber up for the station olympics, and think about friends and family at home. Midwinter is celebrated every year on 21 June by all of the stations of different nations across the ...
Jun 21, 2024•26 min
From living beside a growing ice chasm, to signing up to live in Antarctica through dark Antarctic Winter - Jaskiran Nagi and Jonathan Witherstone are electronics engineers with a shared love of knowing how things work and being outdoors. Jas chats about his work at Halley Research Station and maintaining the seismic instruments on the ice shelf there, and Jonathan reveals the surprisingly low-tech secrets behind maintaining comms in the snow at Rothera Research Station. Iceworld is presented by...
May 23, 2024•25 min•Season 3Ep. 10
Featuring ammonites shaped like giant paperclips, curry cooking in the field, and emergency mud liquidation techniques - this team of fossil hunters are fresh off their expedition to Antarctica's Seymour Island. Led by Dr Rowan Whittle from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), they want to understand how life on the Antarctic sea floor evolved over the last 100 million years. Host Nadia Frontier chats to Rowan about leading her first major Antarctic expedition, along with team members Dr James Witts ...
May 08, 2024•33 min
Meteorologist Jo Cole chats to Nadia Frontier about fixing weather stations in remote locations, and seeing the sun return after Winter from the top of a mountain. Being a meteorologist in Antarctica is a busy job! From launching weather balloons, to making hourly observations to support flights on the frozen continent, the information captured is important for safe operations *and* science. Produced in partnership with Boffin Media.
Apr 24, 2024•19 min•Season 3Ep. 9
In a conversation ranging from ice climbing to the trials of wearing a kilt in Antarctica, Nadia chats to Niall Macleod, the Plant Operator at Rothera Research Station through Antarctic Winter. Niall's route to Antarctica was through agriculture, quarrying and civil engineering - before deciding that he wanted to do something for the environment. His job is to look after the research station's unusual machinery, and to keep the snow at bay as it blows through in the darkest period of the year. I...
Apr 04, 2024•19 min•Season 3Ep. 8
A field guide is one of the most highly skilled and varied jobs in Antarctica. From accompanying scientists on expeditions, training their colleagues to survive on the ice and fixing sledges, there's never a dull day. Polar field guides Ed Luke and Matthew Shepherd talk to Nadia about life on the ice and extreme camping. Produced in partnership with Boffin Media; cover photo by Ed Luke.
Mar 20, 2024•35 min•Season 3Ep. 7
How many people can say they've lost count of their visits to Antarctica? In this special International Women's Day episode, Professor Dame Jane Francis (Director of British Antarctic Survey) chats to Nadia about her journey into science, fossil hunting in Antarctic mud, launching the RRS Sir David Attenborough with Sir David Attenborough, and leading change. Iceworld is presented by marine biologist Nadia Frontier, produced in partnership with Boffin Media.
Mar 08, 2024•32 min
Imagine cooking for 160 with only frozen, tinned and dried food... for a whole season. We all know the stomach is the route to the heart, so the meals need to feel fresh, nourishing and varied. Chefs might have the most important job at Rothera Research Station! In this episode, Summer chef Sadhbh Moore chats to host Nadia Frontier about food sustainability, pickling and preserving, and channelling Hemsley + Hemsley. Winter Chef Katy talks about cooking with staff as the solo chef on station, he...
Feb 28, 2024•33 min•Season 3Ep. 6
Ryan talks to host Nadia Frontier about the extraordinary experience of living in Antarctica through the dark winter - the adventures, the challenges, and preparing for the arrival of the summer community. Ryan Mathews was the Marine Assistant at Rothera Research Station, where he works on scientific diving in Antarctica's icy waters, and in the on-site laboratory (The Bonner Lab). --- Produced in partnership with Boffin Media; cover photograph of Ryan Mathews by Marek Figielski....
Feb 14, 2024•23 min•Season 3Ep. 5
Stu McManus was the Winter Electrician at Rothera Research Station in 2022 - and due to unforeseen circumstances, he was the only person responsible for electrics across the season. His first Antarctic job was at King Edward Point Research Station on South Georgia. Stu talks to host Nadia Frontier about overcoming imposter syndrome, camping in the Antarctic wilderness, and how his career as an electrician has helped him travel around the world. --- In case you missed them, here's an explanation ...
Jan 30, 2024•35 min•Season 3Ep. 4
