Ukraine’s National Antarctic Scientific Center on Aug. 19 closed a deal to purchase the RSS James Clark Ross, a British polar supply and research vessel, for its only Antarctic outpost, the Akademik Vernadskiy station.
The $5.3 million contract with British Antarctic Survey (BAS) provides Kyiv with its first icebreaker in the polar region in decades, according to the Ukrainian scientific agency.
“After all necessary papers are reissued, the vessel will be able to depart from Denmark (where she is now) for Ukraine, under the Ukrainian flag,” the center said on Aug. 19.
“It is planned for the icebreaker to arrive in Odesa early fall this year.”
Evgen Dykyj, the head of Ukraine’s Antarctic mission, said the purchase “opens a world of new opportunities.”
“Over the last 20 years, Ukraine hasn’t had its own icebreaker for Antarctic exploration,” Dykyj was quoted as saying.
“This greatly limited our work. With this vessel, Ukraine now has ambitions to run extensive surveys of the Southern Ocean, and optionally launch the exploration of Arctica sometime later.”
Read more: After years on ice, Ukrainian mission to Antarctica gradually returns to life
Akademik Vernadskiy, initially known as Faraday Station, was handed over to Kyiv by the United Kingdom for a token price of 1 pound sterling. It remains Ukraine’s only island outpost in the Bellingshausen Sea, close to the Antarctic Peninsula.
Notably, it was the RSS James Clark Ross that brought the very first Ukrainian polar team to the station in the 1990s, according to the Ukrainian agency.
Commissioned in the U.K. in 1990, the ship has had a rich history of scientific polar missions.
“The RRS James Clark Ross is much admired by all who have sailed in her,” said Jane Francis, the director with British Antarctic Survey.
“She has enabled scientists from the UK and overseas to make discoveries that help make sense of our changing world. We will miss her greatly, but I am delighted that our research colleagues will use her to carry out important scientific investigations. We wish them well.”
