{"id":39817,"date":"2024-12-24T20:24:59","date_gmt":"2024-12-25T01:24:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/this-christmas-ill-be-counting-penguins\/24\/12\/2024\/"},"modified":"2024-12-24T20:24:59","modified_gmt":"2024-12-25T01:24:59","slug":"this-christmas-ill-be-counting-penguins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/this-christmas-ill-be-counting-penguins\/24\/12\/2024\/","title":{"rendered":"‘This Christmas I’ll be counting penguins’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n<\/p>\n
\n
How are you spending your Christmas? While many will be curled up on the sofa in front of a roaring fire (or at least with the central heating on), spare a thought for the hundreds of people working in the Antarctic region, surrounded instead by penguins.<\/strong><\/p>\n
Thousands of miles from home, those employed by the Cambridge-based British Antarctic Survey (BAS) are spending the festive season at five research stations and on board the Harwich-based vessel, the RRS Sir David Attenborough.<\/p>\n
Some of them have been sharing their Christmas plans – telling us how they will be spending the big day.<\/p>\n
‘Penguins – and a cheesy movie’<\/h2>\n
Derren Fox, 52, is a zoological field assistant at Signy Island Research Station, which is on one of the remote South Orkney Islands, about 370 miles (600km) from the Antarctic Peninsula.<\/p>\n
Originally from Cornwall, he now “lives on a yacht just about anywhere”, he says.<\/p>\n
“On Christmas Day I’ll head over to Gourlay Peninsula on the south-east shores of the island to carry out the almost daily checks on the chinstrap and Adelie penguin colonies to monitor productivity,” he said.<\/p>\n
“This will probably be followed by some sledging or snowman building with some of the other station members before returning to base for a traditional Christmas meal, this year cooked by our station leader, and then probably falling asleep in traditional Christmas style in front of a cheesy festive movie.”<\/p>\n\n