MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Spain's Antarctic season 08/09 takes off in Punta Arenas

On Friday the Spanish Navy oceanographic vessel Las Palmas calls in Punta Arenas to officially begin Spain's Antarctic 2008/09 season. The vessel left from Cartagena last October 8 for the twelfth Antarctic season incursion and will be operating from Punta Arenas.

The 42 meters long research vessel with a crew of 36, including four women, is scheduled to make ten calls in Punta Arenas during the coming austral summer when it will be supplying the Spanish scientific bases Juan Carlos I and Gabriel de Castilla. The Spanish Antarctic Service has seven scientific projects planned for this season, funded by different government offices and several universities and one of them demands that "Las Palmas" sail past the Antarctic Polar circle, 68 degrees south. This year the Spanish Antarctic effort will be celebrating its participation in the third International Polar Year and the twentieth anniversary of the first Spanish expedition to Antarctica which had "Las Palmas" as support and logistics vessel. Spain's scientific interest covers the fields of meteorology, volcanology, geomagnetism and glaciers, plus the marine ecosystems in the Byers peninsula where Spain has a summer camp.