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There were six travelers rowing against the wind, against waves full of ice fragments – perhaps it was the most difficult way to reach Antarctica. In December 2019, explorer Fiann Paul led a team of athletes numa extraordinary rowing expedition from South America to the ice-covered continent. To complete it, they would have to travel 965 kilometers across one of the most treacherous bodies of water in the world – the Drake Passage.
“Cold and wet,” says Paul, describing it. “And dirty.” The short waves that regularly hit the vessel were the worst: “it’s like we were hitting walls”. Deadly storms rage in this fierce place, where the Pacific, Atlantic and Southern oceans converge.
JOHN EASTCOTT AND YVA MOMATIUK
Beneath the region’s icebergs, carbon – one of the main greenhouse gases – sinks and is stored beneath the sea surface. Places like these, existing all over the world, are essential to combat climate change.
On maps, the slender arms of Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula stretch out to touch, separated only by the Drake Passage, so named in English. homage to Sir Francis Drake, a 16th century English explorer, who was also involved in the slave trade. There are those who prefer to call it Mar de Hoces, in reference to the Spanish navigator Francisco de Hoces, who may have arrived in this part of the world 50 years before Drake.
Some of the strongest ocean currents of the world pass through the Drake Passage and gigantic and uncontrolled waves have already caused death of ship passengers in this location em dates as recent as 2022. Travelers who passed by mentioned waves longer than 20 meters.
Most people have never been to the Drake Passage. They may, however, have seen stunning videos on TikTok, or on other social networks, filmed by travelers on board ships buffeted by rough seas. However, the region is known for other phenomena besides tumultuous waves.
Howling winds and storms
The main reason the Drake Passage is so plagued by storms is because the Southern Ocean, which surrounds the frozen continent of Antarctica, is not interrupted by landallowing powerful winds to travel around the globe without any obstacles.
“We just happened to have a big storm in the last 24 hours,” says Karen Heywood, a physical oceanographer at the University of East Anglia and a member of the research team aboard the RRS Sir David Attenborough, which, at the time of writing, was sailing heading southeast in the Drake Passage, towards the Weddell Sea – on the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula.
JASON EDWARDS, NAT GEO IMAGE COLLECTION
The Drake Passage connects the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and lies immediately above the Southern Ocean, which surrounds Antarctica. As this ocean is not blocked by land, powerful winds blow easily without any obstacles.
“It’s always interesting when we go to dinner and they put placemats on the tables to make sure our plates don’t slide from one side to the other,” says Heywood.
She and her colleagues intend study the processes capable of absorbing carbon from the atmosphere and retain it in the ocean in the Weddel Sea. The Drake Passage is a “crucible,” says Heywood, where extreme ocean currents absorb carbon, including that deposited by plankton, carrying it deep down, where it can remain stored for centuries. The Passage’s strong currents also carry materials from the Pacific Ocean thousands of kilometers to the North Atlantic.
This turbulent body of water has yet another function – keeps Antarctica cold, says Alberto Naveira Garabato, a physical oceanographer at the University of Southampton. Without a land bridge connecting to South America, it is much more difficult for hot air to reach the southernmost points of the globe. Climate models suggest that when the Drake Passage opened tens of millions of years ago – no one knows exactly when – contributed significantly to the cooling of Antarctica. We can feel the cooling effect of the Drake Passage when we cross it on a ship, says Naveira Garabato.
“Suddenly, we are in this frozen world,” he explains. “And it happens in an instant – we can see the change happening within hours.”
A carbon reservoir
The cooling power of this unique location means that, ironically, the very dangerous Drake Passage helps protect the planet. If Antarctica were a much warmer place and the 29 million square kilometers of ice clustered around the continent melted tomorrow, global sea levels would rise by more than 60 meters.
The Drake Passage can also be a carbon sequestration “hot spot”. The carbon storage processes studied by Heywood and his colleagues may be particularly efficient here compared with other places on Earth, says Lilian Dove, a postdoctoral fellow at Brown University.
RALPH LEE HOPKINS, NAT GEO IMAGE COLLECTION
The Drake Passage is one of the reasons why Antarctica is so cold. Without a land bridge connecting the continent to South America, mild air from the north does not easily blow south.
Your research suggests what the ocean is less stratified in this region – partly thanks to strong winds and the irregular shape of the seabed. This means that the phytoplankton, which captures carbon from the atmosphere, for example, can be dragged into the depths in large volumes. The Drake Passage may therefore be one of half a dozen carbon sequestration hot spots in the Southern Ocean – which collectively remove 600 million tons of carbon of the atmosphere annually.
It is important to remember the abundance of non-human life that thrives in the Drake Passage and other places around Antarctica, says Naveira Garabato. Vigorous currents transport nutrients over great distances, sustaining life forms from the beginning. plankton and the krill even the biggest whales. “The entire Antarctic ecosystem is based on this resurgence,” he says.
Fiann Paul vividly remembers the penguins, dolphins and whales he and his team saw when they finally approached their goal, Charles Point, on the Antarctic Peninsulaat the end of your paddling adventure. Reached their destination after 13 days facing one of the wildest places on the planet. After all those screaming seagulls and gray skies, suddenly the luminous white ice of Antarctica beckoned them, showing electric blue facades here and there. Some members of the expedition were so happy to see it, says Paul, that they even cried: “it’s such a beautiful place.”