Antarctica is the final frontier for scuba diving. There is nowhere you can go that’s so remote—and so cold—to get underwater. Until relatively recently, the only people who have been able to dive there were scientists, but now any divers with the appropriate cold water experience can travel south to experience it for themselves.
Diving in Antarctica is a long way from the liveaboards of the Red Sea or the Caribbean, so you’ll need to grab rather more than a flimsy wetsuit to get yourself ready. We’ve put together this guide to help you take the plunge, with some expert insights from Lisa Eareckson Kelley, author of The Antarctic Dive Guide – a book we strongly recommend any polar diver should include in their kit bag.
- What to expect while scuba diving in Antarctica
- Where can you go diving in Antarctica?
- What is the water visibility like when scuba diving in Antarctica?
- What marine life can you see in Antarctica?
- Can you dive with penguins in Antarctica?
- Can you go wreck diving in Antarctica?
What to expect while scuba diving in Antarctica
To go scuba diving on Antarctic expedition cruises you must have a minimum number of cold water dives on your log before you can sign up. ‘It is so important to have good dry suit experience and to be confident in that,’ says Kelley. ‘Antarctica is not the place to start getting comfortable in a dry suit.’ Even long-time divers can get a shock to their system when immersed in water that’s usually one or two degrees below freezing point.
‘The mammalian diving reflex of a shortness of breath when you first hit the water in Antarctica is super common, no matter how much experience you have,’ she adds. That involuntary gasp is the first part of the cold shock response, where your body reacts by drawing blood away from your hands and feet so it can maintain your core temperature. It’s why layering up under your dry suit is so important – and why Antarctic scuba dives typically last between 15–30 minutes (Kelley finds that a ‘woolly bear’ undersuit is an invaluable place to start with her layers). The same principle applies for those snorkelling in Antarctica. The severe cold is another reason why it’s important to have absolute familiarity with the kit you’re bringing: always go for tried and trusted rather than getting something brand new for your Antarctica dive.
‘It’s easy to fumble when you’ve got big gloves on,’ Kelley points out, and not just with your diving gear but with underwater cameras. The water on dives can often have a lot of particulate matter in it and you’ll often be diving with lights that cause reflections, so practice adjusting your camera to make sure you get your best shot in advance.
Where can you go diving in Antarctica?
It’s important to note that you won’t visit specific diving sites in Antarctica as you might in other parts of the world. As with all expedition cruises, itineraries are by definition flexible affairs, and planned every day between the Expedition Leader and the ship’s captain, taking into account the weather, ice conditions, other ships in the area and so on.
Several factors go into choosing where to dive, advises Kelley. Many locations that are perfect for zodiac cruising can be challenging for diving due to hidden currents. The presence of icebergs can also have a large effect on a location’s suitability for diving, since their scouring of the sea bed can create an inhospitable environment for slow-growing invertebrate life, leading to a barren diving environment.
‘With trips that are more focused on traditional cruising, there is definitely an opportunistic factor,’ says Kelley. ‘But as long as you look at the bathymetry [the seabed topography] to get an idea of how any ice scour is working, you can always find good places to dive off the cuff.’ The flexibility of itinerary planning means that you’ll almost always dive in places where few people ever have – and even stand a chance of being the first to dive in some locations.
What is the water visibility like when scuba diving in Antarctica?
Don’t expect the most crystal clear waters in Antarctica: just as the water is several orders of magnitude colder than the Caribbean, the visibility is correspondingly shorter.
The reason for this is the wealth of phytoplankton in the water. Phytoplankton blooms are the basis of all life in Antarctica, since they feed the krill that feed everything else (getting involved with the FjordPhyto citizen science project on a cruise trip is a great way of contributing to our knowledge of these building blocks of the ecosystem). A side effect of this is that blooms also lead to murky water.
While the timing of the blooms varies, they tend to be at their height in December and January, when the water can seem positively green with microscopic life. At the very beginning of the visitor season in November and the end of the season in February and March, blooms either haven’t begun or have died back, resulting in better water visibility. It’s worth noting however that even when the water is very green at the surface, once you get down to a depth of around 8–10 m (26–32 feet), it can often be clear.
Beyond the green of the blooms, Antarctica isn’t just monochrome below the waves as so many people expect. ‘‘Of course you have the browns and blacks and a little bit of blue in the icebergs,’ says Kelley, ‘but once you get below the surface, the invertebrates are so colourful. Even some of the rockfish there are bright orange and different colours. It’s really surprising to most people that there’s that much colour – and that much life.’
What marine life can you see when diving in Antarctica?
Antarctica’s marine life is rich, but the benthos you’ll see when diving shouldn’t be compared to that of warmer waters. While the nutrient-packed waters here support plenty of life, the cold temperatures mean it can be thinly distributed and very slow growing. In places where there are plenty of icebergs, seabeds are often scoured clean of life.
The most common marine life found here are the echinoderms – sea stars, sea cucumbers and urchins. Limpets are the most common gastropods. They’re astonishingly mobile, and are the first to recolonise an area when the algae they eat returns following ice scour, and avoid an icy fate themselves by migrating to deeper waters in winter.
Nudibranchs can also be seen, along with cnidarians like jellyfish. Anemones, sponges and soft corals will mostly be seen in places sheltered from ice: wall dives can be excellent for seeing these. These soft invertebrates are often found in greater concentrations at accessible depths in the South Shetland Islands (including Deception Island) where there is slightly less ice than along the Peninsula.
Fish are generally hard to spot. Amazingly, Antarctic fish lack a swim bladder, so they lie perfectly still on the sea floor and are easily missed unless you are virtually swimming on top of them.
In South Georgia, where the water is merely Subantarctic in temperature and ice is less of a problem, it is sometimes possible at sites rich with kelp forests. Fur seals may be encountered, but they can be territorial, so diving in some locations may be restricted during breeding season in October and November.
Can you dive with penguins in Antarctica?
A highlight of Antarctic expedition cruises is being out in a zodiac or paddling in a kayak, and finding yourself surrounded by a group of penguins effortlessly porpoising around. It’s a common question for scuba divers: will they experience the same, but in three dimensions?
Penguin encounters while scuba diving are generally rare. When in the water, penguins are vulnerable to leopard seals, and so they tend to regard people with some wariness as a result.
At landing sites with large gentoo penguin colonies, it’s sometimes possible to dive near the beaches where the penguins come and go, subject to local ice and other conditions. However, avoiding potential disturbance is the paramount rule of wildlife watching in Antarctica, especially when they are entering and exiting the water. Diving with penguins requires patience – and staying stationary in one spot is extremely cold work in these waters, and may require longer than most dives allow. If you’re lucky enough to see penguins, their dynamic swimming makes them extremely hard to frame with a camera, so just point and shoot as you can and concentrate on enjoying the encounter.
It’s important to remember that penguin colonies are also favoured dining spots for leopard seals. If one is spotted before a dive starts, the guides will likely advise relocating to another area – or have divers immediately return to the zodiac if a dive is in progress.
Can you go wreck diving in Antarctica?
Wrecks are a highlight for scuba divers the world over, and the Antarctic Peninsula has two that you can dive at, should local conditions and your ship’s itinerary allow it. The first is the wreck of the Governoren, a whaling factory ship that sank in 1915 at Foyn Harbour in the Enterprise Islands. The wreck sits half-submerged in the water, and has a large invertebrate community once you get deep enough so that they’re not affected by ice scour.
The picturesque nature of the Governoren means that it has often been visited by private yachts who are not members of IAATO, the organisation that regulates Antarctic tourism. Sadly, some of these visitors have been cavalier about waste disposal in the past, and several divers have recorded and removed trash near the wreck, including wine bottles.
A second wreck is Bahia Paraiso, southwest of Anvers Island. This was a 134 m (440 ft) Argentinian research ship that sank in 1989. A small part of the wreck lies above the surface The sinking of Bahia Paraiso caused the release of thousands of litres of fuel oil, creating the Peninsula’s worst known environmental disaster. Today, the ship is home to large numbers of encrusting sponges and sea anemones, though visits are rare as it is not near any major landing sites, and subject to heavy surge.
Swim-throughs are absolutely forbidden on Antarctic wrecks.
Other sites associated with historic whaling often contain large bones on the sea floor. These must not be touched and require careful use of buoyancy devices when approaching, as they may be covered in nutrient-rich ‘marine snow’ that can easily be disturbed by careless positioning or finning.
But wherever you dive in Antarctica, it will be unlike anywhere you’ve been before. ‘It’s still my favorite place to dive,’ says Kelley. ‘On any given day you can find something that nobody’s ever seen before.’ Just make sure you pack extra thermals for your dry suit before you go.
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The Antarctic Dive Guide by Lisa Eareckson Kelley is published by Princeton University Press.
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