On 20th August 2021, the Jan Mayen 2021 Expedition, a critical chapter of the Arctic Sense project, sets sail on a 1,200 nautical mile scientific research and historical storytelling voyage to the remote island of Jan Mayen onboard the ocean conservation platform S.V. Barba.

300 years ago, the small Arctic island of Jan Mayen was a prolific whaling station. In just 50 years, the wild population was hunted to near extinction. Left uninhabited, it wasn’t until August 1921 that a British party led by Shackleton’s former geologist, Sir James Mann Wordie, visited the island to undertake its first geological study. Whilst there, Wordie and his team also summited the unconquered peak of the world’s northernmost volcano Mount Beerenberg. Exactly 100 years later, a team co-led by Norwegian Andreas B. Heide, captain of the research vessel Barba, and British writer & adventurer Hugh Francis Anderson, will travel in the footsteps of Wordie to assess and document the island today.

Featured image and video by Hugo Pettit