Telling Antarctica's Story From the Air: Photography in Service of Science

An aerial image of a glacier meeting the ocean, Seymour Island, Antarctica. Petr Jan Juračka fulfilled a dream many photographers have and got to take aerial photos and videos of Earth’s last frontier. © Amazing Aerial Agency / Petr Jan Juračka

By Rebecca Duras

Petr Jan Juračka has been dreaming about Antarctica for over 20 years.

Countless other photographers before him have had the same dream, but few were able to fulfill it. Getting to Antarctica is difficult. Getting permission to take aerial images with a drone is even harder.

Petr, who is a scientific researcher as well as a photographer, got special permission to bring along his drone when he went to Antarctica on a research trip in January and February 2025. The resulting photos and videos show a stark frozen landscape that is still teeming with life, from whales to penguins to microorganisms.

For Petr and his research colleagues, the photos are even more special because they are hopefully a way to bring people closer to understanding a place that is changing faster than humanity can study it.

Getting to the Uninhabited Continent

A solitary red building stands against the vast ice sheet of a glacier on Seymour Island, Antarctica. Antarctica is the only uninhabited continent, with only a few scientific and military bases on its shores.

Antarctica is one of the most inaccessible places in the world, and not just because of its weather. Access is heavily restricted to protect the continent from overtourism. The frozen landscapes may seem rugged, but they are actually incredibly fragile.

For tourists, limited guided excursions that often stop only on the outlying islands are the sole opportunity to see Antarctica. These trips usually cost thousands of dollars and visitors are subject to additional restrictions to protect the ecosystem if necessary. “Because of the need to protect against bird flu, now many places are forbidden to tourists completely, so now tourists are watching Antarctica from the boat but not on the continent, with only a few exceptions,” Petr explains

Aerial photo of a base on Seymour Island, Antarctica. Scientists conduct their research from bases which provide logistical support in a remote climate.

Even if a photographer is able to secure a spot on an Antarctica excursion, they may not get the photos they want. Photography permission is restricted, and aerial photography permission is nearly impossible to get. Paul Prescott has tried to help photographers secure permits to fly drones in Antarctica, but even with the backing of Amazing Aerial, they were not successful. “Matt Borowick and Pieter de Boer both tried to go on a cruise trip,” he shares. “We wrote to the companies they bought the trip from, but they said it was totally forbidden and they could not issue a permit.”

Petr Jan Juračka did not visit Antarctica as a tourist, but as a scientist who was part of an official research delegation. This gave him access to areas and logistical support the average tourist cannot use. For Petr, the excursion was an unlikely dream come true. “When I came to the Faculty of Sciences in Charles University [as a student], I saw that there were people going to Antarctica and that I wanted to go there for sure, but I didn’t choose polar ecology for my scientific research so the chances were low,” he says. Petr specialized in limnology, studying metapopulations of freshwater crustaceans. Although his research and work in scientific communications for the university has taken him all over the world, he was not expecting to see Antarctica.

Petr’s colleague stands on a rocky beach overlooking the ice-dotted bay. Cooperation is key to research in Antarctica, and cooperation is how Petr was able to see the continent at all.

Although Petr didn’t specialize in polar ecology, his friend, Dr. Kateřina Kopalová, did, studying freshwater diatoms. As she was preparing for her fifth trip to Antarctica, she decided to invite Petr. “For as much as he travels around the world, he was always jealous, saying oh, you got to go to Antarctica,” Kateřina recalls. After confirming that Petr was serious about visiting Antarctica, she offered to ask the logistics team she was partnering with if he could come along.

Research in Antarctica is done through international cooperation. While most countries with polar research programs have their own base, they collaborate with each other on logistics and research. The Czech Republic has its own research station in Antarctica, on James Ross Island, but they often collaborate with the Argentine Antarctic Institute, which has several bases and the logistical support of the Argentine army.

A whale’s fluke emerges from the water as its body is seen just below the surface. After obtaining permission to fly a drone, Petr was able to capture a new perspective on the continent’s wildlife.

To fly a drone, Petr had to get permission from the Argentine Antarctic Institute. “This was the first drone permission in the history of Argentine Antarctic scientific research,” he says. Petr secured his drone permission thanks to his dual role as a researcher and photographer. “Since we are studying metasystems, and freshwater lakes are common in the place [where we were researching], we were allowed to take aerial pictures of those lakes,” he said. He also used the drone to capture other aspects of their research to share with the public after returning.

Completing the Mission in Antarctica

A group of penguins waddle around the entrance to Argentina’s Esperanza Base, where Petr spent some time during his mission.

This was not the first time that Petr has used photography to help with his scientific missions. He has taken photos on research trips from the paramos of Colombia to the Himalayas.

In Antarctica, the photos he took helped with research on freshwater ecosystems, but also helped colleagues with their research. “We used these aerial views of the research for hydrobiology, geology, and to study the various layers of the sediments and mountains,” Petr says. “I believe that from now on they will get that permission for following expeditions.” Aerial photos allowed the scientists to examine the area they are studying from a different perspective.

A helicopter takes off from an Argentine base. Getting aerial images in Antarctica required close coordination with the relevant authorities, in Petr’s case the Argentine military.

Petr and Kateřina’s trip focused on James Ross Island and the Antarctic Peninsula. They stopped in a few other places along the way, including the Marambio and Esperanza bases. To organize his drone flights, Petr coordinated logistics with the Argentine military. “I asked for permission in Buenos Aires, and the chief of the army gave it,” he said. “Flying over the station was a little more complicated because there is traffic from helicopters, Hercules planes, and Lockheed C100s, so I was communicating with the pilots and airport staff.” You probably don’t expect to hear about air traffic in Antarctica, but maintaining bases there is a considerable logistic effort, and there are only a few hours a day where conditions are safe for flying.

Although scientists are civilians, they partner with military personnel during research in Antarctica for logistical support and use their bases. For Petr, this meant that his experience in Antarctica was less extreme than you would expect. “Here you have food, hot water, coffee, and people around, so this makes a difference,” he says, comparing it to other research trips in remote areas. For Petr, having a snug base with limited Internet also meant he was able to easily edit his photos and videos on days when the weather was too poor to fly.

A view of Antarctica through the cockpit. Flying in Antarctica is difficult since there is only a narrow window of time when conditions are safe for takeoff, but for Petr, it was not as extreme in the Southern Hemisphere summer as other places he’s visited.

Petr’s experience with other extreme environments meant that he was surprisingly well adapted to flying a drone in Antarctica. “I’m used to Himalayan expeditions and I’ve flown in really high altitudes, and those temperatures and winds are worse,” he says. He was in Antarctica during the Southern Hemisphere summer, which meant most daily temperatures hovered around freezing. He planned his flights to avoid strong winds and storms.

While some photographers plan their trips carefully, drawing up lists of shots they want to capture, Petr let himself go with the flow. “All my colleagues made fun of me because I had no expectations,” he says with a laugh, but there was reasoning behind his spontaneity. “You can’t plan what you shoot or even when you come home because you’re dependent on the weather, so making plans here in Antarctica would be crazy.”

Although he didn’t plan his shots ahead of time, Petr made sure to take advantage of the opportunities that he got. He spent hours sitting on the shore waiting for flocks of penguins to appear. When whales were spotted close to shore on the last day of the expedition, he prepared his drone carefully. “The whales were 4 kilometers from the shore, and the wind was usually from the shore to the sea. I had to fly very fast to the whales, spend a few minutes with them, and then come back against the wind,” he explains.

Using Photography to Tell the Story of Science in a Rapidly Changing World 

A whale’s body emerges from the water. Capturing a pod of whales just off the shore was one of the most spectacular experiences of Petr’s visit to Antarctica.

Petr’s photos are stunning on their own. Icy landscapes that show their variety despite the stereotype of monotone polar landscapes, flocks of animals on ice floes, bright blue and white colors contrasting with the brown earth.

To the photographer, the beauty of the photos is not as important as the stories they tell. “I’m interested in scientific photography and what pictures can tell the story,” he says. “When you have the story it’s much more interesting to me.” He uses a variety of photography techniques, including timelapses and photographs through microscopes, to share the story of his research. “The drone is just one of the tools we are using, even though we use it a lot,” he says.

Petr regularly uses scientific photography as part of his job as a science communicator in the Public Relations Division of the Faculty of Science at Charles University, where he is also a researcher and lector in the Department of Ecology. “The main aim of my being at the Faculty is to tell nature-related stories to the public and promote the research we do there,” he says.

An aerial view of a colony of penguins on an iceberg. Aerial images help people see the full story of life on Antarctica.

When Kateřina petitioned her research team to allow Petr to join her in Antarctica, his background in scientific communications was a key reason why they accepted him. “I sent them his portfolio and said that he is a scientist, but he is also a professional filmmaker and photographer, and that he has had articles in National Geographic.” The team jumped at the chance to have someone tell the story of their project, one of international collaboration and science on the frontlines.

For scientists, one of the main challenges they face in their work is explaining their work to a public without specialized knowledge and a political climate that is often hostile. “For me, the most important thing I wanted to show the research we do at the faculty of science, that studying those small microorganisms like the diatoms my schoolmate studies, can be the key to some stories we don’t know,” Petr says. Communicating their stories to a wider public helps people understand what they are seeing, and is crucial when securing funding from ever-diminishing sources.

An iceberg adrift among the waters and ice floes off the coast of Seymour Island, Antarctica. Climate change is causing the continent to change rapidly, making it an important laboratory for understanding the world around us.

Explaining to a wider public what is going on is particularly important with research in Antarctica, which has wider implications for the global environment that are often poorly understood. “Antarctica is a kind of model laboratory because you have the opportunity to study the ecological interactions in a very simple environment,” Katerina explains. Although people (and politicians) may see Antarctica research as wasteful if scientists can do the same work at home in Central Europe, the work they do in the polar regions is valuable to understanding how other climates work as well.

Studying Antarctica is particularly important due to climate change. The area of Antarctica where Petr and Katerina were based, the Antarctic Peninsula, is the fastest warming place on the planet. “To study this in a simple Antarctic laboratory gives us the opportunity to see what might be facing Europe, especially European Alpine regions,” Katerina explains. Freshwater diatoms are often the first organisms to appear when ice melts, and could be an insight into what Europe’s ecosystems will look like once its last continental glaciers retreat.

An aerial view of an Antarctic island. Petr’s images can bring the remote continent and scientific research conducted on its shores closer to the general public

Photographs are crucial in making the connection between seemingly far away research in Antarctica and a warming climate back home. Paul is happy to provide a home for such work at Amazing Aerial. “When Petr informed me that he had gone there, I was really surprised and excited. Only scientists can get those permits, and I was honoured that we have a scientist on our Amazing Aerial team,” he said. “We now have exclusive, hard-to-get material that we will keep at Amazing Aerial.”

Petr hopes that the attention his rare aerial images from Antarctica draw attention not just to stunning penguins and whales, but to the environment they call home and the people trying to protect it. “That’s the most important thing for me, much more than how they look, if they’re cute or colorful,” he says, “for me the most important part is that it’s triggered in people’s minds that those pictures are part of the science and conservation program.”