Ship to Antarctica - Ship to Antarctica

1. Mail

Mail for the Antarctic bases (Halley, Rothera and Signy) is only delivered during the Antarctic summer, between October and April. It is delivered by the Survey's two ships, RRS James Clark Ross and RRS Ernest Shackleton and occasionally by tourist or Royal Navy ships and aircraft. Bird Island and King Edward Point (KEP) can have mail delivered throughout the year but in the Antarctic winter deliveries will be very sporadic.

The usual route for mail is via Stanley, Falkland Islands, although the BAS ships from time to time call at other ports in South America or very occasionally South Africa.

Mail falls into two categories, (a) Letters and small packages and (b) Parcels. Procedures for both are described below:

The itineraries provided are to let you know when the ships are due to leave Ports of Call en-route to the bases. (Usually this will be Stanley in the Falkland Islands). Itineraries should be consulted so that you post your mail in optimum time to catch the ship on a particular date. We do however suggest that you write on a regular basis numbering your letters in sequence; this saves any disappointment if you miss one of the departure dates.

Small packages should contain no more than one or two paperback books, tape cassettes, CDs or videos, individual magazines or newspapers. Please ensure that you attach a customs declaration, obtainable from the post office, to any small packages you send. The weight limit is 2kg for Air Mail.
a) Letters and small packages - Air Mail usually takes approximately 14 days.
i) Letters and small packages for Halley, Signy, Rothera, Bird Island, KEP and other Antarctic sites:

All letters and small packages to personnel based at Halley, Signy, Rothera, Bird Island and KEP should be sent by Airmail to the appropriate base using the following address:

Contact Name (forename and surname)
NAME of BASE
British Antarctic Survey
Stanley
Falkland Islands
South Atlantic
FIQQ 1ZZ
ii) Letters and small packages for personnel on RRS James Clark Ross and RRS Ernest Shackleton

All letters and small packages to personnel based on or travelling aboard the above vessels should usually be sent by Airmail to the following address:

Contact Name (forename and surname)
NAME of Vessel
British Antarctic Survey
Stanley
Falkland Islands
South Atlantic
FIQQ 1ZZ

All mail will be sorted in Stanley and collected by each vessel when it calls into the Falkland Islands. You should consult the ships' itineraries and write frequently to avoid disappointment. Occasionally the ships' itineraries offer an opportunity to send mail via our agents in other ports of call (see addresses below).
b) Parcels for all bases

Parcels must be addressed to our agents at the addresses given below in the ports where RRS Ernest Shackleton and RRS James Clark Ross call and sent in time to arrive by the dates given in the itinerary for each of the ships. If itineraries permit we consider it best to use the Falkland Islands for parcel post. This is a surface only service (no airmail facility for larger parcels to the Falklands is available) and takes about 12 weeks. It is a tried and reliable route. However the cost of sending parcels can be prohibitive and you pay for the type of service you want, the more expensive the better the service.

Parcel post to any South American country is unreliable at the best of times and parcels do not always get through. You should check with your local Post Office about regulations and delivery times. The system in Uruguay is that parcels are not delivered to the agent; our agents are notified of their arrival at the Post Office and have to collect them. Please, therefore, make sure that you allow plenty of time for parcels to arrive. You are strongly advised to insure any parcel sent and you can obtain an advice of delivery certificate from the Post Office at the time of posting.
c) Agents:

The addresses for our agents follow. The itineraries show which ports of call are being used by each vessel and when.

PORT STANLEY
Name and Base/Vessel
British Antarctic Survey
Port Stanley
Falkland Islands
South Atlantic FIQQ 1ZZ