Welcome to Chile

The stopover in Valparaiso, 74 miles to the northwest of the Chilean capital of Santiago was successful. VÆDDEREN has now reached Antofagasta, where expedition members are contemplating the stars….

Dato 13.2.2007

There were high expectations of expedition ship VÆDDEREN when she docked at Quay 7 in Valparaiso on the morning of Thursday 8 February.  The Danish Embassy and both countries' education ministries had prepared the ground, so that local scholars and media were greatly interested. Politiken page – Danish only

Photo: Jens Tang Christensen, Aarhus Universitet
VÆDDEREN in Valparaiso, Chile

A sea lacking in oxygen
The overarching project between Valparaiso and the Galapagos Islands will be ‘Oceanic oxygen deficiency zones’, under the leadership of associate professor Bo Thamdrup from the Syddansk Universitet. Bo Thamdrup also leads the expedition on the two legs Valparaiso-Antofagasta- Galapagos.

A 25-man research team will carry out extensive studies and data collection in the ocean off Peru in the next weeks. This is one of the oxygen-deficient zones which account for only 2% of the total area of the oceans, but which nevertheless are of enormous significance for the earth’s cycles.

Osvaldo Ullda is one of four researchers from the University of Concepcion joining the expedition in Valparaiso. From a very young age he was fascinated by the sea and determined at age 15 to be a marine biologist, he says in an interview with Politiken.

Looking at stars
Right now VÆDDEREN is docked in Antofagasta. Expedition members will be driving around 100 km south to Paranal in the Andes in order to visit the European Southern Observatory project - the 'Very Large Telescope', a world renowned observatory.