Climate Change Series The UK has a long tradition of Antarctic science and exploration, starting with James Cook’s voyage round the continent in the 1770s and continuing with the heroic expeditions of Robert Falcon Scott and Sir Ernest Shackleton at the beginning of the 20th century.
During the 1920s and 1930s, the Falkland Islands government funded a series of scientific voyages around Antarctica, funded by taxes from the whaling industry. These led on to Operation Tabarin in the second world war, which combined a secret mission to deny Antarctic waters to enemy ships with the collection of data on marine biology, geology and weather.
