The Balleny Islands () are a series of uninhabited islands in the

Southern Ocean The Southern Ocean, also known as the Antarctic Ocean, comprises the southernmost waters of the World Ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude and encircling Antarctica. With a size of , it is regarded as the second-small ...

extending from 66°15' to 67°35'S and 162°30' to 165°00'E. The group extends for about in a northwest-southeast direction. The islands are heavily glaciated and of volcanic origin. Glaciers project from their slopes into the sea. The islands were formed by the so-called

Balleny hotspot The Balleny hotspot is a volcanic hotspot located in the Southern Ocean. The hotspot created the Balleny Islands, which forms a chain that extends for about in a northwest-southeast direction. Due to plate tectonics the hot spot was under differ ...

. The group includes three main islands:

Young Young may refer to: * Offspring, the product of reproduction of a new organism produced by one or more parents * Youth, the time of life when one is young, often meaning the time between childhood and adulthood Music * The Young, an American roc ...

Buckle The buckle or clasp is a device used for fastening two loose ends, with one end attached to it and the other held by a catch in a secure but adjustable manner. Often taken for granted, the invention of the buckle was indispensable in securing tw ...

and Sturge, which lie in a line from northwest to southeast, and several smaller islets and rocks: *northeast of Young Island: Seal Rocks, Pillar *southeast of Young Island: Row Island,

Borradaile Island Borradaile Island () is one of the Balleny Islands. It was the site of the first landing south of the Antarctic Circle, and features the "remarkable pinnacle" called ''Beale Pinnacle'', near Cape Beale on its south-eastern coast, and Cape Scoresby ...

(with Swan Base shelter hut) *south of Buckle Island: Scott Cone, Chinstrap Islet,

Sabrina Islet Sabrina Island is the largest of three small islets lying south of Buckle Island in the Balleny Islands of Antarctica and are part of New Zealand's Ross Dependency. Sabrina Island was named after Thomas Freeman's cutter when John Balleny's squ ...

(with Sabrina Refuge shelter hut), and the

Monolith A monolith is a geological feature consisting of a single massive stone or rock, such as some mountains. For instance, Savandurga mountain is a monolith mountain in India. Erosion usually exposes the geological formations, which are often ma ...

The islands are claimed by

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

as part of the

Ross Dependency The Ross Dependency is a region of Antarctica defined by a sector originating at the South Pole, passing along longitudes 160° east to 150° west, and terminating at latitude 60° south. It is claimed by New Zealand, a claim accepted only b ...

(see

Territorial claims in Antarctica Seven sovereign states – Argentina, Australia, Chile, France, New Zealand, Norway, and the United Kingdom – have made eight territorial claims in Antarctica. These countries have tended to place their Antarctic scientific observation and st ...

Islands and rocks from north to south

The islands' area totals and the highest point has been measured as or approximately (the unclimbed Brown Peak on Sturge Island). The

Antarctic Circle The Antarctic Circle is the most southerly of the five major circles of latitude that mark maps of Earth. The region south of this circle is known as the Antarctic, and the zone immediately to the north is called the Southern Temperate Zone. S ...

is close to

, in the eight-kilometre channel between Young and Buckle Islands. Buckle Island and the nearby

Sabrina Island Sabrina Island is the largest of three small islets lying south of Buckle Island in the Balleny Islands of Antarctica and are part of New Zealand's Ross Dependency. Sabrina Island was named after Thomas Freeman's cutter when John Balleny's squ ...

is home to several colonies of Adelie and chinstrap penguins.

Recorded human visits to the islands

The English sealing captains

John Balleny John Balleny (died 1857) was the English captain of the sealing schooner , who led an exploration cruise for the English whaling firm Samuel Enderby & Sons to the Antarctic in 1838–1839. During the expedition of 1838–1839, Balleny, sailing in co ...

and Thomas Freeman first sighted the group in 1839. Balleny named the island group after himself and the individual islands after the London merchants whose financial backing had made the expedition possible. Freeman was the first person to land on any of the islands on 9 February 1839, and this was the first human landfall south of the

. Sealers sighted the islands in 1853 but did not land. In February 2015 the islands were visited for three days by the

New Zealand-Australia Antarctic Ecosystems Voyage New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, ...

under the auspices of the New Zealand

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research or NIWA ( mi, Taihoro Nukurangi), is a Crown Research Institute of New Zealand. Established in 1992, NIWA conducts research across a broad range of disciplines in the environmental scien ...

aboard the vessel

RV Tangaroa RV ''Tangaroa'' is a research vessel operated by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) of New Zealand. It was purpose-built as a Deepwater Research Vessel for the then Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries Research Cent ...

, with the objective of studying marine life ecosystems of the islands, especially with reference to the

humpback whale The humpback whale (''Megaptera novaeangliae'') is a species of baleen whale. It is a rorqual (a member of the family Balaenopteridae) and is the only species in the genus ''Megaptera''. Adults range in length from and weigh up to . The hu ...

. This work followed up work done on a previous visit in 2010. On 3 February 2017, personnel from the

Swiss Polar Institute Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland *Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri *Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia *Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss Internationa ...

Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition The Antarctic ( or , American English also or ; commonly ) is a polar region around Earth's South Pole, opposite the Arctic region around the North Pole. The Antarctic comprises the continent of Antarctica, the Kerguelen Plateau and other ...

visited the islands and carried out considerable photographic and video survey work which was intended to contribute to the first accurate mapping of the main islands. Most of the work was done by helicopter, although at least one landfall was also made on the islands by this expedition, using

Zodiac The zodiac is a belt-shaped region of the sky that extends approximately 8° north or south (as measured in celestial latitude) of the ecliptic, the Sun path, apparent path of the Sun across the celestial sphere over the course of the year. ...

inflatable boats.

Geology

In the

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Archi ...

, the Buckle, Sturge and Young Islands are examples of

stratovolcano A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a conical volcano built up by many layers (strata) of hardened lava and tephra. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile with a summit crater and per ...

es. Strong earthquakes very close to the islands are rare, but tremors of moderate strength do occur over the

Pacific-Antarctic Ridge The Pacific-Antarctic Ridge (PAR) is a divergent tectonic plate boundary located on the seafloor of the South Pacific Ocean, separating the Pacific Plate from the Antarctic Plate. It is regarded as the southern section of the East Pacific Rise ...

Macquarie Triple Junction The Macquarie Triple Junction is a geologically active tectonic boundary located at at which the Indo-Australian Plate, Pacific Plate, and Antarctic Plate collide and interact. The term Triple Junction is given to particular tectonic boundaries ...

and

Pacific Rim The Pacific Rim comprises the lands around the rim of the Pacific Ocean. The ''Pacific Basin'' includes the Pacific Rim and the islands in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Rim roughly overlaps with the geologic Pacific Ring of Fire. List of co ...

between the Balleny Islands and

Macquarie Island Macquarie Island is an island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, about halfway between New Zealand and Antarctica. Regionally part of Oceania and politically a part of Tasmania, Australia, since 1900, it became a Tasmanian State Reserve in 197 ...

. Other earthquakes occur near the

Southeast Indian Ridge The Southeast Indian Ridge (SEIR) is a mid-ocean ridge in the southern Indian Ocean. A divergent tectonic plate boundary stretching almost between the Rodrigues Triple Junction () in the Indian Ocean and the Macquarie Triple Junction () in the ...

and Balleny Fracture Zone, including a magnitude 8.1 earthquake in 1998 that struck just over west-northwest of the islands which changed the pattern of seismicity in a wide area around the islands. It is possible that these islands are still volcanically active. The Brown Peak volcano may have had an eruption in 2001, based on satellite observation.

Submerged features

Several underwater features lie close to the Balleny Islands: * Balleny Seamounts * Balleny Trough * Umitaka Bank * Vaughan Bank

References

External links