Today’s photo of the week is of a humpback whale spotted by the deepwater research vessel Tangaroa at the Balleny Islands deep in the Southern Ocean.
Scientists aboard the NIWA ship returned home last week after six weeks in the Southern Ocean.
The voyage, to study the ecosystems around Antarctica, was a joint project between NIWA and the Australian Antarctic Division.
It was supported by Antarctic New Zealand and government departments in both New Zealand and Australia, .
Over 500 hours of whale song recordings were collected during the trip, including more than 40,000 individual calls.
Photo by Dave Allen, NIWA.
