iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 31/10/2025

This was one of my last things to organise at work before soon going on maternity leave and it's always so nice to see how much people still love paper maps. There's just something special about them and the joy, conversation and memories that they bring about 🥰

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 19/09/2025

We are so pleased to announce the official launch of the new BAS Map Catalogue 🎉🗺 The catalogue contains open access topographic, thematic and geological maps, as well as full details on where to purchase our professionally printed published maps. Have a look for yourselves at bas.ac.uk/maps! 1/2

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 12/09/2025

Thank you so much to the British Cartographic Society for recognising 2 of @bas.ac.uk’s maps at last week’s conference. It was fantastic to collect the certificate for our recently-released Alexander Island map, one of the most interesting maps I’ve made in a long time!

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 11/09/2025

#A23a iceberg continues its disintegration north of South Georgia in the South Atlantic, with a brilliant image from today finishing off this timelapse of Copernicus Sentinel-3 imagery over the last few weeks! It's always interesting to track these bergs out of Antarctica and into warmer waters 🌊🌴

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Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 02/09/2025

Iceberg A23A is currently located north of South Georgia & over the weekend has fragmented into a several large pieces. While these individual icebergs are large & may get new names, they may be short lived as further breakup is now likely as currents push them all further north into warmer waters.

A satellite image from 1st Sep. showing the island of South Georgia covered in snow and ice, and iceberg A23A lying about 65 km to the north. There are many clouds in the image. The berg remains as one large piece, with multiple smaller fragments around its edge. The largest fragment is still 35 km in length. A scale bar is shown in the bottom right corner, and a credit statement saying "Copernicus Sentinel-3 imagery acquired 1st Sep. 2025".

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 27/08/2025

Really looking forward to this conference at @bgs.ac.uk next week! Always great to catch up with other mapping enthusiasts. Is anyone else on here going to 1 or both days?

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

I'm just starting an update of BAS's published "Adelaide Island and Arrowsmith Peninsula" map. One of the first things I always work on is creating new hillshades & contours from the latest elevation data. These in-progress images show some of the interesting islands & landscapes in the region! 🏔️🧊

A grey-scale hillshade of Pourquoi-Pas Island in Antarctica. Mountain ridges can be seen, as well as glacier flowlines. The source data is REMA v2.

A grey-scale hillshade of a section of Adelaide Island, Antarctica. Rothera Point is covered in the extent. Large mountain ranges can be seen, along with glaciers and ice piedmonts. The source data is REMA v2.

A grey-scale hillshade of Horseshoe and Lagotellerie islands in Antarctica. A few mountains can be seen on the south of the island. The source data is REMA v2.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 05/08/2025

This new topographic map has been my big project for the last few months and I'm so pleased to see it finally printed and published! 🗺️ It's been a truly fascinating region to work in, with changes happening almost before my eyes as I attempted to keep the new data up to date. ❄️🧊

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

WeatherMatrix @weathermatrix.bsky.social · 31/07/2025

NOAA has released their official animation of the propagation of this week's tsunami. It took almost exactly one day to reach Antarctica and was reported at 0.6 feet high.

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Peter T Fretwell @ptfretwell.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

Bedmap3 map PDFs are now available to freely download from BAS data.bas.ac.uk/items/757872...

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 11/07/2025

South Georgia in winter 😍 These SAR and optical images show the island of South Georgia in the South Atlantic. SAR imagery allows us to see these locations through winter and cloud-covered days, and then the optical imagery adds extra content when it's not cloudy or dark!

A grey-scale SAR image of South Georgia. Mountains can be seen on land, and movements and currents can be seen in the water, affected by wind. The image contains the text "Copernicus Sentinel-1 image acquired 6th July 2025, accessed from icelogistics.info".

An optical RGB image of South Georgia. Mountains can be seen on land, mostly covered in snow and ice. Cloud covers the south-west half of the image. The image contains the text "Copernicus Sentinel-2 image acquired 31st May 2025, accessed from Copernicus Browser".

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Jonathan Amos @jcdamos.bsky.social · 07/07/2025

In case you were wondering... Iceberg A23a seen cruising around South Georgia today by Meteosat 12. The old berg still has an area of 2,846 sq km.

Iceberg A23a on 7/7/25 Eumetsat/Meteosat 12

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 25/06/2025

📢 We're hiring! My team is currently advertising for my maternity cover for 12 months. Join us, making maps and working on some of the most interesting aspects of my role. You'll get to work in beautiful Cambridge and meet all kinds of interesting people at the British Antarctic Survey ❄️🗺️

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 19/06/2025

We've just received the proofs of our new Alexander Island map from Dennis Maps printers and have given the go ahead for printing! This is the first comprehensive map of the entire region produced in decades. At 1:500 000 scale, it also features a geological map on the reverse 😍 Watch this space!

A photo of a map on a table. The map covers Alexander Island, a long island with large peninsulas coming off to the west. The land is white with contours and place names visible. Ice shelves are grey. Bathymetry is shown with intervals of cyan. A large information is shown to the right of the map with photos and text.

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 05/06/2025

The NERC Arctic Office have printed a giant version of our main published Arctic map and it's come out beautifully! We can't wait to see this being used at upcoming events. Who doesn't want a huge 3 metre map?!

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 21/05/2025

We're proud to share that our Bedmap3 map won "Best Map" at the International Map Industry Association (IMIA) forum in London last week! 🏆 This international award celebrates Outstanding Cartographic Design & we’re honoured to be recognised alongside leading names in the field from previous years. 🗺️

A photo of the trophy and certificate, with side A of the Bedmap 3 map shown behind. The map shows the bed topography of Antarctica underneath the ice.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 07/05/2025

I'm speaking at the IMIA Mapping Leaders Forum next week in London. Is anyone here attending? I'm looking forward to meeting other mapping enthusiasts and experts at the 2 day event! There are still a few spaces left if you'd like to come along. More details here: imiamaps.org/mapping-lead...

imiamaps.org

Mapping Leaders Forum - IMIA | International Map Industry Association

May 14-15, 2025 | The News Building, London The IMIA Mapping Leader Forum brings together industry leaders, business experts, and technology innovators during this annual two-day event to explore the...

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Polar Geospatial Center @polargeospatial.bsky.social · 28/04/2025

📢 The final ArcticDEM & REMA release is here - and it might be the last. Funding cuts put vital polar data at risk. Help us rally support: take the survey! 🔗https://z.umn.edu/pgc-dem-survey #PolarScience #SavePolarData

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 08/04/2025

More data! 😄 I love looking at Sentinel-1 imagery through these portals because it gives a near-real-time insight into changes in Antarctica, and the detail in the sea ice patterns can be so insightful for a range of people working in the region 🚢 🛰️ 🌊

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

I've picked up my new Alexander Island map today after a month or two of other work, and while double checking some data, I noticed that this section of ice shelf has retreated by over 1.5 km in places since I updated the data in November. Can things just stop melting?! Keeps me busy for sure!

A simple map showing a Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite image from 27th Feb 2025. Lines are overlaid on the image with a red line showing the ice shelf front from November 2024, purple lines showing the grounding line, and blue lines showing the ice coastline.

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

British Antarctic Survey 🐧 @bas.ac.uk · 14/03/2025

We’ve just published the most detailed map yet of the landscape beneath Antarctica’s ice sheet (called Bedmap3), and we learnt some pretty cool facts about Antarctica that you can use to impress your pals. Ready? Graphic: Hamish Pritchard et al

A map showing the topography of Antarctica, without ice

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 12/03/2025

We've been working with this beautiful Copernicus Sentinel-2 imagery this week, showing South Georgia in all its glory in Feb. 2018. The sediment plumes are clearly highlighted here and it is extremely rare to get an almost cloud-free image of the whole island 🏔️😍

A satellite image covering Busen Region and Thatcher Peninsula. The land is rocky, with a few green areas visible. Many of the glaciers have got large areas of moraine. The water is bluey green, with sediment plumes from the glaciers.

A satellite image. St Andrews Bay is visible in the north, and Twitcher and Herz bays in the south. The ice-free land is rocky, with a few green areas visible. Glaciers cover most of the land. The water is bluey green, with sediment plumes from the glaciers.

A satellite image showing Bird Island. The land looks quite green, with brown rocky areas visible. The water is very dark.

A satellite image covering the Bay of Isles to the north of the land and King Haakon Bay to the south. The land is largely covered in glaciers and the ice-free areas are brown. The water is bluey green, with sediment plumes from the glaciers.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 05/03/2025

Lovely image from the NOAA-20 satellite yesterday showing the location of grounded A23a iceberg close to the island of South Georgia 😍 It's still crazy to me that this iceberg has been in the Southern Ocean since 1986, taking a few little pauses along its way to this current position! @bas.ac.uk

A satellite image showing a large iceberg as a big white block, and an island in the NE corner with blue-ish sediment blooms coming away from the glaciers on land. There are clouds in the south/bottom of the image.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

Back to one of my favourite tasks of iceberg mapping 😄

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 20/02/2025

I'm thrilled to be a part of developing and populating this new catalogue! I’ve created hundreds of maps (maybe even over a thousand!) during my time at BAS - many used once and then forgotten. Now we'll be making them openly available for all to use. Watch this space! 👀🗺️

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 13/02/2025

This is a map I first started about 4 years ago, and it’s been put down and picked back up about 5 times since then (we’ve all had projects like this!) but I’m so glad to see it finally released! The front cover shows some of the very varied terrain that has been mapped 😍

The front cover of the map, showing a landscape photo of Signy Island with Orwell Glacier in the foreground, looking through Three Lakes Valley to Coronation Island in the distance.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 12/02/2025

Interesting article written by BAS scientist Dr Ella Gilbert, featuring a little map that I made the other day. I always like mapping the fast-changing and important region of Thwaites and Pine Island glaciers! 🗺️

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 04/02/2025

A new iceberg, ~30x14 km in size, recently calved from the southern end of the George VI Ice Shelf. It's called A84 and is already making quite an impact, bumping into the Stange Ice Shelf over the weekend! These Copernicus Sentinel-1 images from Polar View show the new berg over the last few days.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 30/01/2025

Beautiful Sentinel-2 imagery of George VI Ice Shelf with lots of meltwater from yesterday. The patterns that this water produces is like artwork! Fossil Bluff is shown in the second image, and Hodgson Lake shown in the last - a former subglacial lake sealed under ice thick perennial ice ❄️

A satellite image showing lots of meltwater pool on an ice shelf in the centre, and rocky outcrops on the left (west) on Alexander Island, and Palmer Land on the right (east).

Hodgson Lake, Citadel Bastion and Corner Cliffs on Alexander Island.

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 29/01/2025

Did you know that MAGIC support the BAS Air Unit with mapping, imagery and also 3D visualisations? Check out Rothera runway, made using the latest drone imagery draped over a digital elevation model! Visualising the runway & obstacle surfaces in 3D helps pilots better understand these remote areas ✈️

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 20/01/2025

Happy #PenguinAwarenessDay! I think it’s a rule that everyone who works at BAS has to like penguins, so to spread their cuteness, here’s a couple of my favourite photos from an amazing trip to the Falkland Islands a few years ago 🐧

A very fluffy brown King penguin chick with more adults and chicks behind

King penguins on a white sandy beach with a blue sky

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 17/01/2025

Beautiful image showing an almost cloud free Stange Ice Shelf with the RRS Sir David Attenborough alongside 🚢 (you’ll need a good eye to spot it!)

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 14/01/2025

🌐 Exciting news! We’re thrilled to announce the release of the new Ice Logistics Portal, providing global sea ice charts from 13 ice & weather services. Explore: www.icelogistics.info 1/3

icelogistics.info

Ice Logistics Portal

The Global Ice Charts And Sea Ice Information Portal

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

I don't get to work in the Arctic as much as I'd like, but someone requested an image of the Qaqortoq region of Greenland today and I found this beautiful Copernicus Sentinel-2 image from a few months ago 😍 There are just so many interesting features to see!

A satellite image showing fjords with turquoise coloured water full of glacial flour flowing from the land, interesting glacial ice formations in the top left, and many brown and green islands and peninsulas.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

I'm currently trying to figure out the 'best' grounding line to use on our new Alexander Island map. Grounding lines are notoriously difficult and these images show 3 potential sources against a REMA hillshade. I'm redrawing the shape of the land so it's important to show as accurately as possible!

A greyscale hillshade of land and ice shelf with three differently coloured lines (purple, red and blue) showing possible options for the grounding line. The region is Haydn Island.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 01/01/2025

An interesting post from the head of my team showing the location of our big red ship in amongst some sea ice at the base of the Antarctic Peninsula. Good luck to the team onboard! I love seeing the web cam photos here: www.bas.ac.uk/polar-operat...

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 24/12/2024

My colleague collated these images and the second one showing ‘Cape Christmas’ is my favourite - named because surveyors from Stonington Island spent Christmas Day in the vicinity in 1947. A bit different to most of our Christmases now! 🎄

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Reposted by Laura Gerrish

Mapping and Geographic Information Centre @magic.bas.ac.uk · 19/12/2024

🗺️❄️New mapping blog alert ❄️🗺️ Discover our blog post to explore the latest topographic datasets released in the @scar-antarctic.bsky.social Antarctic Digital Database. We've also got exciting news on the release of versions 1-5 of the Antarctic coastlines from 1993-2010! www.bas.ac.uk/blogpost/ant...

bas.ac.uk

Antarctic Digital Database - December 2024 update - British Antarctic Survey

Continuous mapping of Antarctica reveals new topographic features In November, we released version 7.10 of the SCAR ADD which included updated coastlines for the Alexander Island region, and new lakes...

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

To anyone who has followed me on here - my team at BAS now has its own page and will be posting really cool and interesting bits of work. Check it out and give them a follow for all things related to ice and mapping ❄️ 🌍 We also happen to have one of the best team names around (MAGIC!).

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

These draft extracts of our new Alexander Island map show 5 new places recently named - Isopleth Island, recently detached from the main island, Mount Meridian, the tallest point in the Colbert Mtns, Projection Rocks, plotting in deep water and so easily missed, and Raster and Vector islands ❤️ 🗺️

An extract of a topographic map with blue sea and white land. Multiple place names are shown in the extract, including Isopleth Island, Cape Brown and Hampton Glacier.

An extract of a topographic map with white shaded land, with a mountain range in the centre. Multiple place names are shown in the extract, including Colbert Mountains, Mount Meridian and Vivaldi Glacier.

An extract of a topographic map with blue sea and white land. Multiple place names are shown in the extract, including Johansen Islands, Projection Rocks, Raster Island and Vector Island.

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Laura Gerrish @lauragerrish.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

Hi everyone! First post here, so I thought I’d share some photos of two maps I’m working on at the moment - Alexander Island and The South Orkney Islands. These two maps will join our series of published maps at BAS, with the South Orkneys map heading to the printers very soon!

Two paper maps laid on a table with blue bathymetry and white land shading

A zoomed in photo of a section of one of the maps, with place names shown including ‘Beethoven Peninsula’

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