Celebrating Polar Pride Day 2022

18 November, 2022 News stories

Today (18 November) British Antarctic Survey (BAS) joins global celebrations to mark LGBTQIA+ STEM DAY and Polar Pride Day. Polar Pride is a celebration of the contribution of LGBTQIA+ people in polar research and operations, the day was originally designated by the Government of the British Antarctic Territory and South Georgia & the South Sandwich Islands (SGSSI) in 2020.

Here are some of the ways the BAS community is marking Polar Pride.

Celebrating at Cambridge

The Pride flag was raised outside BAS headquarters in Cambridge today.

Our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion network took part in a live webinar with Durham University Antarctic Research Group on topics important to the LGBTQIA+ community.

Colleagues gathered together in the afternoon for an informal mingle and shared a special Pride cake.

Celebrating in the polar regions

The Rothera Research Station team raised the flag on the station flagpole, and took the flag all around the station. Marine scientists from our Dutch collaborators working in the Dutch Gerritsz Laboratory also took the flag on a small boat while they collected water samples.

Colleagues also raised the flag in front of our aircraft before travelling onto a field camp on Larsen C Ice Shelf.

The Rothera team also celebrated with a Pride 'smoko' coffee break, with a brightly coloured Pride cake.

The Progress Pride flag also flew on South Georgia today as the King Edward Point and Bird Island Research Station teams celebrated Polar Pride day.

At Halley VI, the team were treated to a real-life rainbow and the unique phenomenon of a sun dog (halos caused by the refraction of sunlight by ice crystals in the atmosphere).

Celebrating at sea

The Progress Pride flag also flies onboard RRS Sir David Attenborough today to celebrate Polar Pride 2022 as the ship prepares to head south for its second voyage to Antarctica.

Diversity in UK Polar Science

The Diversity in UK Polar Science initiative, conceived and funded by the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Development Office Polar Regions Department, celebrates existing diversity, and takes an important step forward to promote and enhance Antarctic science opportunities to under-represented groups, including women, people from ethnic minorities, BAME, LGBTQIA+ community and people with a disability.

We recently launched the Community Guide to Inclusive Behaviours in the Polar Regions that contains tools for collective learning and guidance on how to resolve challenging situations.

We aim to give staff, students and visitors a secure environment where they are respected for who they are, no matter their age, disability, sexual orientation, religion, race, ethnicity, gender identity or other parts of their identity.

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