Researchers Filmed the Reactions of Antarctic Animals As They Met Humans for the First Time

When a human comes in a close encounter with a non-human animal, their typical reaction is an emotion such as love, fear, wonder, or fright. Maybe the fear is too much that they flee away from the spot. Or perhaps, the love is so intense that they approach the animal and give it a warm hug. But when it comes to animals, it is generally unknown and unpredictable as to how they will react to encountering a human being. Recently, two researchers from Saudi Arabia embarked on an expedition to Antarctica to study how whales act as carbon filters for the environment. During the expedition, they encountered several new animals that had never been seen before. Reaction of some of the penguins can be seen in the series of videos shared by BBC Discover Wildlife.

Diego Rivera, marine and biodiversity researcher at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), told BBC Discover Wildlife that some of the animals they came across, looked like they had never seen a human before, especially those in Orkney and Elephant islands. “We were the first. They would be curious but cautious, even walking behind us when we were not noticing,” he said.

The two KAUST scientists, Carlos Preckler and Rivera were the first researchers from a Saudi Arabia institution to embark on a science expedition to Antarctica, according to a KAUST press release. Despite the harsh climate and brutal environmental conditions of Antarctica, their expedition ran smoothly, facilitated mainly by the consistency of the midnight sun. “There was a period of around three to four weeks where we did not see the night or moon at all, as it would always be a day,” Rivera told the outlet.

At first, their journey brought them to four species of penguins -Chinstrap, Gentoo, Adelie, and King. They recorded some of these penguins on their cameras. One footage, for instance, shows an adorable black-beaked penguin waddling through a steep trail of rocks, moving into a plain of icy-dusted dunes. It seems to be flapping its flippers and bobbing its head while running, its tiny black tail trailing behind. Another video shows a group of penguins gathered on a jagged chunk of ice floating in an icy lake. Some of these flightless birds were hopping on the protruded surface of the ice chunk, while others waddled from here to there. Some splashed water on their backs as if bathing. Herds of marine mammals swam nearby.

Although they didn’t specify which type of penguin was in these videos, the Adélie penguins, Rivera said, “were always funny to watch.” “Whenever they wanted to jump into the water, they would do so by falling from the rocks. Sometimes they’d regret their decision last-minute and turn back around,” he described. Rivera shared that he and his team spotted an island full of these penguins’ hatcheries, all of which were covered in ice. “You could see trails formed by penguins passing through and sliding on their bellies,” he said.

Another peculiar and unusual sighting they stumbled upon was related to sea lions. In an unlikely neighborhood, the sea lions were basking in the Sun quite close to the penguins. “Only a few times when a sea lion or seal would get up and start heading towards water would penguins start running away.” Keeping these pudgy seabirds aside, the team investigated whale population and how they acted as intelligent carbon sequestrators. By filtering out massive amounts of carbon from the environment, they are, in a way, breaking the greenhouse emission cycle, thereby, soothing the heating planet. If scientists could understand the carbon-removal mechanism in whales, they could use that knowledge to develop some remarkable scientific solutions to climate change.