{"id":646481,"date":"2026-05-09T22:19:21","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T20:19:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=646481"},"modified":"2026-05-09T22:22:51","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T20:22:51","slug":"south-african-icebreaker-delayed-in-delivering-critical-supplies-to-scientists-on-remote-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/science\/646481-south-african-icebreaker-delayed-in-delivering-critical-supplies-to-scientists-on-remote-island.html","title":{"rendered":"South African icebreaker delayed in delivering critical supplies to scientists on remote island"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A South African vessel headed to a sub-Antarctic island to resupply scientists has been held up by fuel supply disruptions caused by the Iran war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The SA Agulhas II<\/a>, an icebreaking polar supply ship, was unable to leave Cape Town on schedule in April because it couldn\u2019t secure diesel supplies in time, the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, which owns the vessel, said in a statement on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe delay is primarily due to the global scarcity of fuel products linked to ongoing geopolitical developments in the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Operations at the station require a specialised polar diesel that doesn\u2019t freeze in extreme cold. A shipment of the fuel finally arrived at the Cape Town refinery earlier this month, the department said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mixing and testing are underway and it\u2019s expected to be delivered to the vessel within two days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s \u201cno immediate risk\u201d to the Marion Island research station<\/a> team, with sufficient fuel for another nine days and food supplies for two months, according to the department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, it means a narrowing window to replenish stocks at the base \u2014 another example of how the disruption of global energy flows, driven by the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, is affecting even some of the most remote areas on Earth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Delays caused by the war in Iran have prevented the SA Agulhas II from leaving Cape Town harbour on schedule to deliver supplies to an important scientific outpost.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341034,"featured_media":646482,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31750],"tags":[13459,92869,105119],"class_list":["post-646481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science","tag-antarctica","tag-marion-island","tag-sa-agulhas-ii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646481"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341034"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646481"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":646483,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646481\/revisions\/646483"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646482"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}