Expedition Team

Jonathan Zaccaria grew up in France and graduated as an engineer in spectrometry. His work brought him to Antarctica to the French Dumont d’Urville Station, best known for its role in the documentary March of the Penguins. He made another overwinter in the only international station in the Antarctic. Later, he began working as a guide on board expedition ships in Antarctica and the Arctic. He has worked for 10 years in the polar regions, leading trips on small, expedition vessels.

The justification of one passion is enough to guide an entire life. Destiny can be written from a single event. Crossing Greenland on skis was Didier Drouet’s first major action. At that point, he decided to pursue his polar adventure by becoming a mid-mountain and sea kayak guide in Greenland, a dog sled driver and Nordic ski expedition guide in Nunavut, and finally a base manager in Antarctica for the French Southern and Antarctic Lands. In 2019, he published an essay titled “Esquimau toi-même! (Eskimo yourself!)” in tribute to the Inuit people.

Ekaterina Uryupova grew up in Siberia. She holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences from Lomonosov Moscow State University and a master’s in international journalism from the University of Salford. Her disciplines include marine biology, oceanography, climate impact on ecosystems and interdisciplinary research efforts in environmental protection. Her experience in the Antarctic includes an internship at the Secretariat of the Antarctic Treaty in Argentina and at the Smithsonian Institution in the US. She is currently a member of the Association of Polar Early Career Scientists (APECS) and Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN). She has worked in both Antarctica and the Arctic for over 10 years.