Explorers discover unknown Antarctic island long marked as 'danger zone' on maps

Researchers recently discovered that a long-misidentified Antarctic "danger zone" was actually an island — and have now mapped it for the first time.

The discovery was announced in an April press release from the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), a German polar research center based in Bremerhaven.

The island is located in the northwestern Weddell Sea, and was spotted during an expedition aboard the AWI's icebreaker Polarstern.

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Researchers were originally studying the rapid decline of sea ice in the region when harsh weather forced them to pause.

They took shelter on Joinville Island to avoid the wind and waves — where they later spotted the previously unidentified island.

"On our route, the nautical chart showed an area with unexplored dangers to navigation, but it wasn’t clear what it was or where the information came from," Simon Dreutter, a bathymetry data engineer at AWI, said in a statement.

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After examining the available coastline records, Dreutter looked out the window and saw "an 'iceberg' that looked kind of dirty."

He recalled that "on closer inspection, we realized that it was probably rock."

"We then changed course and headed in that direction, and it became increasingly clear that we had an island in front of us!"

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Researchers approached and circumnavigated the island, surveying the seabed with an echo sounder and drone imaging — marking the first time the region had been surveyed and recorded.

The island is roughly 426 feet long and about 164 feet wide. Officials say it "protrudes about 16 meters (52 feet) out of the water."

Officials are still unclear why the island was marked as a danger zone — noting it resembles surrounding icebergs from an aerial view.

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The reason may be tied to the number of uncharted shoals on the seafloor, said a representative from the institute.

The official, who spoke on behalf of the research team, told Fox News Digital the area appears to have "hummocky mounds in which water depths can change abruptly over very short distances."

"Most areas are modeled from satellite data in low resolution," the AWI representative said. "Therefore, many areas, especially inshore and nearshore, can be considered white spots or gaps in the map. In consequence, also nautical charts only have a patchy data coverage."

Since the island has not yet been officially named, it will now go through the formal naming process, with a proposal being submitted to the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) for consideration.

The age of exploration may seem over, but officials say less than a quarter of the Weddell Sea is fully charted — and there's plenty more to find.

"Since satellite observation, even in the remote areas of Antarctica, the discovery of an island is a rare and exciting event," the spokesperson said. 

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"But with only about a quarter of the Antarctic water charted, there is still a good scope for discovering landforms on the seabed."