The sinking of the cruise ship Explorer off King George Island on 23 November was an "incident of grave concern to the shipping industry and, but for a narrow and lucky escape, could have turned out to be a serious and tragic catastrophe," a spokesman for the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) told SASI. "Large cruise ships like this are very vulnerable in icy, Antarctic conditions. On another day, a similar or bigger ship might have taken longer to sink, the passengers and crew would have spent hours in the icy water and there would have been considerable loss of life," said Athena Dinar of the BAS, which runs the UK's scientific interests in the Antarctic.
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