LONDON: The remains of a British meteorologist who died in an Antarctic expedition in 1959 have been recovered six decades later from a glacier, the British Antarctic Survey said on Monday.
They were identified by DNA-testing as those of Dennis “Tink” Bell, who died aged 25 when he was working for the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, which became the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), the UK’s polar research institute. Bell died on Admiralty Bay on King George Island, located 120 kilometres (75 miles) off the coast of Antarctica on July 26, 1959. He was stationed on the island for a two-year assignment at a small UK research base.
Bell and three other men had set out to climb and survey a glacier, when he fell through a crevasse — a deep chasm in the ice. His body was never recovered.
The remains, which were exposed by a receding glacier, were found on January 19 by a team from the Henryk Arctowski Polish Antarctic Station.
“This discovery brings closure to a decades-long mystery and reminds us of the human stories embedded in the history of Antarctic science,” said BAS director Jane Francis.
The bone fragments were carried to the Falkland Islands by the BAS Royal Research Ship Sir David Attenborough, and then brought to London for DNA testing.
Published in Dawn, August 12th, 2025
