Extravaganza P

The base and its 21 occupants are all secure. Officials see no need for an evacuation.

Concerns had been expressed that a major Emperor penguin colony near the breakaway could have been disrupted.

The Emperors breed on sea-ice attached to the coast - so-called "fast ice".

But the new Sentinel-2 picture clearly shows the stains from the birds' excrement, or guano, to be on an ice platform that remains intact.

"These large igneous provinces, as we call them, coincided with changes in the climate and also mass extinctions," explained Prof Ferreira.

Nothing on that scale looks like it is about to happen under the area studied by Upflow, fortunately. But it's thought still to be an excellent laboratory.

Its siting was close to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge where some of Earth's tectonic plates meet. The nearby continent of Africa would also influence how plumes would flow. The Upflow team hopes to publish its imagery in the next couple of years.