Emperor Penguins From Space: What Decades of Satellite Images Reveal
Emperor penguins are among the most recognizable animals on Earth, and some of the hardest to study. Recent satellite surveys estimate that hundreds of thousands of them live in 66 colonies along Antarctica's remote, frozen coast. New research using decades of NASA-USGS Landsat images now offers a more hopeful picture of how these birds cope with a changing world.
How do you count penguins from space?
Satellites cannot see individual penguins. Instead, scientists look for brown guano stains, the droppings that build up on the ice where thousands of birds gather. Landsat has imaged Antarctica continuously since the early 1980s, which gives researchers one of the few long-term records of colonies that are very difficult to reach.
Colonies older than we thought
Researchers at the University of Freiburg found that 18 colonies were already there, on average, about 17 years before they were first identified. One of the oldest is the roughly 6,000-bird colony on Smyley Island in the Bellingshausen Sea, which dates to at least 1989, two decades earlier than previously known. That colony may have suffered a total breeding failure in 2022, yet it has continued to appear in satellite images, usually near icebergs at the edge of the ice shelf.
Moving house to survive
A second study, led by Durham University's Grant Macdonald, looked at nearly 40 years of images of three colonies disrupted by iceberg calving or early sea ice breakup. The Mertz and SANAE colonies temporarily moved to nearby icebergs, embayments or ice shelves, then returned to their old breeding grounds. Macdonald says such moves may be more common than believed and could be a useful adaptation, though he cautions that flexibility alone will not offset long-term sea ice loss.
Still under threat
Emperor penguins rely on fast ice, sea ice attached to the shore, to breed, raise chicks and molt. Antarctic sea ice has been declining since 2016, and some models project the birds could disappear by 2100. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed them as threatened in 2022, and the IUCN classified them as endangered in 2026. After record-low sea ice in 2022, British Antarctic Survey researchers reported catastrophic breeding failures in some colonies. Wildlife ecologist Michelle LaRue says one bad year does not end a colony; the danger is repeated failures year after year.
Quick FAQ
How many emperor penguin colonies are there? About 66 around Antarctica, according to recent satellite surveys.
How do scientists find them? By spotting guano stains on the ice in satellite images.
Are emperor penguins endangered? The IUCN classified them as endangered in 2026.
Source: NASA Earth Observatory, A Changing World for Emperor Penguins (August 26, 2026). Photo: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA.
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