The Halley VI Research Station in Antarctica, positioned on a floating ice shelf jutting into the Weddell Sea, will shut down between March and November this year, according to the British Antarctic Survey.

Several lengthening cracks in the ice near the research station have raised the possibility that a large block of ice could break off from the shelf in the coming months — and out of concern for the safety of the scientists living there, the agency has decided to remove the research team before the Antarctic winter begins. Currently, there are a total of 88 people at the station, 16 of whom were scheduled to spend the winter there.

“We want to do the right thing for our people,” said Tim Stockings, the British Antarctic Survey’s director of operations, in a statement. “Bringing them home for winter is a prudent precaution given the changes that our glaciologists have seen in the ice shelf in recent months.

“Our goal is to winterize the station and leave it ready for re-occupation as soon as possible after the Antarctic winter.”

The Halley Research Station is a movable research facility located on the Brunt Ice Shelf, which juts out from Antarctica’s Caird coast into the Weddell Sea. Research from Halley is what first led to the discovery of the atmosphere’s ozone hole in 1985.