A talk on the 'Tanzanian Drilling Project', delivered by Bridget Wade at the 2012 Lyell Meeting held at the Geological Society on 29 March. The 'Tanzania Drilling Project' (TDP) is an informal name for a programme of shallow coring in marine sediments that are now exposed on land in the coastal basins of Tanzania. The main objective is to provide palaeoclimate and micropalaeontological records. In successive field seasons from 2002-2009, over 40 holes were drilled using small truck-mounted rigs, recovering sediments from Aptian to Oligocene age. The main funding stream was through a series standard research grants from Natural Environment Research Council (UK) and National Science Foundation (USA), with additional support from the Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation, Enterprise Ireland, and individuals (eg via fellowship research funding). TDP has involved scientists from the UK, USA, Tanzania, Ireland and Netherlands. Over 30 peer-reviewed papers have been published ! so far.