John and Tyler encountered a big maze of rubble again. First they moved their small sleds over the blocks “and then together with 2 people on one big pulk at a time to get the larger pulks through the maze.” Live image courtesy of forwardexpeditions.com (click to enlarge)
John: “[The new sea ice] makes for hard camping because we don't have ice screws, we just have snow pegs, and we need a bunch of snow to hold down the tent. We have snow flaps on the side of the tent that hold snow that's secure.” Live image courtesy of forwardexpeditions.com (click to enlarge)
Lonnie, Stuart and Max reported different kinds of terrain, form pans of ice separated by pressure ridges and dense pack, to leads. Live image over Contact 4 courtesy of Max Chaya/ thethreepoles.com (click to enlarge)
Stuart explained in a voice dispatch that every morning they look outside at the wind, sun/visibility, ice conditions and temperature. Live image of Stuart over Contact 4 courtesy of Max Chaya/ thethreepoles.com (click to enlarge)
Pen, Ann and Martin were still waiting for their resupply and the support team was studying satellite images of the area. Live image courtesy of catlinarcticsurvey.com (click to enlarge)
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Arctic wrap-up: Better miles and another rough rubble field
Posted: Mar 19, 2009 10:57 am EDT
(ThePoles.com) John and Tyler reported traveling 6 nautical miles in one day while Lonnie’s team broke the 7 nm barrier. Ice conditions vary from rubble as high as a four-story building, to snow dunes to frozen leads. Pen's team was still waiting for their resupply.
Unsupported, Unassisted
John Huston and Tyler Fish (USA)
The team reported travelling across a bunch of old sea ice “with kind of small 1 to 2 meter snow dunes that made it difficult to ski over and also due to the overcast skies, we had lots of low contrast and poor visibility. These snow dunes appear flat, so you kind of run into them and they are not flat and require quite a bit of effort to pull our sleds over.”
They also encountered “what can only be described as a small town of different sea ice formations, all sorts of sizes of rubble, shoebox size, soccer ball size, all the way up to gigantic small building size piled 4 stories tall, formations of ice. It was an absolutely incredible place. And as we skied into this with our pulks, it felt like we were entering a small urban area.”
They spent two and a half hours in the area, navigating through the maze. “This was a joining together or a smashing together of 2 old multi-year ice pans that due to the forces of the Arctic Ocean at some point must have just had some massive crushing and grinding going on and upheaval and this was the result.”
First they moved their small sleds over the blocks “and then together with 2 people on one big pulk at a time to get the larger pulks through the maze. We were able to let go of being in a hurry. We put in our time everyday and we do the best we can. We put in our most effort, and we can only go so quickly, so that mindset allowed us to enjoy the experience and we really felt like little kids in some gigantic playground.”
Read more on their website how Tyler explained navigation.
In the latest dispatch John explained about old ice or multi-year ice and new ice or one-year ice. “We're camped right near a whole bunch of new sea ice that is very stable. It looks like it's perfect skiing, like one inch of snow on top of ice, and that hopefully will take us north quite a bit tomorrow. However, it makes for hard camping because we don't have ice screws, we just have snow pegs, and we need a bunch of snow to hold down the tent. We have snow flaps on the side of the tent that hold snow that's secure.”
Stats March 17:
Location: N83° 56.895' W074 10.629'
Time Traveled: 8 hours 30 minutes
Distance Traveled: 6.0 nautical miles
AM Temperature: -36°F/-37.8°C
Wind: ~5 knots out of the SW
clear skies, sunny, good contrast
Unsupported, Assisted
Lonnie Dupre, guide, (USA), Max Chaya (Lebanon) and Stuart Smith (USA)
The guys reported different kinds of terrain, from pans of ice separated by pressure ridges and dense pack, to leads. They were glad to get solid frozen leads running N/NW and were able to make good progress. Lonnie, Stuart and Max broke the 7-mile barrier in one day’s skiing. They saw some polar bear tracks again.
Stuart explained in a voice dispatch that every morning they look outside at the wind, sun/visibility, ice conditions and temperature. He said they can’t do anything about those conditions, but are affected by all of them and have to handle them.
Max said the expedition is as hard if not harder than he anticipated, but he is thankful for our progress and good spirits so far.
Stats Day 15, 18 March:
-39°F to –20°F / -39.4°C to –28.9°C
Position: N84°03’30”, W78°08’05”
Pen Hadow, Ann Daniels and Martin Hartley (UK)
The team is stil waiting for a resupply, because the weather is not good for the support team to fly.
Ann said, ‘’I lie in my sleeping bag and close my eyes but it’s so bitterly cold that I’m always half-awake, shivering. All I can think of is that while I’m lying here we’re constantly drifting southwards. All that effort, day-in, day-out, but when we stop to rest we’re being carried back the way we’ve come and it’s completely beyond our control. It’s soul destroying.’’
Unsupported/Unassisted Magnetic North Pole; 1996 position (78°35'42"N, 104°11'54"W)
Michele Pontrandolfo (Italy)
No new news.
Links to Arctic 2009 expeditions
Unsupported, Unassisted Geographic North Pole
John Huston and Tyler Fish (USA) - Victorinox North Pole '09 Expedition
Unsupported, Assisted Geographic North Pole
Pen Hadow, Ann Daniels and Martin Hartley (UK) – Catlin Arctic Survey Expedition
Lonnie Dupre (USA), Max Chaya (Lebanon) and Stuart Smith (USA) – Peary-Henson Centennial North Pole Expedition 09
Unsupported/Unassisted Magnetic North Pole (1996 position)
Michele Pontrandolfo (Italy)
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