Far North Science

Credit: Arctic Arc

Two Belgium explorers on a mission to measure snow depths across the Arctic Ocean have launched a grueling 500-mile trek across the ragged, crevassed ice between the North Pole and Greenland.

Alain Hubert and Dixie Dansercoer reached the North Pole on April 24, after traveling on foot from the remote north coast of Siberia almost 578 miles in 54 days. Now they enter the unknown.

Almost no one ventures into this area. In an age when tourists visit the pole itself, and adventurers regularly visit the ice cap north of Alaska and far northern Canada, the shattered floes leading toward the all-but uninhabited corner of Greenland remains Ultima Thule. Untouched and unmeasured.

As the team reported in a May 1 dispatch:

The story on this side of the Pole is different. This is truly the road less travelled. Few have ever attempted this approach to Greenland over the Arctic Ocean. On this ‘Greenland side’ the skiing conditions are far more difficult.

“Before the Pole, there was more chance of encountering hard and relatively flatter ice” explained Alain. “But now there is more than a knee-deep layer of snow on the ice, which forces us to remove our skis and to proceed on foot, as the surface of this snow is frozen into a hard crust and so irregular that it is impossible to use skis”.

Read on » » » »

Crossing a lead
The Arctic Arc

Two Belgium explorers on a mission to measure snow depths across the Arctic Ocean ice pack trudged up to the North Pole on April 24, after traveling on foot from the remote north coast of Siberia almost 578 miles in 54 days, according to a dispatch on the expedition website.

After their final exhausting 13-hour ordeal pulling their sleds through drifts, Alain Hubert and Dixie Dansercoer reached the Earth’s boreal crown at 6:30 p.m. GMT ( 10:30 a.m. in Alaska.)

Since leaving Severnaya Zemlya off Siberia at the end of February, the two men had averaged almost 11 miles per day on the first leg of The Arctic Arc. They now face a 500-mile slog to the coast of Greenland for a second leg.

In the end, if they reach their goal of the southern tip of Greenland in June, they will have traveled on foot an unprecedented 2,700 miles.

Read on » » » »

Caribou along the trail
SnowStar Traverse

The determined explorers of the SnowSTAR 2007: Barrenlands Traverse — now on the 39th day of their 1,800 mile traverse across Alaska and far northern Canada — this weekend reached one of the Far North’s weirdest ecological anomalies: the Thelon Oasis.

It’s a patch of dense spruce forest that has somehow thrived in one of the harshest and most barren habitats on Earth.

“SnowSTAR accomplished a major goal today by reaching the Thelon River, which they will follow all the way to their finish in Baker Lake,” wrote basecamp manager Dave Andersen.

“They are now back in dense spruce trees — the famous Thelon Oasis. These trees will be with them for about the next two or three days and then they will be returned to the rocky and windswept barrenlands.”

Read on » » » »

Treeline near Dease River

On the 25th day of their trek across the tundra of northern Canada, the snow-machining explorers of SnowSTAR 2007: Barrenlands Traverse reached the village of Kugluktuk in western edge of Nunavut, and began preparing for their 20-day crossing of the rocky, windswept Barrenlands, the unforgiving tundra beyond the comfort of spruce.

For the past two days, the guys have been working on their snowmachines, repairing equipment and visiting with high school students in the remote village and talking to local artists. It’s the longest break of their trip so far.

On Day 27, April 11, they expected to launch on the next lonely leg.

Read on » » » »

Deline in winter 2006
Credit: Sahtu Monitoring Project

On the 20th day of their trek across the tundra of northern Canada, those intrepid explorers on the SnowSTAR 2007: Barrenlands Traverse have reached the remote village of Deline and entered the vast frozen expanse of one of the world’s seventh largest freshwater lake.

Great Bear Lake — Canada’s largest lake and North America’s fourth largest — stretches horizon to horizon, appearing as vast as a frozen sea. Natives have long called it Sahtu, a Dene Athabascan name for the North Slavey people who have lived along the lake for thousands of years.

“They will make a major ice crossing (April 5) into the Dease Arm,” reports basecamp manager Dave Andersen, in a new dispatch. “Looking Northeast from their hillside camp to tomorrow’s track, it is Great Bear Lake ice as far as you can see.”

With nightly temperatures often breaking Minus 20 F, the members of the expedition must struggle to make a satellite phone connection to upload their latest dispatches. Imagine the journey the bytes and bits must take — from a camp on Far North late winter tundra, via satellite, to a computer in Fairbanks and then into fiber optic and DSL lines to the world.

Read on » » » »

Far North taiga
Credit: SnowStar 2007

The SnowSTAR 2007: Barrenlands Traverse skirted one of the Far North’s mysteries: The Mad Trapper of Rat River.

In the hard winter of ‘31, Albert Johnson just wanted to be left alone when Royal Canadian Mounted Police visited his shack on the Rat River in the Yukon Territory. But when he refused to answer questions about whether he was vandalizing rival traps, and shot and wounded a Mountie, the Canadian police returned and blew up the cabin with dynamite.

The Mad Trapper of Rat River emerged from a foxhole in the cabin floor with his rifle blazing.

Read on » » » »

Masatoshi Kuriaki on Denali in winter
Credit: Japanese Caribou

A man known as the “Japanese Caribou” for his trans-Alaska treks has become the first person to climb the fourth tallest peak in the United States alone during the winter season.

Masatoshi Kuriaki summited 17,400-foot Mt. Foraker on March 10, completing the first solo winter ascent of the peak, the sixth-highest in North America and widely rated a much more difficult climb than the 20,320-foot Mt. McKinley, only 14 miles to the northeast.

In late January, Kuriaki was dropped off by airplane onto the Kahiltna Glacier, where Foraker rises in a stunning massif that fills the entire western sky. In a dim, wind-scoured glacial basin where the sun never shines in winter, Kuriaki spent weeks ferrying loads through cold snaps and blizzards, gradually working his way up Foraker’s seldom-climbed Southeast Ridge.

Read on » » » »

It’s 1978. Two windburned mushers paused on the Iditarod Trail just outside Nome, their beards crusted with ice, their bodies aching from 1,000 miles of trail. Both had reputations as tough mushers, ruthlessly competitive men capable of seizing any advantage. As they squinted through the predawn darkness, mutual distrust hung between them as thick as the blowing snow.

One was Rick Swenson, who would go on to win the race five times, still unmatched to this day. The other was wily Dick Mackey, one of the race’s founding fathers.

As he urged his dogs forward, Swenson shouted back at Mackey: “We’ve got first and second sewn up. Just stay right where you are!”

Mackey thought to himself: “Like hell.”

Another Mackey has made history. In a feat most considered impossible to achieve and foolhardy to try, Lance Mackey just drove a team of dogs to the championship of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race only 12 days after the same animals won the Yukon Quest.

Read on » » » »