PoleTrack

North Pole Expedition archived log

Here you can follow Tjalling Halbertsma, Frank Werst, Edwin Klaver, Marius Brinkhorst, Rupert Goodwin, Bart Reefman, Farzad  Khaleghi Yazdi en expedition leader Marc Cornelissen as they make their way across the arctic ocean from 89° North to the Geographic North Pole.

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Latest news

During the expedition, the team will call in via satellite phone on a regular basis and we will post the latest news here. Short updates will also be posted on twitter .

12-04-2010 Expedition photos

As promised, the first photos from the expedition are in (click on the photos below to see larger versions). This gives you a little glipse of the different types of terrain and weather you can encounter in the arctic.

If you would like to experience an expedition like this for yourself, feel free to have a look at the other expedition options on the PoleTrack website .

11-04-2010 Celebrations in Spitsbergen

As expected, the team is safely back in Spitsbergen at the moment, where they just enjoyed a well earned celebratory meal, probably accompanied by a celebratory beverage or two. From here they will make their way back home to the Netherlands and the UK respectively.

Spitsbergen (archive photo)

Below is a special message from the whole team for everyone who followed the expedition via this site and via Twitter. Unfortunately the message cuts off after 3 minutes, but everyone managed to get in a few words nonetheless. Tomorrow morning we'll probably be able to share some photos photos from the expedition.

10-04-2010 Back to Barneo

News just came in that the expedition team was picked up by helicopter today. Before returning to Barneo ice base (see photo below) the helicopter pilots made a brief detour towards the north, so that the Pole Track team could actually enjoy a short visit to the northernmost point on earth after all.

Barneo ice base - source: www.barneo.ru

This was a great reward for all the efforts of the past week, during which the expedition covered a lot of distance, but continuously had to fight the ice drift, which was pushing them in exactly the wrong direction. Tjalling Halbertsma reports from the ice:

It is to be expected that the expedition team will fly back to the relative civilization of Spitsbergen tomorrow. Once they arrive there, they will be able to upload some photos, so make sure to check this site in the next few days.

09-04-2010 Never a dull moment

Yesterday was another eventfull day for our expedition team. In keeping with the tradition of the past couple of days, the fairly good result of 14km of skiing resulted in getting only 7km closer to the pole due to the continuing ice drift.

Strong winds and relatively high temperatures create a lot of open water at the in the north pole area at the moment, which can make the terrain quite challenging. Marius Brinkhorst called in to tell us about yesterdays adventures, with the "highlight" of the day being him falling halfway into an open lead:

The team is in good spirit and probably will be picked up by helicopter today (Friday).

In other north-pole related news: yesterday the European Space Agence (ESA) successfully launced a satellite called Cryosat-2 that will be able to measure ice thickness and snow cover of the polar ice caps. Our expedition team is actually conducting some measurements that will help scientists to verify the data from this satellite, contributing to a better understanding of the changes that are happening in the arctic. The image below shows Cryosat-2 scanning the ice with radar signals.

Cryosat-2 - Image by ESA / AOES Medialab

08-04-2010 Going backwards

If you look at the map at the top of this page you would be forgiven for thinking that our polar explorers have lost all sense of direction. In reality they're actually working very hard to get closer to the north pole, but are having trouble keeping up with the motion of the ice in the opposite direction.

In addition, they lost half a day yesterday due to whiteout conditions, high winds and driving snow, all the while drifting southeast with the ice. After a little telephone conference with Barneo ice base, it was decided that the expedition will try to get moving again today. At the end of the day, the will be picked up by helicopter and, after a brief visit to the north pole, return to Barneo.

Rupert Goodwin reports from the arctic ice with a typically British sense of humor :-)

07-04-2010 Open water

Arctic lead (archive photo)

After an early start yesterday, the Pole Track team initially made some good progress across an area of very smooth ice. Later during the day however, they hit upon some leads. These are areas of open water, caused by the wind tearing apart the ice sheet. Attempts to find a way to walk around the leads were not successful, so they decided to set up camp and wait for the water to freeze over during the night. Tjalling Halbertsma called in to tell the story in his own words:

The expedition is still around 50km removed from the north pole at this moment, with another 3 to 4 days left to cover that distance.

06-04-2010 Drifting ice

The expedition's progress yesterday was somewhat hindered by the fact that they are experiencing some ice drift towards the south-east at the moment. The ice cap never stays in one place for very long. Different parts move in different directions all the time, similar to the motion of continents floating on the earth's liquid interior. The ice can move significantly faster though, and not always in the direction you want to go in. As a result, as soon as you stand still, you might actually be moving away from your destination, in this case from the north pole.

Pressure rigde (archive photo)

In addition, the moving sections of the ice cap can bump into each other. When this happens, big chunks of ice are piled up on top of each other, forming a pressure ridge similar to the one in the archive photo above.

The team had to cross one of those areas yesterday, and below you can hear Frank Werst describing the whole experience using some very interesting Dutch metaphors.

05-04-2010 21:00h A special message from Rupert

We just received this (somewhat delayed) voicemail update from Rupert Goodwin with a very special message for his son Max:

Rupert actually recorded this message on Sunday, but it must have gotten a bit lost in cyberspace somehow. At the same time, an even more delayed message came in from Tjalling Halbertsma, recorded on the first day of the expedition, with some interesting first impressions of life on the arctic ice cap.

05-04-2010 Good progress, not so good weather

Yesterday the PoleTrack team made excellent progess and managed to get 18km closer to the north pole. That means they have now covered about a third of the distance to the pole, as you can see on the map at the top of this page. The wind has picked up however, and the weather is getting more challenging.

03-04-2010 21:00h A productive day on the ice cap

Edwin Klaver called in tonight via satellite phone. Despite a somewhat slow start this morning, the team managed to cover a respectable 15km today. The temperature today was -31˚C, but because there was not much wind, it was tolerable. Setting up camp went very quickly, after which the daily routine of melting snow and preparing dinner commences. Also, some of the team members performed some scientific measurements that help scientists better understand the dynamics of the polar ice cap.

Listen to Edwin's message below.

If you're in the Netherlands and you would like to read some more background information, check out the article that was published about the expedition today (Saturday) in the Financieele Dagblad .

03-04-2010 On the ice!

After landing at the Barneo ice base on the arctic ice cap, the expedition team was dropped off by helicopter yesterday at the actual starting point of the expedition: 89˚N - 120˚E, exactly 1 degree of latitude from the north pole, a distance of around 110km. The helicopter drop off was necessary because the ice base is built on the drifting polar ice, and had moved a significant distance towards the pole, much closer than the intended starting point.

After being dropped of the team started skiing right away in order to make good use of the first expedition day. Weather conditions are good. The temperature is a decidedly crisp -28˚C, with blue skies and a light wind. Around this time of year, the sun doesn't set and there's daylight 24 hous/day.

02-04-2010 - Preparations in Longyearbyen

At the moment the expedition team is in Longyearbyen, Spitsbergen, preparing for departure to the actic ice cap this afternoon. If everything goes according to plan, they should arrive on the ice cap around 13:30CET. Stay tuned for more updates...