"Tara" Yacht Scientific Expedition:
Stuck In the Ice and Drift to North Pole
Six Frenchmen and two Russians decided to repeat a feat of the polar explorer and pathbreaker Fridjof Nansena who 120 years ago floated on a yacht from Norway to North Pole and wintered in the Arctic ice. Their yacht stuck in the ice but they plan to reach the North Pole on drifting ice.
"Tara" is following
"Captain Dranitsyn".
Photo by R. Besonnov |
Research crew.
Photo by R. Besonnov |
"Tara" Yacht
This yacht is the largest in the world. The special aluminium design developed by the French ship builders caves under the pressure of ice and pushes the yacht out on a surface of an ice floe.
One of the meanings of the word " Tara " is «the house you always come back» (do you remember the patrimonial house of «Gone with the Wind» Scarlet O'Hara?). Now " Tara " becomes house for unique expedition to North Pole for the nearest two years.
"Tara" has already gone through some expeditions: to Antarctica and Arctic regions, including Spitsbergen, Greenland and Russian Polar; but none of them was so long.
For the first time the yacht was launched in France in 1985. In the Maori language, the native language of New Zealand aboriginals, the word " Tara " means «snow mountain». Right after that the yacht was bought by New Zealand seafarer Peter Blejk. 15 years ago he was killed by pirates in Amazonia .
Years later the French paleontologist Bernard Buigues has persuaded his friend, the businessman Etienne Bourgois, to buy " Tara " from new zealanders specially for this drift. So "Tara" returned to France .
Bernard and Etien kept the idea to navigate on a yacht to North Pole for 18 years! Why did the expedition begin now? 2007-2008 are declared by UNESCO the year of Arctic regions; the project "Tara-Arctic" has the international support. Moreover, the project unites 53 scientific institutes of the European Union, the USA and Russia . Also it is included into the program of preservation of the environment of the United Nations. The president of France Jacque Chiraque, the ministries of ecology, transport, external relations of France look after this project.
The Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) is one of the official partners of the project.
Lorient - Murmansk - Tiksi - the Ice Floe. The Following Station is the North Pole
On July 11, 2006 "Tara" left the French city of Lorient . On August 5 the yacht was in Murmansk where the Russian border was opened to travelers. On August 15 seafarers came in Tiksi. " Tara " has left the Yakutian port only on September 1, with a delay. As the crew gathered in neutral waters it was necessary to open portable point of the boundary and customs control in Tiksi specially for the Frenchmen. Frontier guards arrived quickly and the customs officer came one day later.
The next day in Tiksi the weather was terrible. In result the Murmansk ice breaker "Captain Dranitsyn" waited for " Tara " on an ice floe for five day! The freight of the ice breaker for one day costs about $45,000, but it's not the main point. «Dranitsyn» was to go in the following freight, so the project could have been delayed for one year, if the customs officer came later for one day - " Tara " simply would have had no time to reach the Pakov ice before winter. And, as the ice breaker hurried up, " Tara " stuck practically to the first decent ice floe.
On September 18, after 17 days of drift on the ice floe, the part of participants of expedition departed therefrom on the helicopter. Among them Bernard, Etien and the Yakut woman Larisa Semyonova, the coordinator of the aviation part of the project. The second Yakut, who stepped into an ice floe, was photographer Ruslan Bessonov.
Drift passed with undue incident: water filters were hammered, the drain ceased to work. Also it came out that the Frenchmen took on a yacht a full set of tablewares, aromatic candles, but no small basin, buckets, nor normal knife (only the dining ones).
Why Do They Need Arctic Regions?
«The planet is in danger. I worry about the future of the descendants,» tells Etienne Bourgois. He is a father of six children, younger from which was 4 days when the yacht came in Tiksi. The purpose of the project is studying of global climatic changes or global warming. The basic research program will begin in April when scientists will arrive to " Tara ". They will carry out the constant monitoring of the ice condition, ocean, and atmosphere.
49% of ice have thawn in Arctic regions since 1979. The scientists foresee that in 70 years polar bears will die out.
The Ideologist of the Project
Bernard Buigues is the paleontologist, the polar explorer in soul and the adventurer in the best sense of this word. He is the expert of mammoth fauna, he lived in Khatanga , where Zharkov's mammoth was found and the museum was based for 15 years. Bernard was the initiator of the ice air station Barneo creation, the unique official Russian way to North Pole (before Tara-Arctic expedition). Our correspondent managed to talk to Bernard in Yakutsk where he came from neutral waters, having left the crew for long wintering.
- Now we should conclude the contract with the Ministry of Extreme Situations to think over a technical part of the second stage, all unforeseen situations. We have a lot of things to discuss. I've got a big responsibility, we left people in the open ocean.
- Do you keep connection with the crew?
- Yes, we do. And the truth is that the news is not so good. In area of drift there is a snowstorm, 40 units. Around the vessel is water, an ice floe where the tents are burst. Guys had to move everything out, rescuing fuel, products. We set tents as a spare variant for residing if suddenly something would happen with a yacht. But it is an extreme case and I believe that guys would not leave the yacht. " Tara " is the cutting-edge vessel, equipped with up-to-date technical achievements of mankind: the Internet, a satellite communication, devices for processing water, etc. On a vessel there are 10 tons of foodstuff, 50 tons of solar oil. All stocks of fish and meat were prepared in Tiksi. In fact the crew has no opportunity to hunt there. But they can meet polar bears there, two dogs will protect them from invasion. We brought the adult Yakut leather Zagri, it's 9 years old, and we were presented the puppy in settlement. We named it Tiksi.
- How many persons left there on the yacht?
- There are 8. The youngest is 22 years old, the middle age of the crew is 30 years. The chief of our expedition is Grant Redvers, he is from New Zealand . There also are 2 members of drifting crew from Russia and 5 citizens of France . I can see this ice floe where they stand and wave to us their hands. It's so gard, my heart is bleeding. How are they? And the filters are hammered; now for household needs they take snow and kindle it. When we were there, the temperature was from 0 up to -10, inside a yacht it was +18.
- Is the crew well prepared?
- They are skilled climbers, guides, instructors of a polar extreme, the Arctic logistics. Though the local inhabitants were much in doubt with our clothes – we have only 1 fur cap, there are no high fur boots. But the crew has the special clothes adapted to climbers.
- Will you arrive her one more time?
- I will be here in October. How can I leave the friends in the middle of ice? I will depart to them from Tiksi. Though it will be difficult, we have the impression about the Arctic weather. We waited for the helicopter for several days. This helicopter should have taken us away from the ice floe. We even had to use "shamanism" for gleam to appear. And right after the helicopter took us away the weather changed, the snow tumbled down.
- What did you do on the ice floe for all this time?
- We equipped, prepared for two 20x30 meters platforms for the helicopter landing. The complexity was the summer ice condition that we had to press. The summer ice thickness is only 40 centimeters , then 60 centimeters of water, and then there is an old, dense 150 centimeters layer of ice. Usually in April or May the ice comes off, and if there is a crack on one strip, we have another one in 4- 5 kilometers from the basic. The strip length is 800- 1000 meters . It is necessary for An-26 or An-74 planes landing. In our case the difficulty is that it is necessary to refuel the helicopters or planes so they could take away the drifting crew. The maximal range of flight of the helicopter makes 500 kilometers and what if people are in 1500 kilometers ? How many bases they need for refueling the helicopter? And for the plane landing the strip and the sanction to acceptance of air station is necessary. It is a big problem to leave fuel in three places by plane on platforms and it is rather too expensive and hard to make it with helicopters. Even in September it was dangerous to fly because of low overcast, an icing. The weather changed every 15 minutes, for 12 hours of flight we could see only the water and no horizon. I would like to express my admiration with pilots of “Polar Airlines”. They flew in such conditions… They are super experts.
- Where did you study Russian? Your Russian is very good.
- I didn't study it anywhere. I have a lot of friends, colleagues from Russia . I studied language on the streets… just like a dog (laughing).
- Good luck and success to your crew! I am sure that Yakutia will keep up with your wintering.
Reported by Irina EFIMOVA,
Interviewed by Xenia EVEREST.
Photo by Roman Bessonov.
Resource: Yakutsk Vechernij Weekly Newspaper .
Translated by
Nurgunstan Novopriezhy,
Yakutsk State University student |
