Transglobal expedition

In the winter of 1972, Ginny Fiennes proposed to her husband, the captain of the territorial army, Ranulf Twistleton-Wyckham-Fiennes, the idea of traveling around the world around the poles. After the end of the army contract in 1968, the former tanker had an expedition to the origins of the White Nile on the ship and the Justedalsbreen glacier. Having worked on the project by the summer, he presented it to the Foreign Office , but they categorically refused to deal with private expeditions to the poles. The favorable attitude of the ministry to the undertaking was extremely important, since without it it was impossible to get help at the Antarctic stations . The next few years, Fiennes spent on the fight against the obstacles of Foreign Ministry officials. Despite his noble birth, his financial situation was poor, while the expedition required several million pounds . Fiennes received a significant part of the equipment and food supplies from sponsoring companies who wanted to advertise and test their products in critical conditions. By the beginning of the expedition, more than 700 of such sponsors had gathered.

At first, only Ranulf and his wife, the colonel of the Special Air Service, allocated premises for them in the barracks for an office. As people approached the campaign’s start date, there was a need for people, for starters Ranulf selected four of the 120 volunteers who responded to the announcement: Fines fellow Oliver Shepard, Jeff Newman, Charles Burton and Mary Gibbs. With two of the three men, Fiennes was about to go all the way, the third and Mary were to join Ginny in the expedition office. Like Ranulf, the men were enrolled in the SAS territorial service, Ginny was listed in the communications department, Mary in the military hospital. No one received a salary, each earned extra money; for example, Shepard and Burton worked as bartenders in a nearby pub. Fiennes soon decided that Shepard would definitely go to the poles with him in the role of mechanic, he also underwent a course of medical training, including dental.

Fiennes consulted a lot with eminent British polar explorers, including Vivian Fuchs , since he considered the analysis of the Transantarctic expedition especially useful for his undertaking. All polar explorers advised Fiennes to use dog teams , not snowmobiles , since the former did not break in the cold and had increased cross-country ability. However, after learning that you needed to learn at least a year to manage a team, Ranulf decided to use snowmobiles. He opted for an Austrian snowcat upgraded by British Steel scientists with an alloy they wanted to test at critically low temperatures. None of the expedition members participated in the polar campaigns, and after numerous trainings in the Cambrian mountains, they received permission from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to train in Greenland . The British Air Force agreed to transfer there the cargo of the expedition, but not the participants themselves. The US Air Force attache at the Embassy in London, Colonel Paul Clark, provided them with an airplane for a flight to Greenland for $ 2,000; By the beginning of the Transglobal Transition, Clark quit his job to get a job as a simple sailor on an expedition ship.

In July 1976, six expedition members made their way to Greenland, where the three made 2 trips inland; in the second, Burton replaced Newman. Even following the results of these trainings, Fiennes was not able to finally dwell on the candidacy of the third member of the expedition. He was pleased that, unlike himself, the other three participants worked well in the team, and it didn’t occur to any of them to block against the boss, although conflicts quickly sparked during the polar campaigns; as a therapy, the participants “reprimanded” their diaries. On both hikes, Fiennes went skiing ahead, followed by snowcats. In the second campaign, both cars hovered on the edge of the canyon, and the polar explorers released them from captivity for two days using shovels. Returning to his homeland, Fiennes decided to replace the snowcat, which did not bite into the ice and walked in a skid. He opted for the Ski-Doo of the Canadian Bombardier with Rotax air-cooled engines of 640 cubic centimeters.

Fiennes decided that the second polar training should be the achievement of the North Pole , which would attract sponsors and have mercy on the government. After long negotiations, Canadians were allowed to use the premises in Alert as a base; participants and goods were delivered there for free by Scandinavian Airlines System , whose management liked the coincidence of SAS abbreviations; the equipment remaining in Greenland, also with diplomatic delays, was transferred from Thule to Alert. February 26, 1977 Fiennes, Shepord, Newman and Burton went to the pole. The winter of that year turned out to be abnormally cold, the temperature soon dropped below −50 ° Celsius: Ski-do refused to start, and Newman froze his fingers. The polar explorers turned back to build an engine heating system in Alert. When they went north again on March 10, Newman was no longer with them. Later, he still worked in the office for some time, then left his comrades, like Mary Gibbs, who married him shortly after the Transglobal transition began.

Three polar explorers continued to endure an unprecedented cold, because of it the frequency of ice crests of compression turned out to be much higher than they expected: work for the ice ax was increased, and the speed of advancement decreased; often the road had to be cut only to the west or east with minimal approach to the north. The engine factory continued to be a problem, so the participants in the campaign tried to ride them as long as possible. Fiennes, left alone after his retirement in his tent, suffered a sharp eye pain, and almost burned himself in this state; he had to move into a tent with the rest of the polar explorers. During the trip, the participants for three lost 19 fillings, which blamed the chocolate bars. After the cold weather an extremely early warming set in, pack ice began to crack. April 4, Fiennes went on reconnaissance and fell through the ice. Hardly drowning, he considered it a miracle that later the consequences of hypothermia in water did not appear. The polar explorers continued to move forward until on May 7 at a latitude of 87 ° 11'30 "they reached a porridge-like surface, which did not allow them to move further. For 9 days they waited for colds, after which they called for the evacuation of" De Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter ". Despite the setback, Fiennes was pleased with the trek that allowed polar explorers to become familiar with both temperature extremes.

The expedition to the pole really had a beneficial effect on the public; the transglobal transition was taken under the care of Prince Charles . Fiennes recruited several new volunteers. Engineer Simon Grimes took Mary's place in the office; being a Quaker , he refused to join the SAS combat units, and was sent to training in the parachute airborne health regiment. Poole Anderson, a 21-year-old cadet of the Danish Maritime School, along with Suffolkans Anton Bowring and Mick Hart, began searching for a vessel for further purchase with a budget of £ 350,000. In addition to a cheap icebreaker, Fiennes intended to purchase a Twin Otter, which would deliver fuel and food by parachute. At the end of 1977, it became clear that unsolved problems postpone the start date of the expedition from September 1, 1978 by at least a year. Friction continued with British officials, without whose approval the South African base SANAE I, the American Amundsen-Scott and the New Zealand Scott-Base did not want to help. Fiennes continued to maintain relations with the Sultan of Oman , on the side of which he had once fought. With his help, the expedition received a sponsor from among British companies operating in Oman, who bought a supported Twin Otter for polar explorers. Former Air Force pilot Ant Preston was involved in the expedition on the organizational side of the flight business. Experienced Antarctic pilot Gilles Kershaw agreed to pilot the aircraft.

A few months before the departure, scheduled for September 2, 1979, the expedition still did not have a ship, since the budget for it was clearly underestimated. Cronyism came to the rescue: Anton Bowring was the son of the chairman of the largest British ship insurer K. T. Bowring. " The Bowring family prided themselves on providing Captain Scott with the Terra Nova bark and decided to sponsor the ship for the Transglobal Transition. Anton found a 27-year-old carrier of lead ore, fortified to work in the Northwest Passage , with a displacement of 1,100 tons and an engine capacity of 1,200 horsepower. Its cost was 2 times higher than the funds allocated by the Boring, but the partner “K. T. Bowring " Marsh & McLennan Companies " as a gesture of friendship; the ship was named "Benjamin Bowring." Volunteers from the merchant fleet were recruited to the team, and Rear Admiral Otto Steiner agreed to become captain of the vessel without a salary. At the same time, several people agreed to work in the office of the expedition. During work on the ship, Anderson had a heart attack , and a week later he died.

Back in 1975, Fiennes agreed with Imperial Chemical Industries on the free supply of all the necessary expedition fuel, but its amount was calculated on a significantly smaller ship than Benjamin Bowring, and the company refused to supply. Other British oil companies also refused help, and Fiennes was forced to turn to the Prince of Wales. He brought him in with Armand Hammer , chairman of Occidental Petroleum . His company was not involved in retail deliveries, but he persuaded Mobil to sponsor a fuel expedition. Fiennes finally managed to get the approval of the British Antarctic Service , Vivian Fuchs drew up a plan for the scientific research of the expedition, mainly glaciological and magnetic observations. He also managed to negotiate with the South African government to supply fuel to SANAE, but the US government refused to help. The expedition needed dozens of barrels of fuel at the South Pole, which could be distinguished from the reserve by American polar explorers. It was decided to hit the road with the intention of agreeing on the receipt of this fuel directly with the polar explorers.

Start South

September 2, 1979, Prince Charles announced at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich about the beginning of the expedition. On August 27, his uncle, Lord Mountbatten , was killed, and the prince canceled his participation in all events except the start of the Transglobal transition. "Benjamin Bowring" walked along the Thames to Tilbury , where he landed the expedition members, since officials had not yet received permission to go to sea. Ranulf and Ginny Fiennes, Shepard, Burton and Grimes loaded their two Land Rover SUVs and one Range Rover ferry to Dunkirk , from where they left for Paris . In Montmartre, they held the first of the exhibitions of Arctic equipment and equipment planned in large cities on the route, repelling sponsorship investments. As it turned out later, it turned out to be the most unsuccessful: there were extremely few visitors, and some of the exhibits disappeared. Most of the travelers moved south to Barcelona , and Burton left with the administrator girl of one of the sponsors in Saint-Tropez , upon his return from whom he announced the upcoming wedding in Sydney . In the capital of Catalonia, cars were loaded onto the Benjamin Bowring, which went to the port of Algeria . Fiennes learned of Rear Admiral’s dissatisfaction with the discipline on board the ship, as well as the lack of funding for ship repairs; as a result, the conflicts were settled.

From Algeria, the same team continued their journey on off-road vehicles to Abidjan as they crossed France. The expedition members crossed West Africa along the route Algeria - El Golea - Ain Salah - Tamanrasset - Gao - Tombouctou - Markala - Abidjan. Fiennes had a minimal amount of money with him, and paid the local population for food and food for the guides with barter , mostly canned tomatoes. Travelers suffered from the usual troubles for Africa - heat and insects. As a scientific work, they caught and embalmed rare animals. On November 20, the Benjamin Bowring, with travelers aboard, left Abidjan in the direction of Cape Town . The waves tipped the old ship to 37 degrees, the engines hardly developed the required power. On December 8, the Bowring landed in Cape Town, where Ranulf Fiennes grew up. There they were joined by Anton Birkbek, who was to winter on an auxiliary base along with Grimes. On December 22, the ship left Keptown for SANAE, first reaching the roaring forties . The ship tilted at 47 degrees, and the team was seized with some fear: even Anton Bowring, who chose it, believed that he could sink. On December 28, ice floes first met at 50 ° south latitude, soon Benjamin Bowring had to push through pack ice with its weight.

Antarctica

Wintering

On January 4, 1980, the ship reached coastal open water, then entered the ice bay of Polarbjornbukhta at SANAE. Immediately began round-the-clock unloading. Soon an expedition plane flew in, upgraded with retractable skis and six 340-liter fuel tanks. He transferred 45 tons of cargo 500 kilometers to the south, where, near Mount Rivingen at an altitude of 1800 meters, Fiennes set up a winter base for himself, his wife, Shepard and Burton. Several corrugated cardboard huts were built there. On January 17, Benjamin Bowring sailed to Africa, leaving, apart from the wintering men, Rivingen, Birkbeck and Grimes, for whom a hut was collected at the expedition's warehouse at SANAE. In early February, with the change of SANAE polar explorers, a South African ship arrived, bringing Fiennes' expeditions the remaining 600 200-liter barrels of fuel to the 900 that were brought by the Bowring. On January 21, Fiennes, Shepord, and Burton set off for Ski Doo with loaded sledges at Rivingen Base. The 600-kilometer track became a dress rehearsal of the main campaign. The heaviest site was the edge zone at the junction of floating ice and the ice sheet, where Fiennes stupidly nearly fell into one of the many cracks several tens of meters deep. On February 10, Kershaw's plane made the last of 80 cargo flights, and left the couple of Fiennes, Shepard, Burton, and Bosie's Yorkshire Terrier alone with each other and on a polar night .

The residential hut was demarcated by two bulkheads: in the middle room there was an exit to the street, in the other two pairs Faines and Burton-Shepard friends lived. Soon, Ranulf noticed the breakdown of the sleds, which Ski-do had to tow in the campaign; breakdowns were caused by participation in the unloading of the vessel and still had to be repaired. Polar explorers moved only between huts and warehouses, in the fall Ranulf decided to arrange for men an eight-kilometer ski run, which ended in frostbite. At the same time, the crew of “Benjamin Bowring” was exhausted from the heat on charter flights in Polynesia , which earned money for the expedition. Ginny spent a lot of time in the "radio hut", where she took part in wave experiments along with polar stations, and also maintained contact with the outside world. Shepard hosted a hut with a generator; she and Ginny were more likely to suffer from toxic fumes and burns. Shepard argued with his wife many times about his stay on the expedition, but this time she got to the hospital because of her worries, and he was forced to give her word to leave her comrades after crossing the Antarctic. Predictably over time, the relationship of polar explorers with each other deteriorated, the same problem overtook Birkbek and Grimes in their warehouse. Closer to spring, radio experiments became more intense, Ginny began to suffer from hallucinations. In early October, her husband, an acrophobe, decided to conquer Rivingen Peak, but several attempts to climb did not bring success. Shortly before reaching the pole, a radiogram came from Walter Herbert , where he brought astrological information: people fall into one of three categories depending on the position of the Sun at birth, and of the thirty leading polar explorers, only two represented the same category as Fiennes - Losers Scott and Cook .

Crossing the Continent

On the evening of October 29, at −50 ° Fiennes, Shepard and Burton set off on a hike to the pole. Each rode on Ski Do, towing metal sledges, Fiennes also dragged wooden sledges. He rode first, a distance of about a mile between the polar explorers. Every 10 hours tired travelers pitched a tent, where they fell asleep. They consumed 6,500 kilocalories per day, eating a stew of rice and soybeans . As a result of the campaign, each of them lost weight, more than the other Shepard - 12 kilograms. The first days the path went uphill, the expedition members climbed the plateau. Ski-do with difficulty, but still cope with the rise, and at a considerable height, contrary to fear, the engines worked fine. During the day, the Sun shone extremely brightly, and the polar explorers preferred to move “at night,” when the non-passing sun no longer threatened their eyes with injuries. The day after the release, Burton broke his glasses, after which his vision began to deteriorate; Shepard was terribly cold, and travelers were forced to set up camp much earlier. Fatigue and cold never disappeared, and the polar explorers tried not to pay attention to them. Fiennes constantly rushed his comrades, he wanted to not only cross 3,500 kilometers of the continent in those 4 months in which it was possible, but also to go through the snowy bridges through the cracks before the sun melts them. The sounds of ice explosions, when new cracks formed, scared polar explorers. On October 31, the drive axle broke on Ski Do Fiennes. Shepard had a spare axis, but the polar explorers decided to call Kershaw's plane, which delivered a spare Ski do Fiennes. Kershaw and his navigator James Nicholson were forced to work without interruptions, first transferring cargo from SANAE to Rivingen, and then delivering gas to the three polar explorers. Those at each camp built snow pyramids that were supposed to serve as a guide for the aircraft, since the radio navigation system in these latitudes no longer worked.

Soon, although the ice fog at times did not even allow to determine the location of the sun, the clouds completely disappeared. This enabled Fiennes to craft a solar compass by scratching the front of his snowmobile for this. This method of positioning was the most efficient, saving time. Each degree of latitude Shepard drilled ice to take a sample at a depth of two meters. Then he melted the ice and poured water into bottles, later transferred to scientists. They wanted to know what was happening faster in Antarctica - snow accumulation or ice leak. Over the first 10 days, 822 kilometers were covered, the speed of advance was 2 times higher than planned, but the main obstacles were ahead. On November 9, a latitude of 80 ° was reached, where the aircraft was soon to be relocated; another "air base" was planned at a latitude of 85 °. Birkbek relocated along with the aircraft, in warehouses in conditions of poor visibility, he and the lantern served as a beacon for Kershaw. 13 kilograms of jet fuel was spent on the transportation of one kilogram of cargo, and, according to calculations, its supplies were short-lived, and in the case of force majeure of the polar explorers and subsequent "extra" flights, the expedition was in danger. A radiogram came from London that the Americans refused to provide fuel from the reserves of the base at the pole, and also promised to forcefully evacuate the British from the continent if they did not provide themselves with supplies by the time they arrived at the pole. The polar explorers had to spend 17 days in the camp at a latitude of 80 °, waiting for Kershaw to collect extended communications. On the same day that the expedition members continued on their way, a message came that the Americans would nevertheless supply them with 23 barrels of jet fuel at the pole.

Polyarnikov was waiting for an area with many cracks where a person’s foot had not yet set foot. However, zastrugi with a height of half a meter posed a much bigger problem, and the speed of advancement fell to a minimum. The ridges were broken by ice axes, however, and then the snowmobiles climbed with difficulty. The sleds were attached to Ski-do with a three-meter cable, the polar explorers were also tied to the sleds in order to be saved if the snowmobile fell into the crack. With the beginning of the shelling, the cables had to be replaced with a meter and a half, and the polar explorers lost their insurance, since in this case the sled would fly into the abyss along with snowmobiles. Участников экспедиции также беспокоило состояние металлических нарт, у которых постоянно ломались вертикальные подпорки. 4 декабря окончательно прохудились деревянные нарты Файнса, и их пришлось бросить вместе с частью груза. Экономя авиатопливо, Ранульф собирался вызвать самолёт только по достижении 85°, в то время как медленное продвижения через заструги приводило к многочисленным поломкам, и запасных части вскоре не хватило. 5 декабря за 50 километров до искомой широты поломка лыжи снегохода вынудила вызвать самолёт и разбить лагерь. Вскоре прилетел Кершоу с половиной необходимого для продолжения движения бензина, однако его второго прилёта пришлось ждать дольше из-за катастрофической ситуации с южноафриканцами.

30 ноября 9 южноафриканских геологов выехали из своей полевой базы на трёх тракторах назад в SANAE, располагавшийся в 100 километрах от них. Один из тракторов провалился в трещину, его экипаж из трёх человек остался жив и решил пересесть на три Ски-ду, чтобы по хорошей погоде добраться до базы налегке, без еды и палаток. Из шестерых оставшихся один вскоре погиб, упав в трещину; по радио им передали о пропаже тройки на Ски-ду, которая уже должна была попасть в SANAE. Начальник экспедиции, опытный полярник, остававшийся на одном из двух тракторов, отправился на Ски-ду на поиски, и также заблудился и потерял радиосвязь. Самолёт экспедиции Файнса находился в тысяче с лишним километров от места пропажи южноафриканцев, однако он был в разы ближе остальных воздушных судов, « Геркулесов » с Мак-Мердо , которым ещё предстояло заняться эвакуацией погибших пассажиров самолёта, врезавшегося в Эребус . Кершоу получил приказ оставаться на широте 80° для возможного участия в поисках. Затем ему дали добро на вылет, однако портативный генератор остался на 85°, и самолёт с трудом удалось завести. Поздним вечером 6 декабря он привёз топливо Файнсу, затем отправился на полюс для дозаправки. Оттуда самолёт вызвали на поиски, и Кершоу удалось спасти сначала оголодавшую тройку на Ски-ду, а затем и начальника экспедиции. Эти действия проходили при значительном риске опустения топливных баков и потери самолёта.

7 декабря Файнс, Шепард и Бёртон отправились к полюсу, и после двух дней работы ледорубами вышли из района трещин и заструг на 85°30'. Нарты Шепарда давно сломались, и были заменены привезёнными на самолёте деревянными, двое оставшихся саней могли развалиться до полюса. Последние 4 градуса преодолевались в сплошном тумане; достигнув района полюса, полярники не могли отыскать станцию. Утром 15 декабря, после радиопереговоров с американцами, британцы добрались до Южного полюса. Они разбили две палатки в 100 метрах от купола, однако питались у американцев. Джинни и Граймс упаковали имущество лагеря в Ривингене, оно было перевезено самолётом в SANAE, там погружено на южноафриканское судно, и в итоге добралось до Лондона, где стало ждать арктического похода. Кершоу, Николсон и Биркбек без приглашения прилетели с алкоголем на Новолазаревскую . После пьянки, где начальник станции сообщил британцам, что они стали первыми гражданами западного лагеря, посетившими Новолазаревскую, Николсона под руки занесли в самолёт. Джинни вместе с радиооборудованием была доставлена самолётом на полюс, Биркбек вместе с имуществом с SANAE отправился на родину.

23 декабря Файнс, Шепард и Бёртон выступили к Скотт-Бейс . Файнс ещё не настроился на походный дух, и повёл товарищей к SANAE. Поняв ошибку, он решил сделать вид, что так и задумано, из-за чего пришлось делать крюк вокруг станции. Путь полярников лежал к леднику Росса через ледник Скотта . Всю дорогу до побережья им приходилось преодолевать множественные трещины различных размеров. Часто снежные мостики обрушивались, и полярники постоянно находились в страхе. Порой трещины создавали перед ними лабиринты, в которых британцы опасались не найти выходов. Высота поверхности понижалась, но спуски не облегчали задачу, так как повышался риск падения в трещину. С подходом к Трансантарктическим горам полярники старались продвигаться по склонам гор, так как там меньше трещин. Страх подгонял Файнса, и, как и в походе на полюс, его экспедиция продвигалась значительно быстрее плана. 1 января 1981 года полярники вышли на ледник Росса, и отправились напрямик к Скотт-Бейс . Ещё в последних числах декабря туда перебазировались самолёт и Джинни. Температура воздуха поднялась выше 0°, единственной помехой был плотный туман, мешавший Кершоу вовремя доставить бензин. 10 января, в двух часах езды от Скотт-Бейс, на Ски-ду Бёртона сломался двигатель, и полярники наконец воспользовались запасным, который везли через весь континент. На следующий день новозеландские полярники встретили Трансглобальную экспедицию, которой пришли поздравительные телеграммы от принца Чарльза и президента США Рейгана .

Тихий океан

Арктика

Return

• Official site

• Файнс, Ранульф . Вокруг света по меридиану. — М.: Прогресс, 1992. — 304 с. — ISBN 5-01-002747-x