A treacherous Polar expedition sponsored by a UK fruit entrepreneur is finally underway – despite new worrying climate change warnings.
Last month the £350k North Pole 16 expedition, financed by Midlands’ fruit importer and exporter, Mark Tweddle, of Shropshire’s Jupiter Marketing, was forced to postpone its start date.
The unexpected delay was partly due to Arctic ice levels hitting a record low in January and the team was forced to revise its route.
Now, despite climate change experts revealing February was the hottest month in recorded history, the expedition’s three man team has set off for the freezing Arctic.
Headed up by Coventry explorer Mark Wood, the team will spend a few days on a Norwegian island before being dropped by helicopter at the North Pole to start the expedition, which is being backed by patron Sir Ranulph Fiennes, on April 1.
Although the success of the icy trek, which has been dubbed A Race Against Time, will be dictated by ice conditions, the team is planning to ski 470 miles from the North Pole to the Canadian Arctic Coast recording the impact of global warming on our planet along the way.
The expedition’s main sponsor, father-of-two Mark Tweddle, of Kings Bromley, said he was pleased that North Pole 16, which could be the last expedition of its kind, was finally underway.
But the 38-year-old said: “Obviously the team is heading out on the back of some shocking reports in the media about the temperatures and the conditions of the ice, but like anything, it has to get onto the ground to see for itself.
“Of course we have satellite images to get an idea of the conditions out in the Arctic, but the team’s job as explorers is to go out there and give real and immediate feedback.
“Mark Wood has said to me that all the signs are saying ‘Don’t go’, but he and his two teammates are as determined as ever to go to give real feedback on the true state of play before it’s too late.
“We all feel that the expedition has really become a lot more dangerous and highlighted the impact of what it aims to expose. We remain fully behind the expedition.”
Only a handful of teams in history have covered this new expedition route - and the fastest time has been 38 days.
Although the team is not setting out with the aim to break records, it will have just 35 days to reach its goal, because after May 5 no helicopter will be able to land on the ice to extract them as it will be too thin.
Explorer 49-year-old Mark Wood, who now lives in Stratford, said: “This expedition needed good people, like Mark Tweddle at Jupiter Marketing, to believe in us and what we’re doing to enable us to get to the starting line.
“But now it’s all up to us. Anyone can talk about a good expedition, but going out and executing it, is a different matter.”
He added: “We don’t go to on expeditions to break records, or to be famous, we go because we love exploration.
“If we didn’t have that drive then we would fail, because it’s really difficult when you are out there and it gets tough. It’s then that you really need that passion, drive and determination to get you through the hard times, just like in normal life.”
Earlier this year the team was hit with the devastating blow that expedition patron Lt Col Henry Worsley, a great friend of all three North Pole 16 explorers – the others are Mark Langridge MC and Paul Vicary – had died while trying to cross Antarctica solo.
To keep updated on this incredible expedition follow: twitter.com/Jupiter_Mark1, www.facebook.com/jupitermarketingltd