FinalAnnReport 2004 _artwork - Hugha.co.uk

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SVALBARD 2004 Chief Leader: John Ramwell BACKGROUND Svalbard is Europe's northernmost territory, an archipelago lying between latitudes 74N and 81N, and less than 700 miles from the North Pole. Spitsbergen is the largest of the four main islands and it was here that the expedition took place. A recce was carried out by the Chief Leader and Fieldwork Leader Dave Youren in the summer of 2003, and a base-camp site was selected on a rocky scree platform at the base of the Von Post Breen glacier. This would give us ready access to mountains, glaciers and high snow-covered plateaus. Being on the coast of Templefjorden we would also have boat access from Longyearbyen, some 60 km away. THE EXPEDITION After over a year of preparations we all met up at Terminal 3, Heathrow Airport, at 1330 hours on Friday 16th July 2004. The journey to Longyearbyen was uneventful and we arrived in broad daylight at 0100 hours on 17th July to be met by the Advance Party (led by our doctor, Martin Spurling) who had arrived a week earlier and who now escorted us to the tents they had erected for us on a site by the airport. We had four fires: Glacial Hydrology, Geomorphology, Meteorology and Perception, each led by a Mountain Leader and a Fieldwork Leader. With each fire consisting of 12 Young Explorers and two leaders, and with a Basecamp contingent of Chief Leader, Deputy Chief Leader, Doctor, Base Camp Manager and Boat Handler we had an expedition of 61. The morning was spent organizing the charter boat so it would take us all out in one trip that evening rather than in two trips as had been planned. The rest of the day was used to move all food and equipment from the container to the Lang Oysund’s jetty, with the help of a car kindly lent by local resident Edwin Bailey and with a borrowed trailer. Once the Lang Oysund had berthed and disembarked BSES EXPEDITIONS | ANNUAL REPORT 2004 SVALBARD NORWAY its tourist passengers we loaded her and went aboard, accompanied by a dog we SVALBARD had borrowed which was to be our polar bear alarm dog. We left at 2000 hours. By 0300 hrs on our second day we were safely ensconced at our Base-camp. 16 Our first task was to move all the equipment from the landing site across to our Base-camp site and assemble it ready for distribution. Our Base-camp proved ideal. To the north was the Tunabreen glacier, actively calving huge chunks of ice into the water below. To the east was the Von Postbreen glacier, of which there is little left but a thin coating of ice. Behind us to the south was Noisdalen, a range of mountains, and to our west Sassenfjordan and the sea route to Longyearbyen. Our prompt arrival allowed us immediately to commence our training programme. We established four workshops or training stations: one on radio communications, one on medical/hygiene aspects, one on fire-arms training and one on mountaineering skills and safety. Svalbard’s Governor and his officers were very supportive during the planning and we were pleased to greet his senior colleagues as they paid us an unannounced visit during our training phase. They wished to check our safety and hygiene arrangements, which they found satisfactory. We subsequently ensured that we ‘left only footprints and took only photographs’. Once the training phase was completed the four Fires prepared themselves for departure from Base-camp into the "wild beyond". We staggered our departures, one of the fires leaving by water aboard our two inflatable Zodiacs. These vessels proved invaluable on the expedition, not just for logistical reasons but since they were an important safety factor in the event a casevac became necessary. An account of the mountaineering and scientific activity of each fire will be described in the full post-Expedition report currently being prepared. Suffice to say that each of them made the maximum use of the area as they ranged far and wide. Under these circumstances the radio contact between Base-camp and each fire, established each morning and evening, were an essential safety factor and they worked exceedingly well under the various meteorogical conditions we experienced. Perhaps we should give some credit to the Base-camp aerial which would have done justice to Houston Space Centre!
Tunabreen glacier The mountaineering activities were led by Philip West. Here is a brief extract from Philip’s report on his work with Geomorphology Fire. "Our intention had been to make an adventurous journey and to take advantage of whatever the area had to offer for exploration. Although the mountain Panoramaberget was only 18 km from BC, the journey was challenging in terms of both terrain and weather/visibility. Fourteen individuals with varying levels of experience of living outdoors quickly gelled into a team, and I was pleased to see the high morale and the enthusiasm that continued throughout the period, in spite of sometimes adverse conditions and resulting frustration. Naturally, mistakes were made and lessons learned but we were a happy fire, and the drama of the stunning views that we saw, albeit briefly, was the icing on the cake. Thanks, guys!’" I was enthusiastic for at least one fire to undertake the walk out from Base-camp to Longyearbyen, and so I was pleased that Perception Fire were determined to give it a go. The major obstacle was the river which runs through Sassendalen. There were two ways to circumnavigate this; one was to trek well inland, and the other was to portage using the Zodiacs. We opted for the latter, but even so the group had some tricky moments as they crossed one of the other rivers on the route. One of our major concerns at Base-camp was the ice-floes as they moved across the bay. The glacier opposite our camp was particularly active and with the wind in a certain direction the entire length of the shore at Base-camp would become clogged with huge ice-floes. Several times we had a real challenge in getting the Zodiacs into open water. Consequently I decided to move our Base-camp several kilometres west to escape the ice and ensure the charter boat, the Lang Oysund, would be able to retrieve us all at the end of the expedition. SAFETY The risk-assessment study we did before the expedition proved to be relevant and complete. Expeditions necessarily involve some risks and although we Loading equipment onto the Lang Oysund Establishing Base Camp SVALBARD | 2004 ‘manage’ them we do not preclude them. An expedition without risk is one without any adventurous element. We were fortunate in that we had an adventure-packed expedition, but without incident. Keith Maslen, our Deputy Chief Leader, had also agreed to be our Safety Officer and several times his wise counsel prevailed. This almost certainly contributed to our doctor remaining largely unemployed (apart, that is, from his other self-appointed job of repairing stoves). One useful exercise that he and I undertook early in the expedition when all the fires had deserted us, involved working our way through various ‘what-if’ scenarios in order to reinforce our contingency plans. A major concern was the possibility of a close encounter with the local Polar Bears. The closest we came to one, however, was finding a large and fairly fresh footprint. At night we surrounded Base-camp with trip wires and miniexplosives, and carried rifles and flares, and on occasions we even mounted a night-time bear-watch. By the end of the expedition we concluded that the trip wire was of limited use. On waking we found on more than one occasion that the explosives had gone off, but we had failed to hear them for the noise of the wind flapping our tents. We could have been devoured as we slept! Finally on the matter of preventing bear-attacks I should mention our ‘bear dogs’. Before leaving Longyearbyen we were offered a couple of dogs in return for feeding them. Meteorological Fire opted to take one along with them and though it was great having it around as a pet, I have yet to be persuaded that it was an effective deterrent against bears. Then again it was never really tested. FIELD WORK PROJECTS At the time of writing the fieldwork results are still being worked up. I am able to report, however, that the field work was completed successfully and ranged from geomorphology projects under Dave Youren, to recording data on the 17
Page 1 and 2: BSES EXPEDITIONS 2004 ANNUAL REPORT
Page 3 and 4: I am pleased to report that the num
Page 5 and 6: BSES EXPEDITIONS OFFICERS AND COUNC
Page 7 and 8: major risks. A review of potential
Page 9 and 10: Statement by the Trustees The summa
Page 11 and 12: En route to snow and ice training I
Page 13 and 14: TANZANIA 2004 The Mountain of God E
Page 15: Survey Fire on the rim of a sunken
Page 19 and 20: THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING, EXPEDIT
Page 21 and 22: Maurice Dybeck asked why the expedi
Page 23 and 24: STAR SCHOOLS 2004 Schools from whic

FinalAnnReport 2004 _artwork - Hugha.co.uk

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