5000 KMS OF POLAR PLATEAU TRAVELLING

Transcription

1 5000 KMS OF POLAR PLATEAU TRAVELLING First Greenland s Icecap circumnavigation km of polar plateau travelling, the longest Greenland expedition ever. An innovative, sustainable, low operating cost and global impact project. Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail Muriel Strode

2 100% ECOLOGIC VEHICLE First zero emission vehicle in history to travel over the icecap surfaces Thanks to state of the art giant kites the vehicle uses only the wind to transport people, load and scientific material. It can reach up to 40km/h speeds in favorable wind conditions. It is an ecologic, simple and reliable system that has been designed to explore and survey remote and unknown areas in Greenland and Antartica icecaps interior. It has been thought as a green alternative mean for fuel-burning conventional convoys, which are expensive, polluting and logistically complicated.

3 POSSIBLE ROUTE Longest possible route over Greenland s Icecap A unique expedition over the biggest Island of the world, on the coldest place in the Arctic circle km around the gigantic Greenland s glaciar, with no support at all. Thanks to the Windsled a group of polar explorers and technicians may attempt this ambitious project hard to be done in total autonomy by other means.

4 ABOUT US Ramón Larramendi Polar Explorer and leader of numerous epic expeditions for more than 30 years. He was part of the first Spanish expeditions to Greenland, to Magnetic North Pole and Geographic North Pole. He travelled for 3 years on the Circumpolar Expedition: km on dog sledge and kayak, from South Greenland to Alaska. He learned the Inuit language, their ancient knowledge and philosophy on Polar Travelling. He has solved the old wish of polar explorers of sailing over the ice by developing the Windsled, and for his achievement he has led an International group of experts and technicians that has accumulated 4 Greenland crossings and 2 Antartic crossings. Almost km covered over the icecaps. He currently runs in Greenland a Polar Travel agency, the Inuit WindSled project and the Inuit Enviromental Patrol.

5 INUIT WINDSLED PROJECT The International Inuit WindSled Project has 14 years of history It pursues to help on the logistics for surveying and monitoring the study of Climate change on Polar Regions. The philosophy of the project joins the Inuit way of life of simplicity and reliability together with nowadays technology and scientific commitment. The project has raised to give simple and eco-friendly alternatives for conventional fuel-burning logistics when travelling on remote Greenland and Antartica s interior. The Windsled may transport up to 2 tonnes of personnel and material over unknown remote territories hard to reach by other means, at a low operating cost and with zero impact to environment. It has a a great potential for exploration, transport and most of all for scientific surveying by setting a nonpollutant lab over the Windsled.

6 WINDSLED EXPEDITIONS Transantartic Greenland has been the testing ground for developing the Windsled. Almost 6.000km over the inland ice to engineer an idea into a real vehicle that was ready to try a bigger challenge: the East Antartica. 2000: first 600km covered by a simple sled probed that the concept worked. Many difficulties related to the kite s strength gave hard experiences on the ice: the Windsled kites needed to be reinforced from that time on. 2001: a first South-North traverse with an more developed windsled. Sailing with stormy weather led to set up a new record of distance covered in 24h over Greenland's icecap: more that 400km; it was big step forward on Windsled driving technique. 2002: a second South-North traverse was needed to secure knowledge and improve techniques. The Windsled design was getting better in efficiency and reliability. 2003: an East West traverse was needed to sail the Windsled in unfavourable wind directions. It crossed the Greenland icecap Dome where the wind is weak, and it developed the technique to move almost 90º off the surface wind.

7 WINDSLED EXPEDITIONS Transantartic The Windsled passes its litmus test with the hard Transantartcic Expedition , where Antartica's ice cap showed its differences compared with Greenland s ice cap. It succeeded in covering 4.500km along the coldest place on Earth: East Antartica. The expedition achieved many positive results: it was the first one to reach the Inaccessibility Pole; the first time that a non pollutant vehicle sailed Antartica s interior, it was the longest and fastest autonomous expedition by that time and it set a new record in distance covered in 24h. This expedition fulfilled the geographic and exploring challenge of crossing East Antartica and opened a new phase on the Windsled project, which started to focus on developing a green-convoy as an alternative of a fuel-burning convoy.

8 WINDSLED EXPEDITIONS Acciona Windpowered Antarctica A leading company on renewable energy: Acciona, sponsored the Windsled project so to be the first zero emission vehicle to reach the South Pole. The expedition was planned to match up with 100th anniversary of the first human to reach the south Pole. The Windsled set up scientific data collection for 3 different projects and carry one scientific person within the team. It increased the payload of the Windsled, it improved the comfort of the living module and made for the first time a separate module for the personel controlling the kites.

9 MEDIA TV, Documentaries, Press INFORME SEMANAL (TVE) AL FILO DE LO IMPOSIBLE (TVE) EL ESCARABAJO VERDE (TVE) EL MUNDO MUY INTERESANTE GEO

10 PEOPLE HAVE SAID Peter Clarksson (Ex Directir of SCAR; Scott Polar Insitute, UK): We might be at the threshold of a new scientific era for exploring and monitoring the Antartic Interior. Pío Cabanillas (Marketing and Communication Director of ACCIONA co.): A unique project that allows to travel the Antartic Interior by zero emission. It is worth to follow it. Noboday has done any thing similiar to it!. Juan José Dañobeitia (Director of UTM, Spanish Antartic bases logistics): The Windlsed will help to dimisnish the environmental impact that the Scientific work has in Antartica continent.