April 2022 – Volume Twenty-Eight, Number Four
Celebrating our 27th year.
EXPEDITION NEWS, founded in 1994, is the monthly review of significant expeditions, research projects and newsworthy adventures. It is distributed online to media representatives, corporate sponsors, educators, research librarians, explorers, environmentalists, and outdoor enthusiasts. This forum on exploration covers projects that stimulate, motivate and educate.
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Space entrepreneur Dylan Taylor was transformed by space. |
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EXPEDITION NOTES
Transformed by Space
“Space is a tool for transformation and everyone I’ve spoken to who has been there has been transformed by the experience. Having been there myself, I can say it’s true,” says Denver space entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist Dylan Taylor who recently addressed the Rocky Mountain chapter of The Explorers Club.
“I’m here to tell you going to space changes your life.”
Taylor, who like many space enthusiasts was inspired by Star Trek at an early age (see related story), was captivated by the utopian world of space exploration.
Last December, Taylor, then age 51, flew aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket on NS-19 and became the 606th human to enter space and the 592nd human to cross the Karman Line. He told the Explorers Club members, “Space gives us something to aspire to. It’s a new paradigm that inspires us to reimagine the best version of what humanity can be.”
In 2018, when he witnessed the SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch vehicle take off, then land itself upright, “I had to rub my eyes. It was science fiction come alive.”
He said he had been negotiating with his wife, author Gabrielle V. Taylor, to go to space for 10 years (he has been married for 22), and “finally got a hall pass to go on Blue. But she said ‘let’s get the kids through high school before you strap yourself to a rocket.’”
Flying with Michael T. Strahan, an American television personality, journalist, and former professional American football player. The cost of the flight was not divulged; Taylor is honoring Blue Origin’s strict NDA regarding what he paid in an auction for the experience.
He said, “the training was amazing. Getting to know the crew was amazing. It was the best week of my life.”
Taylor, a triathlete in his spare time, is proud he may someday be recognized as an early pioneer of space travel. Meanwhile, he’s chairman and CEO of Voyager Space, a multinational space exploration firm based in Denver. Taylor is also founder of Space for Humanity, a global non-profit dedicated to democratizing access to space. Read his full biography and learn more about his passionate commitment to commercial space travel at www.dylantaylor.org.
Learn about Space for Humanity at:
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Bowers Museum Opens Everest: Ascent to Glory Exhibition
The Bowers Museum’s newest partnership with the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), Everest: Ascent to Glory, combines photographs, films, and artifacts from five expeditions leading up to and including the earliest successful attempt to climb the colossal mountain that the Tibetan people call the “Mother Goddess of the World.” The museum is located in Santa Ana, California.
Now at the centennial of the first reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest (1921-2021), this holistic exhibition curated by Wade Davis, Lynda Thomas Distinguished Lecturer and award-winning author of Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest (Vintage; 2012), explores the history, resolute characters, unsung heroes – including Tibetan and Nepalese Sherpas – and changing technologies of the initial attempts to climb Everest. The exhibition features more than 20 original objects and 60 photographs of the mountain’s illustrious history.
The exhibition continues through August 28, 2022. For more information and to watch Wade Davis’ lecture on his book Into The Silence view:
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QUOTE OF THE MONTH
“I hold that a man should strive to the uttermost for his life’s set prize.”
– Robert Browning (1812-1889), English poet and playwright whose dramatic monologues put him high among the Victorian poets. The quote can be seen on the grave of Sir Ernest Shackleton who is buried at a modest cemetery in Grytviken, a settlement on South Georgia in the South Atlantic. (See related story).
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EXPEDITION FOCUS
EC 50.2 Introduces 50 People Changing the World
The Explorers Club last month announced the winners of its second annual Explorers Club 50: Fifty People Changing the World that the World Needs to Know About.
The Explorers Club 50 was established to reflect the great diversity of individuals on the cutting edge of exploration, and to help amplify the voices of these trailblazers.
Among the many fields covered in the inaugural EC50 class, the honorees have led groundbreaking conservation efforts in Iraq, promoted environmental stewardship to facilitate inter-tribal relations in Africa, produced leading research on orbital debris and space junk, decoded the secrets of Egyptian animal mummies, organized efforts to conserve large parts of the Southern Ocean and Antarctica, and studied the pre-hispanic Maya and contemporary perceptions of self-identity on Maya communities.
As part of this new class, which will continue to transform the composition of The Explorers Club and increase access to explorers from around the world, EC50 winners will receive complimentary Club membership for three years, access to a network of explorers, a notable mention in a new special issue of The Explorers Journal, lecture opportunities and more.
“Lifting these global exploration leaders by naming them to the EC50 shines a bright lite (sic) on them and their great work. Many in the EC50 class of 2021 found their careers uplifted soon after being named and having their work celebrated by TEC,” says Club president Richard Garriott de Cayeux, who adds, “The Explorers Club 50 may well be the most important initiative our club has ever undertaken.”
Read profiles of all the EC 50.2 winners here:
MEDIA MATTERS
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The Endurance22 search team used advanced underwater technology to locate the wreckage of the Endurance – specially built hybrid Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) called Sabertooths fitted with High-Definition cameras and side-scan imaging capability. The Sabertooths can search and map huge patches of the ocean floor to depths of up to 4,000 meters (13,123 feet) sending the data to the surface in real-time.
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Discovery of Shackleton’s Wreck Aided by Technology and Climate Change
On March 5, 1922, the polar explorer Ernest Shackleton was buried in a hillside cemetery on the island of South Georgia, in the frigid far southern reaches of the Atlantic. Recently, a team of marine archaeologists announced that it had located the long-sought wreck of his famous ship, Endurance, a three-masted schooner barque that sank off Antarctica more than a century ago. The ship was found on March 5, 2022 – exactly 100 years after Shackleton was laid to rest, reports Judy Rosen in the March 30 New York Times Magazine.
Rosen adds, “The discovery of the long-lost ship is a reminder of Shackleton’s deeds. It’s also a lesson in how technology is transforming our encounters with the past. …
"The world today is smaller and less mysterious than in Shackleton’s time. Earth’s remotest realms have given up their secrets. … Now, thanks to our conquest of the most distant frontier, outer space, all-seeing satellites provide detailed maps of Antarctica’s ice-sheet moraines, available at the tap of a touch-screen. Journeys once undertaken only by the intrepid – to the depths of the Amazon or the heights of the Himalayas – are on the adventure-tourism circuit.
“Yet we know too much to romanticize the swashbuckling past. The history of exploration, after all, is inseparable from exploitation, the relentless drive of empires and private enterprise to claim territory and expropriate raw materials. These days, a sunken ship inspires not just awe but melancholy, moral unease, even dread.
“The Great White South is thawing out,” Rosen believes. “Once, the ice that covered the Weddell Sea made underwater exploration impractical, but in recent months the thickness of that ice has been at some of the lowest levels ever recorded. The discovery of Endurance was aided by climate change.
“In Shackleton’s time, the hardiest adventurers – those strivers to the uttermost – made journeys to the poles. Now, as glaciers dissolve and sea levels rise, the poles may, in effect, journey to us, swamping our shores,” Rosen writes disheartingly.
Read the story here:
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Petty Officer Edgar Evans was unfairly blamed for the failure of the ill-fated Scott Terra Nova Expedition according to historian Anne Fletcher.
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Historian: R.F. Scott Teammate’s Reputation Restored by Wife
The story of a woman who restored her husband's reputation, after he was blamed for Captain Scott's doomed mission to the South Pole, has been highlighted by a historian, according to the BBC’s Neil Prior.
Most accounts of Scott's ill-fated 1910-1913 Terra Nova Expedition end with his team's death on their return journey. Historian Anne Fletcher has set out to tell the story of the women who were left behind for decades afterwards.
Her book Widows of the Ice, The Women that Scott's Antarctic Expedition Left Behind (Amberley Publishing, August 2022), looks at the life of Lois Evans, who married Petty Officer Edgar Evans (1876-1912), from Middleton, near Swansea, UK. Despite her working class background Lois "stood her ground" and defended her husband to a hostile and patronizing press.
Scott's biographer, Roland Huntford, described Evans as "a huge, bull-necked beefy figure" and a "beery womaniser" who was "running a bit too fat" by the time of Scott's second expedition aboard Terra Nova.
Huntford's account has however been widely discredited in recent years and the Evans family successfully sued him for his comments.
Scott’s five-man team arrived at the South Pole only to find that a Norwegian explorer had got there first. They died on the return. The last entry in Scott's diary was on March 29, 1912.
Read the BBC News story here:
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The Darien Gap poses a major obstacle for record-breaking distance hikers. |
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Longest Possible Walk on Earth
The comic Steven Wright once joked that, “Everywhere is within walking distance if you have the time.”
How true.
Looking for a good hook to snare sponsors? Perhaps a hiking boot or trekking pole company? Consider how far could you can go without crossing any major bodies of water. That’s the question John Arnst tries to answer on Livescience.com (posted January 23, 2022).
The breadth of the continental U.S. (about 2,340 miles at its narrowest), pales in comparison with the length of the Pan-American Highway, a de facto network of roads that stretches nearly 19,000 miles (30,500 km) from Ushuaia, Argentina, to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. While the route, which includes a walk across the Panama Canal via either bridge or lock, is unable to be traversed entirely by car – the roads of Colombia and Panama are separated by a 66-mile (106 km) stretch of dense jungle known as the Darién Gap – it has been completed on foot twice by different adventurers.
The first person to make the trek from Argentina to Alaska was British former sailor George Meegan, who began what would be a multipart, 19,019-mile (30,608 km) walk in 1977, ultimately wrapping it up 2,425 days later in 1983. Holly Harrison, a former U.S. Army Ranger, made the same northbound voyage on foot in 2018, completing a more direct 14,481-mile (23,305 km) walk in just 530 days.
Another contender for the longest possible journey by foot, as plotted by an intrepid Reddit user in mid-2020 with Google Maps – which considers the Darién Gap untraversable – begins in Cape Town, South Africa, and ends 13,735 miles (22,104 km) to the northeast in Magadan, Russia, writes Arnst.
Read more:
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Kai Lightner is a professional rock climber who started climbing at age six and became the Open/Adult Lead Climbing National Champion at age 15. |
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Kai Lightner’s Climbing For Change Announces New Grant Program
Climbing For Change (C4C) has announced a new grant program aimed at creating a more equitable outdoor industry. Founded by professional rock climber Kai Lightner, the organization brings more diversity into the sport of rock climbing and removing barriers. The C4C grant directly addresses the shortcomings of the broader outdoor industry by connecting brands with talented professionals for paid, project-based work.
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"The diversity gap in the outdoor sector is well known," says Lightner. "Company executives have expressed a desire to hire diverse talent but cite difficulty in identifying qualified applicants. I have worked with talented BIPOC individuals that are creators, engineers, programmers ... we have skilled professionals in all fields.”
Lightner developed this grant program to address this need. "We want to connect companies with highly skilled individuals from diverse backgrounds. In doing so, we will be providing grantees with the opportunity to work with national and international brands to showcase their talents, and perhaps open the door for future opportunities.”
One grant, for instance, available on the C4C online portal, is the New River Alliance of Climbers (NRAC), Fayetteville, West Virginia. It will award two $1,800 grants to help BIPOC individuals become AMGA certified Single Pitch Instructors (deadline: May 15, 2022).
EXPEDITION MARKETING
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Tiny Shatner
We weren’t huge Star Trek fans, but can’t help but admire the spunk and nonagenarian drive of 91-year-old actor William Shatner who continues to embrace his base of 2.5 million Twitter followers and 297,000 Instagram fans. He tours the country reminiscing during one-man shows, has a book coming out in October called Boldy Go, sells action figures of himself on a robust e-commerce site at WilliamShatnerStore.com, and, as dedicated EN readers are well-aware, became the oldest man in space after a flight on Blue Origin last October.
Recently, his fans had the opportunity drop $2,250 to pose with him for a 3D scan that was turned into a nine-inch figurine. Those who spent this astronomical amount also received a 3D GIF of the moment, a short video of their interaction with Shatner, two smaller five-inch figurines of the former Starship captain, and his digital signature on all three 3D printed figurines.
The fun happened during SciFi con Star Trek: Mission Chicago 2022, and buyers, called “experience holders,” could appear in any cosplay they wanted, although Shatner was in street clothes. Seems there’s a limit to what he’ll do.
The force behind this money-making scheme is MassPersona, the producer of Minikin, a high-volume 3D color printing factory that produces mass personalized 3D color products or parts.
Learn more and see Shatner’s breathless promo video at:
EXPEDITION INK
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The Hunt for Mount Everest
by Craig Storti
(Nicholas Brealey, 2021)
The height of Mt. Everest was first measured in 1850, but the closest any westerner got to Everest during the next 71 years, until 1921, was 40 miles. The Hunt for Mount Everest tells the story of the 71-year quest to find the world's highest mountain. It's a tale of high drama, of larger-than-life characters – George Everest, Francis Younghusband, George Mallory, Lord Curzon, Edward Whymper – and a few quiet heroes: Alexander Kellas, the 13th Dalai Lama, Charles Bell.
Booklist says, "This book would be enjoyed by those seeking knowledge of Everest beyond the climbing narratives, as well as those who appreciate the details of navigation and exploration."
Climber and historian Ed Webster says, “The definitive book on Mt. Everest’s discovery, naming, and earliest climbing history. Superlative research and captivating reading! A colorfully-cast detective story about the Empire-building British surveyors, explorers, and mountaineers who adamantly believed this newly-crowned Third Pole must be conquered, absolutely without fail, by an Englishman.”
BUZZ WORDS
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Rock face damaged by pitons. |
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Pin Scars
A heinous string of irregular boreholes punched by pitons along climbing routes. In 1972, Yvon Chouinard and his business partner, Tom Frost, opened the Chouinard Equipment catalog with an essay urging readers to stop using pitons. “Mountains are finite,” they wrote about the vertical wilderness, “and despite their massive appearance, they are fragile.”
?They believed that if you couldn’t climb a route under your own power and without harming the rock, then you had no business climbing the route until you could. Clean climbing would replace pitons and other bash-in gear with chocks and hexes, protection easily removed and less damaging to the rock. (Source: Mailee Hung, Patagonia Spring 2022 catalog).
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Screaming Barfies
A strange health condition also known as the “hot aches.” This highly painful sensation occurs when your hands (and sometimes feet) warm up after a period of extreme cold. It’s caused by ischemia or lack of blood flow to the hands due to a combination of body positioning and cold. It most commonly happens to ice climbers. (Source: Josh MacMillan, assistant director of Education at SOLO Schools, as told to Backpacker.com)
EXPEDITION MAILBAG
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Boomerang Bags Spark Memory of 28x Antarctic Veteran
“Just finished reading through the most recent Expedition News. You always find the greatest stuff. Enjoy it a lot. Thanks for putting it together! (See EN, March 2022).
“I especially enjoyed reading about Boomerang bags. I was quite lucky in my 28 trips to the ice. I only had a handful of boomerangs. The longest one was when we were escorting Sir David Attenborough to the ice when he was going down to participate in some of the filming of Frozen Planet. We got almost all the way to McMurdo but had to turn back when the weather wasn't good enough to land. That was a long day!
“Another time I actually had a boomerang from McMurdo. After the plane took off to head back to Christchurch the plane had to turn around because of a mechanical problem. Those are however much rarer than boomerangs from Christchurch.”
– Julie Palais, an American polar glaciologist who has made significant contributions to climate change research by studying volcanic fallout in ice cores from both Greenland and Antarctica.
ON THE HORIZON
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Berkeley’s Himalayan Fair is Back, May 21-22, 2022
Founded in 1983, the Himalayan Fair is an annual celebration of the arts and culture of the Himalayan region and its people. The Fair, back after a three-year hiatus, has grown larger every year offering a rare occasion to experience a unique Himalayan festival without leaving Northern California’s Bay Area. For over three decades the Himalayan Fair has presented a rich mix of crafts, food and entertainment celebrating the people and cultures of the Himalayan region.
Proceeds from the Fair are donated to organizations working to improve education, health and the environment. It was founded in 1983 by Arlene Blum who led the first female expedition up the world’s 10th highest peak – Annapurna in 1978. Location is the City of Berkeley’s Live Oak Park.
For more information:
https://himalayanfair.net
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Travel With Purpose, A Field Guide to Voluntourism (Rowman & Littlefield) by Jeff Blumenfeld – Covid-19 has practically put the brakes on travel, but once we get through the pandemic, travel will come roaring back and so will voluntourism. Be ready to lend a hand wherever you go. How to travel and make a difference while you see the world? Read excerpts and “Look Inside” at: tinyurl.com/voluntourismbook @purpose_book
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Get Sponsored! – Need money for your next project? Read about proven techniques that will help you find both cash and in-kind sponsors. If the trip is bigger than you, and is designed to help others, well, that’s half the game right there. Read Jeff Blumenfeld’s "Get Sponsored: A Funding Guide for Explorers, Adventurers and Would Be World Travelers." (Skyhorse Publishing).
Buy it here:
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EXPEDITION NEWS is published by Blumenfeld and Associates, LLC, 290 Laramie Blvd., Boulder, CO 80304 USA. Tel. 203 326 1200, editor@expeditionnews.com. Editor/publisher: Jeff Blumenfeld. Research editor: Lee Kovel. ©2022 Blumenfeld and Associates, Inc. All rights reserved. ISSN: 1526-8977. Subscriptions: US$36/yr. available by e-mail only. Credit card payments accepted through www.paypal.com. Read EXPEDITION NEWS at www.expeditionnews.com.
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