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Two Week Itinerary
for the two weeks
of participation is as follows:
We leave Monday April 13
via JFK and Aeroflot. We arrive in Moscow, (April 14, 8:30 AM) for two days
retrieving balloon equipment from customs. Maybe some touring, too!
Then we would be off to
Siberia, (April 16th) a town named Khatanga, where we would go through
survival training for 2 to 3 days. Supposedly here wildlife and Eskimo
life prevail. Maybe we'll take a sleigh ride or visit an Eskimo village.
From there we would go to Ice Camp
(April 19 through the 22 or
23) which would be located near the
pole. We could be here for up to one week depending on the weather window.
Housing is in the form of double sided tents heated by generators. The
heating system creates a mini weather lesson where it is 30 degrees on the
floor to 5' up and from there to the ceiling it's 85 degrees which creates
thunder storms, or lots of condensation in the middle!
During this time a French ski team
will overnight with us. Scuba diving for the first time will be occurring
more than likely in any weather, skydiving will occur one day.
For the balloonists the best
scenario would be several flights on several days the worst would be one
flight on the best day. Flight lengths would vary according to the weather
window from a half-hour to five hours or more as fuel consumption would
not be an issue. Balloons will be retrieved by helicopter.
Dangers are in equipment and human
failure due to the cold, retrieval and hard landings due to white out
conditions and no reference points, landing in water (the pole is made up
of moving ice, it is not a land mass) not to mention high wind inflation's
on ice! We think we've done our homework and have the solutions to most
dangers.
From the pole we will return to
Moscow (April 24) and an awards dinner ceremony.
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