Big Tom Attempts to Reach North Pole Solo and Unsupported

Rob Howard / 04.03.2010

<i> One of Australia's well known adventure racers, big Tom Smitheringale, who is responsible for creating the Anaconda Adventure Race in Western Australia, has just set off on an epic trip to the North Pole.</i>

Western Australian polar explorer Tom Smitheringale sets off from northern Canada this week full of hope and confidence in his quest to become the third person in history to reach the North Pole solo and unsupported.

Tom is scheduled to depart from McClintock Inlet at the northernmost edge of Canada in the very early hours of Saturday (WST) to trek 800km of frozen Arctic sea on foot, alone, and dragging a 160kg sled, to the North Pole. It will take 70 days in temperatures as low as minus 50 degrees.

To get there, Tom will have to ski, climb, guard against polar bear attack, risk falling through the increasingly thin Arctic ice and swim across leads (breaks in the ice). Five people have tried the same feat in the past five years. All failed and two have died trying. In the history of arctic exploration only two men have ever reached the North Pole solo and unsupported and Tom will be the first Australian ever to make it.

After a spending a month training and acclimatising in Iqaluit, northern Canada, Tom is ready to tackle the extremes of the Arctic on his way to the Pole. He is excited about his impending expedition despite recent news of an unusually high number of breaks and fractures in the ice near his start point. The ice has been broken apart by repeated storms this winter, causing frequent fracturing and the production of open leads and very thin ice.

But Tom remains confident. “I’m feeling better than good about my preparation,” Tom said yesterday from the tiny town of Resolute in the very north of Canada, a four-hour plane ride from his start point at McClintock Inlet. “It has been everything it should have been and there is no shortcut to experience and hard lessons that only come from making your own mistakes. I start with no injuries, no frostbite, in high spirits and with a heart full of hope.”

Previously, Tom has completed two shorter group treks to the North Pole with Norwegian polar legend Borge Ousland, who has been an important mentor to Tom in the lead up to his One Man Epic. Borge has taught Tom all he can but said experience and details you learn along the way cannot be taught. He will be keeping a close eye on Tom’s progress.

“The first two weeks of an expedition like this is normally the hardest, and most difficult,” Borge said. “Very low temperatures, extremely bad pack ice close to land, darkness, and also because it’s a new environment you are not accustomed to yet. “Surviving the first two weeks is critical. I have tried to teach him to always be ahead of yourself. Look for problems before they happen, take action before the problem gets too big. To be solo out there can be very dangerous. You have to turn yourself into an animal, get the old instinct up under your skin and balance between pushing hard to get the distance needed and pull back and say stop when that is needed to be safe.