‘A Passage Through Ice’ Sailing Expedition has just completed the crossing of the infamous M’Clure strait in the Canadian Arctic to become the first sailboat ever to achieve this feat. The international expedition team consisting of Edvin Buregren, Nicolas Peissel and Morgan Peissel have spent the last three months at sea on a 31 foot boat sailing from Newfoundland Canada to Greenland, through the Canadian Arctic to track the depleting polar ice cap and bring awareness to climate change.
“The Arctic is melting at an alarming rate and is clear proof of our disharmony with the planet. By sailing this newly opened route we hope that our expedition will play a small part in bringing further attention to climate change and contributing to a larger shift in attitudes. Our approach to sail across a historical stretch of water that has traditionally been frozen is meant to be a clear visual example of the extent of declining polar ice.”
We will continue to track the polar ice cap towards the Bering strait where we will head into the Pacific Ocean to complete the most Northern Northwest passage ever accomplished by a sailboat.
We have spent the last few days crossing Viscount Melville sound from south to north in order to avoid the ice and to reach our waypoint in the far west of the Parry Channel. This point marks a crossroad where we will have to make the difficult decision whether to go through the not yet opened McClure or our backup route though Prince of Wales strait.
A thick omnipresent fog has been making navigation complicated and the cold has made us spend almost all our time off watch in our sleeping bags. We notice that the summer is coming to an end and while we are enjoying beautiful misty sunrises we are concerned about the combination of ice and darker nights. We are constantly in contact with our advisors to discuss our route and there has been a lot of speculation and discussion on whether McClure will open up or not.
Last night the wind picked up to around 30 knots and we were battling some three to four meter breaking waves throughout the night in constant outlook trying to distinguish white caps from ice. Cold and soaking wet we returned one by one from our three hour watches until the wind died down and the fog settled in again.
This morning we finally got the report we had been waiting for! A narrow channel had opened up along the northern coast of Banks Island that may make passage of the McClure strait possible. Heavy 9/10th ice has been moving in and out of this coast for a while. The weather forecast shows winds from the SouthWest until Wednesday which means that the ice will be pushed off the coast until then. This gives us a window of just 36 hours attempt to go through. There is a lot of excitement onboard mixed with caution in our approach and we are thrilled about this chance to attempt to cross the infamous McClure strait.
Returning back to Resolute from the heart of Parry Channel to monitor ice and weather conditions for a better window to attempt McClure strait was a tough decision. However, after several days in Resolute experiencing the local culture, making necessary repairs and watching how the ice changed we were certain it was the right one.
For days a strong wind howled from the East shaking us up at anchor in Resolute bay but also shifting the ice to the West of us. After nearly a week we finally received the cloud free satellite image we hoped for and the weather report we wanted, so early Friday morning we lifted our anchors and set sail back into Parry Channel towards Banks Island and McClure strait.
While sea ice concentration in the Arctic is well below average what ice is sticking around tends to be heavy multiyear ice pushed into the newly opened waters from the northern polar ice cap. These large pieces of ice on their own are of little worry to navigation but when picked up by the currents and influenced by the winds they tend to congregate at certain key areas in the Arctic and create impassable clog points…one of these being McClure strait.
Reaching our staging point in Banks island from Resolute will be difficult as few have achieved this without ice breaking capacity. From there it will be a matter of waiting for favourable conditions to open the clog point before we attempt the passage.
At the moment we are back in Parry Channel amongst the ice close to the point where we turned around last time to head back to Resolute bringing back memories of the difficult decision we had to make. If we only knew the kindness of all the people in Resolute that received us in their homes and shared their way of life with us it would have been a simpler decision.
On our return to Resolute we experienced some equipment failure that we needed to deal with before heading back out into Arctic waters. So while we sailed through the stiff winds of Parry Channel we began to organize the complicated task of having a package shipped up to the Arctic in any reasonable sort of time. A solid logistics chain would be paramount in making sure we would not be delayed in our time sensitive expedition.
Even with the advent of satellite phone and email onboard we found that organizing a complicated parts order and shipping to this remote part of the world just wasn’t possible, but after a few calls we had the most amazing team working tirelessly to research and bring us the needed equipment.
After localising the part Edvin’s father, Lars, drove across Sweden to pick up and deliver the parts to FedEx’s international terminal who would send it to Nicks father in Montreal, Bernard, who would then drive to Ottawa where a good Pilot friend of ours would ensure the shipment to Resolute via his airline. It was a solid three day plan which in it self is amazing regarding that the normal shipping alternatives would take over 1 week. We where thrilled over the generosity of our friends and family as well as the beautiful logistics chain they had put together.
In spite of all this effort we where saddened when we learned that the package did not arrive this morning because FedEx had lost it and had no record of it. So the wheels where set in motion again and this time the parts were localized in Canada and it is now on its way to Montreal again. While we intended on staying here for several days to wait for the ice conditions to change these added shipment days are concerning. We need to be able to make it out of Resolute at any time and are worried about the consequences if we can not.
We pushed southwest under sail and engine along our trajectory between “Death star” and the land fast ice of Prince of Wales Island. Random growlers and floes were getting more and more frequent, and after a days sail we saw nothing but ice on the horizon. There was no way around it so we headed for a small opening just south of our route. It brought us in to an incredible landscape of dense multiyear ice with enormous floating islands of ice. With concentrations between 2 – 6/10th of ice it was hard to find passages that did not lead us to far astray and there was constant concern about what would happen if “Death Star” would push and compress the ice around us. On the other hand it was the most amazing experience to sail into and though this moving ice archipelago and we could see several seals and polar bears sleeping on the ice and slipping into the water when the boat got to close. Every second hour we had radio contact with Nick’s father Bernard to get updates on the ice situation and we were relived to hear that “Death star” had changed its course and was drifting east and out of our path. We also learned that Canadian Ice service now issued daily ice charts for the area and we would not have to rely on satellite information anymore.
After 36 hours we reached open water again and headed for Melville Island to await an opening in the McClure straight. A few hours later we received two very unsettling reports; the first one was a gale warning which is unpleasant in any ice concentration. The other one came from the Ice expert Peter Semiuktuk who told us that heavy ice was being pushed into Viscount Melville Sound from the McClure straight, as well from the northern channels and perhaps even the south. This ice had the capability of rapidly filling up our entire area and the report was confirmed by Nick’s father who had been in direct contact with Canadian Ice Services and they all urged us to leave the area the same way we came immediately. So with ice possibly closing in on all three directions and with an escape route that was closing behind us we began to feel the claustrophobia creeping in.
Using the building wind we turned 180 degrees and hauled back towards the ice and safe harbour. Hour by hour we reduced sail until we where on our third reef and less than half the jib. When we reached the dense ice again it had changed structure. There was a compact white wall from north to south and there seemed to be openings. We ran parallel to it for distances up to 6 miles to find a narrow passage that lead into open water. This pattern repeated itself and we sailed though more than 30 of these long streaks of ice with water in between them. We had seen this pattern of ice on the satellite images before but from above it looks just like fractals or streaks of cream dissolving in a coffee cup. On several occasions we felt trapped in this maze of ice but there was always small opening to be found, sometimes less than 8 meters wide and we squeezed though without starting the engine having lots of fun with the close manoeuvres. As I write we have cleared the ice and are on route back to Resolute where we will wait hoping for another opening before the ice settles in the Parry channel.
