GE and Doug Stoup
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I wrote about young Parker Liautaud over at TreeHugger back in March. On March 31, 15 year old Parker Liautaud attempted to be one of the youngest kids ever to ski the Last Degree of the North Pole. While a 12 year old and 14 year old did ski the last 51 km leg of the journey with their parents in 2007, Liautaud would go the full 110 km accompanied by only a guide. Liautaud decided to attempt the expedition in an effort to inform his generation of change makers about the Arctic's changing landscape. He trained vigorously in preparation for the journey, working extra hard to add weight to his teenage frame. He gained 17 pounds for the expedition with strength training that consisted of wearing a 25 pound weighted vest while dragging a weighted sled around a track in his native England. I recently chatted with Liautaud after he arrived back from the North Pole.
Planet Green: Why are you interested in the Polar Regions in particular?
Parker Liautaud: I first became interested in bringing awareness to the Polar Regions when I went on an expedition a few years ago to the Antarctic with an organization called 2041. While I was on the expedition I saw dead whales floating in the ocean because they had starved to death. They couldn't find enough food to eat. When I returned from the trip I felt a certain responsibility to do what I could about it. Not many people have an opportunity to see the Polar Regions and witness the change going on. I don't claim to be a climate scientist but I know what I saw.
PG: How did you get the funding for such a journey?
PL: I just basically emailed a bunch of companies and told them my story. I knew it was a long shot considering that I'm just a kid out of the blue emailing these large corporations. I sought out GE's ecomagination for sponsorship. GE said yes to sponsoring my expedition because I fit well into their ecomagination initiatives. They paid for my trip.
PG: Who was your guide?
PL: My guide was Doug Stoup and he had done the voyage seven times before. I felt confident that I would be safe.
PG: What scared you the most about the trip?
PL: I was most concerned about staying focused. You can get caught up in the repetition of it and lose focus for a moment and then everything can change. I lost focus once when I was pulling Doug's kayak out of the water and I fell in. It's hard to stay completely mindful when you're physically exerting yourself that much.
PG: What was it like once you got there?
PL: I couldn't believe the amount of open waters. It looked more like the open water with sporadic ice rather than the opposite. You could feel the ice moving beneath you. Doug was also surprised by the state of the Arctic even compared to a few years prior. He had never seen such heavy ice drift.
In the past few years less and less teams have successfully been able to make it across because of the warmer temperatures. There just isn't a way to get there. There were days that were very warm, where the temperature got up to 30 degrees. Usually when huge plates of ice separate the water between them freezes, but this time the weather was just too warm.
PG: When did you know you weren't going to be able to make it?
PL: We did everything that we could to make it but the heavy drifts and endless open waters made it impossible to ski across. The final straw was an 8 mile stretch of open water with no freezing in between. We had to get picked up in a helicopter. The Arctic natives were likely the most shocked of anyone. They had never seen anything like this weather. The normally snow capped mountains were bare. From the air I could see that we would never have made it. There were endless breaks beyond this one that would have made it impossible.
PG: Were you disappointed?
PL: I was, but I knew we had done everything we could.
PG: At 15, where do you go from here?
PL: I want to continue to focus on the Polar Regions. I can't decide in school whether to focus on environmental issues within the business world or whether to study the science of climate change. I'll also be inviting teens to submit YouTube video pledges on how they're reducing their carbon footprint and how they want the world's governments to do the same. Videos can be submitted on The Last Degree Facebook Page and winners will be viewed at the next UN Climate Summit.
More on the Arctic:
Russia to Clean Abandoned Barrels of Oil from Arctic
We Need New Rules Limiting a Little in the Arctic, To Save a Lot: WWF
What's it Like Living on a Sea of Ice? Arctic Surveyors Speak (Slideshow)
