JOIN US ON OUR VOYAGE - AND LET'S SEE WHAT WE CAN DISCOVER TOGETHER ...
Arctic Mission is asking for YOUR support to fund (and share with your friends on your social media) our work exploring, discovering and revealing the AMAZING ecosystem and wildlife 'up there', upon which we depend more than many of us realise.
Wildlife?! Seriously? Up there? Yes, orca aka (killer whale), all-white beluga whale, dark-skinned polar bear, bearded seal, narwhal (the original unicorn), Greenland shark (that live to 450 years old), King Eider (once producers of eider-down for bedding), and Arctic cod, and that's just the more famous ones. Marine animals go right down in size from the fish and squid to the single-cell plant life-forms which create 50% of our atmosphere's oxygen!
And why the urgency to think about protection? Because we are now all faced with a stark choice:
Protect all this wildlife ASAP ... Or They May Soon Be Lost to Us, Accidentally-on Purpose!
Even this summer commercial fishing fleets may start exploiting this area for money, and governments for power.
To advance scientific understanding of these possible threats to the region, and start a global public awareness campaign about the issues, British polar explorer, Pen Hadow, is setting sail this summer on a pioneering voyage towards the North Pole; and he and his team would like YOUR help to make this ambitious voyage as successful as possible.
Changes in the Arctic's climate and ocean have recently caused a massive loss of summer sea-ice cover, leaving the region's wildlife (once protected by the natural barrier created by the sea ice) now vulnerable to exploitation (commercial fishing), disruption (commercial shipping and tourism) and pollution (fishing, shipping and mining).
As many polar species are exceptionally slow to reproduce, grow and mature (e.g. the Greenland shark may not reach breeding age until its 250 years old), the North Pole's wildlife is at much higher risk of long-term damage than most other marine ecosystems.
A VOYAGE TO PROTECT ALL OUR FUTURES
Known as Arctic Mission, in early August (2017), Pen and his specialist team will embark on their 3,500-mile voyage of exploration, explanation and protection - hopefully with YOU virtually onboard with us.
For six weeks we’ll be far out to sea, surveying the unexplored international waters of the Central Arctic Ocean around the North Pole. In so doing we may reach further North than any previous vessel under sail.
In our two 50-foot yachts we will be demonstrating to a global audience just how much open water there already is up there, where there used to be only sea ice. Up to 40% has been open water in recent summers (i.e. almost no sea ice), and it may be 50-60% ice-free this summer, looking at this year's satellite images. And if we can sail about in our small yachts, imagine what damage the much bigger, stronger commercial fishing vessels could do any time soon.
The other part of Arctic Mission's work is to reveal just how abundant the marine life is around the North Pole. We all know about the polar bears, and maybe the seals, but did you know about the zooplankton (animals that drift with the ocean currents) and phytoplankton (plants that drift ...), and then there's the extraordinary Arctic fox (that scavenges for polar bear kills hundreds of miles out to sea, but can't swim)?
And don't even get Pen started on marine microbes, of which up to x1,000,000 individuals live in every cubic millimetre of seawater - and between them they release more oxygen than rain-forests into the atmosphere - in fact half the oxygen in every breathe you take is produced by these tiny guys!
![]()
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN UNEXPLORED WATERS
While breaking sailing records can make the news headlines, the main purpose of the expedition is far more important: to undertake the urgent and essential scientific research and information gathering that policy-makers MUST have, so that they can work out how best to protect this ecosystem. The region being so unexplored is therefore a problem! No one knows enough about it to know how best to protect it!
So our voyage's scientific work will be focused on:
- Showing how melting sea ice is exposing vulnerable marine life to the immediate threat of irreversible exploitation and destruction.
- Communicating with the public in real time to promote the function and value of the Arctic Ocean’s unique ecosystem.
- Recording as many forms of marine life as possible including polar bear, whale, and seal, shark, birds, other fish, zooplankton, phytoplankton and those awesome microbes!
- Studying the characteristics of the ocean’s waters looking at sea-ice cover, temperature, salinity, currents and nutrients ... and taking air, ice and water samples for pollutant analysis.
PEN HADOW - OUR EXPEDITION LEADER
![]()
Pen Hadow, one of Britain’s foremost explorers, has been launching expeditions onto the Arctic's sea ice for more than 25 years. What started out as a series of fear-conquering adventures swiftly evolved into a pioneering polar guide service, which included organising the first all-woman expedition to the North Pole (1997). Most recently his work led to the running of a programme of scientific exploration across the Arctic Ocean. And all of this has now led to him embarking on his rest-of-life mission: to protect the North Pole's now-vulnerable wildlife .
Previously, Pen led the £6.5m multi award-winning, international research programme, Catlin Arctic Survey (2008-2012) investigating the rates, causes and impacts of the Arctic Ocean’s rapidly melting sea ice. These Surveys secured £90m worth of news coverage worldwide about the issues relating to sea-ice loss and included TV documentaries on CNN, BBC and Channel 4.
Pen is the first person ever to have made it solo, without resupply, from Canada to the North Geographic Pole (2003) - a feat that has never been repeated; and is the first Briton to have reached both the North and South Geographic Poles (without resupply) from their respective continental coastlines.
He has written books, including the best-seller, Solo: Alone & Unsupported to the North Pole (Michael Joseph/Penguin); self-filmed, The Hardest Way to the North Pole (TV documentary, National Geographic); presented a literary series on BBC Radio 4 around Jules Vernon's works; and contributed to numerous TV documentaries and books about adventure and exploration.
He is patron of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, British Exploring, and the Scientific Exploration Society, and has Honorary Doctorates from the University of Exeter (Laws) and University of Plymouth (Science).
ARCTIC MISSION'S EXPEDITION TEAM
Joining Pen Hadow onboard the expedition are:
Scientist - Tim Gordon
Doctor - Nick Carter
Journalist - Laura Hampton
Photographer - Conor McDonnell
Film-maker - Tegid Cartwright
Skippers & mates - Erik de Jong, Krystina Scheller, Frances Brann & Jaap van Rijckevorsel
SO WHY GET INVOLVED?
As you can begin to see, Arctic Mission is not a small undertaking. The expedition is ambitious, hazardous and expensive, but Pen and his team see the greater purpose of their work and believe that it's necessary to maximise the possibility of the best protection for the North Pole's wildlife.
We’re looking to raise £25,000 through the awesome things we have for sale in the PERKS section on this Indiegogo site. All the money raised here will go towards the delivery of the expedition and the projects it supports (e.g. school resources). The expedition's costs include:
- Yacht charter
- Medical and yacht insurance
- Scientific research
- Professional fees
- Foods & consumables
- Travel arrangements
- Equipment & samples freight
- Medical resources
- Satellite communications
- Specialist equipment
- London HQ support
ARCTIC MISSION IS ONLY THE BEGINNING
Arctic Mission is the first and essential initiative in Pen’s broader plan to protect permanently the waters around the North Pole from commercial fishing, shipping and mineral extraction. Something he can do with your help.
THANK YOU
Whatever you'd like to contribute to this Arctic Mission will be gratefully received by Pen and his team. And don't forget, you can also support our work by sharing this page across your own social platforms. Nice one!