Scientists stranded on floating icepack

[SoCalDem]

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/05/1078464643736.html

Scientists stranded on floating icepack
By Andrew Osborn in Moscow
March 6, 2004



Twelve Russian scientists were stranded on a disintegrating free-floating icepack near the North Pole yesterday with dwindling power and food supplies, after 90 per cent of their research base was destroyed when the icepack it was built upon began to fragment and sink.

An operation using the world's largest helicopter to pluck the men off the ice was being planned, but rescuers said the task would be dangerous and highly dependent upon the weather.

Artur Chillingarov, the rescue team leader and a seasoned Arctic explorer, warned that the scientists' location - 720 kilometres north of Norway's Spitzbergen archipelago - was generally considered inaccessible for helicopters and aircraft because it was so remote.

The men were surviving in two huts on the icepack drifting south with just four days' food left. The battery for their satellite phone was running low to the point that they could speak briefly to rescuers only at four-hour intervals.







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