MOSCOW, February 3. /TASS/. The first Cold Conquerors expedition to Yakutia’s Arctic districts is over. The explorers registered record low minus 54 degrees Celsius in the Oymyakon district.
Bloggers, reporters and photographers for two weeks stayed in tents and registered lowest temperatures in places far from meteorology stations or villages. TASS tells about how it was there and how to survive in extreme field conditions.
Searching for lowest temperatures
The expedition participants studied places with the lowest temperatures in two districts - Oymyakon and Verkhoyansk. They registered extremely low rates, which at this time of year may drop to minus 60 degrees.
The explorers measured temperature in compliance with standards of the Russian Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring (Roshydromet). Besides, they took reindeer sleds to get to lowlands and measure temperature there.
The lowest air temperature of minus 54 degrees was registered in the Oymyakon district, which is the Northern Hemisphere’s pole of cold.
The breath of North
The route to the Verkhoyansk district was about 300 km. "Those were roads, along which we were moving for two days practically without stops. Those are roads, where you may make a baby, deliver it, bring it up, or even die. Once, we got stuck (at an unfrozen passage of the roads, laid over frozen ice [the so-called winter roads on rivers and lakes]," photographer Konstantin Chalabov said laughing.
However, the most valuable emotions during the expedition were not from the extreme cold or fears, they were from the North’s people and nature. "The most fantastic are the deer. When you travel at night or early in the morning, you can see only stars, and here is the snow dust from under the deer’s feet… You can barely see the outlined horns, you can hear the animals breathe, and all this is in the light from stars and the Moon. It was the biggest impression," he said.
Blogger Ilya Voskresensky will remember for life how reindeer herders live, how the expedition members stayed in a tent in minus 50 degrees. Even with stoves and generators, with Wi-Fi they had, it was not easy to get adapted to the freezing.
"The biggest challenge was the first night, when we were brought to the camp. I was freezing. I could not expect it would be that unbearably cold. I used to wake up to add wood into the stove. It was quite a deal to go to the toilet outside, when the temperatures are so low. It’s like you have to set yourself to go outside. But on the second day already, everything became better, I penetrated fully into the life the deer herders have," the blogger said.
Down puffy jackets are of little help
The expedition participants took lessons in surviving from local mushes: how to cut dry woods and start a fire, how to use the Yakut sharp knife - this skill is very helpful in the tundra.
Those who plan traveling to the North, must realize clearly where they are going, the blogger said. "They must 100% have sleeping bags of deer skin. Nothing but valenki (felt boots). The Alaska down puffy jackets will be of little help: without a kukhlyanka (deer fur overcoat) anyone will get cold in no time. People should realize - they would not have a warm toilet bowl there. Anyone planning a trip must be morally prepared for this."
Another explorer, a reporter, Natalia Belyakova, insists "people need to be moving. Unless you move, the cold grasps you. For centuries, people in the North learned how to live in the complicated arctic conditions. You won’t find an excessive detail in how the sleds are made or how the deer are harnessed… On those details depends whether you survive or not. It is the experience of centuries, which has left aside anything extra and has kept what’s necessary."
The extreme for the sake of content
The Cold Conquerors is an experiment of volunteers, supported by Yakutia’s Governor Aisen Nikolayev. The regional authorities hope the expedition will grow into an annual event, which will boost the tourism potential of Yakutia as the world’s coldest inhabited area.
Exotic places, extreme traveling, life in the North have stirred huge interest among the bloggers and reporters’ subscribers.
"They have seen that this country is so huge," the blogger said. "It’s a great video, where I show how herders live."
"All the equipment has survived. I did have a few problems. You know, standing in that frost with the tripod and camera. Fingers were burning from the frost. The screen in the freezing air turns black, and I can’t see anything on it. Strangely, the drones worked fine in those temperatures. The biggest trick is to keep accumulators warm. The content I’ve got is superb," the photographer told TASS.
How to market Northern tourism
Reporter Natalia Belyakova is adamant the Northern tourism in Yakutia could be a high-quality export product.
"It is unique: to experience the extreme cold, to take a course in surviving, to learn how deer herders - true conquerors of the cold - live," she said. "A tour should be ten to 14 days. It would be not just an idea, but a radical casting into the North."
At the same time, a tour must be ecology-friendly. "No plastics, and a zero impact on the nature," she added. "We nowadays register the fosts, which soon may not happen at all."
The true conquerors of the cold are the local people, she continued. They can make the project interesting.
"In addition to deer breeding, tourists could see breeding of northern horses, and the traditional crafts," she said. "The project is promising, and it may be commercial and profitable."
The expedition’s another stage, due in 2021, will continue for three weeks. The groups will have to review methods of measuring temperatures. Digital equipment has proven to be unreliable. "Most probably, we shall have to use regular alcohol thermometers," the expedition’s leader Vyacheslav Ipatyev told TASS.