Unreinforced Sailboat Does NW Passage In 2 Weeks; "Not Enough Ice For A Gin & Tonic"

[hatrack]

EDIT

During the Northabout's two-week transit of the famed Northwest Passage, for example, he said there was a near complete absence of sea ice. The passage was blocked with ice throughout all of human history until sea ice loss from global warming opened it briefly during the summer of 2007. It has been seasonally open during several summers since, including 2016. This year, in addition to the Northabout, a cruise ship carrying more than 1,000 people also sailed through the passage.

"We went through the Northwest Passage in 14 days and didn’t see one drop of ice, not even enough ice for a gin and tonic," Hempleman-Adams said. He compared a previous group's voyage using the same boat just a few years ago. That team took four years to complete both the Northeast and Northwest Passage, largely because they kept getting held up by thick ice floes.

"Whereas when you see the photographs of their trip and how they were in the same boat and the conditions they had with the ice, and what we had, they are massive contrasts..." Hempleman-Adams said. "They had ice where we had just open water."

Other than an iceberg or two in Lancaster Sound, Hempleman-Adams said the crew didn't encounter any sea ice in the traditional choke points of the Northwest Passage, which is actually a series of twists and turns between islands and straits through the Canadian Arctic.

EDIT

http://mashable.com/2016/11/02/sailboat-arctic-circumnavigation-ice/#8gCCLhFGBkqi