Polar Ring 2011

On March 3 after breakfast the whole team came to the garage with our all-terrain vehicles. We found that it has almost no heating. Heat batteries are cold and only one is slightly warm. However next days revealed that the box inside temperature is about minus 7-8 C if there’s no strong wind.

The EMERCOM division team has also joined us at the vehicles to help to assemble the four trailers and residuary fourteen wheels. It’s a great help for us. Maxim managed assembly of the trailers, Mike – tire fitting and the work started hammering. The rest of our team started assembly of the all-terrain vehicles. It's necessary to mount back their suspensions, attached implements, to lay heat insulation rugs etc. There’s enough work for all and the day passes by quickly.

Daytime is still short. Wind calms down in the evening and sky above our heads is filled in with flaming aurora. Frosty, -35 degrees.

On March 4 the EMERCOM team flies away along with Maxim who is the last guy of our support team. It is very sensitive loss for us. It had to happen but it's better to be later. EMERCOM airplane AN-74 named after Georgy Bajdukov arrived after lunch and the guys who helped us get aboard. The fan heater leaves the box along with them. Last commemorative group photo and airplane ramp closes. Weather is not indulge – strong blizzard and the runway is hardly seen over a hundred of meters. However the EMERCOM airplane runs to another end of the runway and in 19 minutes we see it flying above heading to the continent. We return to our ‘iron’ in a slightly sad mood.

Next three days we continue to prepare outfit and vehicles. The first vehicle that Dima for some reason calls ‘second’ drives out of the box and sets off for the first journey over the Severnaja Zemlja. Its author, Shasha Borisevich, drives. Route is simple - less than a kilometer to the frontier post and back. But what a huge job had been done during the last years to accomplish this first ‘sally’!

Now box has enough space to mount suspension onto the second vehicle and to finally tune it. Oleg and Mike 'concoct' over the wiring, Vladimir Semenovich arranges sleeping and sitting places, Dima and Sasha are 'gurus' of the whole mechanical equipment. Two-three days more and our caravan should start out. We can’t wait any longer. Weather is unstable. On March 6 in the morning – minis 40, by the evening it’s close to thirty. Today it is about -26.