March 03, 2009: 31st short message (00:49 a.m. MEZ)
The expedition got stuck in an intense snow flurry together with other people. The driver of the D10 tried the whole night to break through the snow masses and gave up at 7 a.m. Even these experienced drivers have seen such a storm only once in their lives. It was and still is unbelievable strong. Now it seems that the wind is only blowing fallen snow around rather than new snow. They came from a mine which is located 20km away and informed us that they cannot tell us how long we have to wait until they try to continue. There is no visibility at all. Everything really everything is white. "White out" is the name of this frightening situation.
There were some unbelievable situations yesterday night. One of them was that the truck bus, in which we assumed 20 people, was left behind. We do not know if there were people in it. It was not able to rescue it out of the snow masses. Another 8x8 truck was pushed out of the snow. In order to cross the huge snow crater which it left with this action, the D10 drove a loop through the deep snow. There, he also towed his sledge and behind of it a Ural truck 6x6, which fell onto its left side. I was running, falling, and crawling forward through the channel in order to literally feel by touching if we could manage to come through. Luckily the broad sledge of the snow clean dozer made so much space on the right side, that our vehicles were falling in the channel, which was the fatality for the Ural truck. As we totally strained tried to follow the cat - which was only possible in gear reduction and in first or second gear, our engines suddenly became hot. During the storm we opened the bonnet and realized that the engine compartment - although especially isolated from all sides - was totally covered in ice. As through our doors, the storm pushed into the engine compartment. The accumulated ice was responsible for our frozen electronic fans. We continued in order not to lose contact to the Cat, always on the edge to the red area. Currently my fan is working again, in contrast to the one from F2. That's just about the limit.
Current position: estimated 4-6 km behind the last position in direction towards Valonisti. Total amount of people locked in at this point: 10 in 5 vehicles, no injured ones or similar, fuel reserve of the Jeeps in total 320 l, food reserve of Extrem Events team for 7-8 days, existing communication with the mine which is 20km away through the Cat driver, existing satellite communication to head office through own system.
GPS Cords: N 66 29?20" / E 177 23?13"
March 03, 2009: 32nd short message (08:23 a.m. MEZ)
Still no progess. No movement for the last 12 hours. Force of storm has increased once more. We needed to refuel. Therefore we have 2 full main tanks appr. 200 l reserve at the moment, which means one additional refueling of the main tanks + rest for driving. Enough fuel for 96 hours, food reserve ok, beverage is getting scarce. We are melting snow. We just built an emergency tent out of Russian canvas, which we brought with us for worst cases. We mounted it over the vehicle bonnets as there is more and more snow getting into the engine compartment and passenger cabin.
March 03, 2009: 33rd short message (12:01 p.m. MEZ)
The fuel reserve of the bulldozer is getting scarce. The dozer team decided to decamp. After 20 hours of stagnation we started again. F2 is permanently getting hot due to the damaged fan. We removed the isolation at the radiator grill, but it will be difficult to manage the pass like that.
March 03, 2009: 34th short message (05:45 p.m. MEZ)
We made it. We reached the mine of Valonisti. The small community, built due to the situation of being stuck in the snow just started to prepare for difficult days (food was gathered und divided, we provided the pot/the men of the other team melted snow, we cooked together, and so on) as it was already disbanded again. We respectfully bid farewell keeping in mind that everyone managed this situation very good. We covered the last 18 km which separated us from civilization in 9 hours. Meter after meter. 2m forwards = clearing of 1-2m snow height... sometimes the CAT crawls that deep into the snow that his roof was totally covered. I pulled Kaspars Jeep and trailer with F1 and trailer over appr. Half the distance. The rest of the track he tried to manage it on his own somehow, every time marginal below the red area. He is a really good and reasonable driver. Luckily, the weather has meanwhile also improved a little bit. It is still windy, but comparably weak with moderate snowfall. We are looking forward to a shower now after 6 exhausting days and nights in the car.
GPS cords: N 66 24?55" / E 177 34?59"
March 05, 2009: 35th short message (00:54 a.m. MEZ)
We are currently trying to fix Kaspar's fan. No continuation without fan. I am not able to tow F2 and trailer for hundreds of kms. We fixed everything on the vehicles so far. Due to the damages of the storm (removed all the ice out of the engine compartments, fans, induction pipes and so on) we hope to start over again today.
