A Breton on his way to the North Pole to tell about "the disappearing sea ice"
Vincent Grison will leave with his canoe to join the ice floe bordering Greenland, which he intends to explore for 1 month.
Gettyimages / Sue Flood
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
He set off this Saturday morning from Rennes, in Brittany, for the North Pole: a 34-year-old naval architect has just started a 3-month expedition aboard a canoe propelled by muscle power and wind.
At first, Vincent Grison will reach the coast of the Channel by pulling his boat by bike, which will then be transported by sailboat to Iceland.
It is from there that he will leave with his canoe to join the ice floe bordering Greenland, which he intends to explore for 1 month.
Its objective is to tell
the
story of “
the disappearing sea ice
”.
Publicity
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The naval architect himself designed the fluorescent yellow boat which will also serve as a living space, a canoe 5.5m long by 1m wide and high, capable of producing electricity via solar panels. But it is by force of arms and wind that Vincent Grison will have to move the 150 kilograms of boat and equipment on board to navigate the pack ice. He will be helped remotely by academics from Rennes 2, with whom he has developed a research partnership.
“
I went to see them,” he
explains,
with a first question: is it possible to map the ice, since they are constantly moving on the Arctic sea ice. They told me that these maps did not yet exist and that we could try to create them. For two years, therefore, we have been trying to create a tool that makes it possible to map ice, using satellite radar imagery, we produce maps on demand, it is really an exchange of good practices. They will provide me with maps that will allow me to locate myself, to know where the ice sheets are, where the water is, and I in return I send them aerial images taken by drones so that they can calibrate their images. .
"
The project also aims to educate young people about the consequences of climate change, with educational programs sent from the ice floe to 3,000 schoolchildren and college students who have been following the preparations for the expedition for months.
“
It means being able to make videoconferences, to be able to discuss with the children, send images and videos,”
continues Vincent Grison.
The idea is above all to arouse their interest before trying to teach them something.
And I bet that out of curiosity they will make good choices later.
"
An expedition to follow in particular on the
rennespolenord.com
website
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