Animal Planet Presents New Special MELTING: LAST RACE TO THE POLE Tonight
By: TV News Desk Dec. 09, 2015
The North Pole has captured the imagination of explorers for more than 100 years, but fewer than 50 people have ever completed the grueling, dangerous journey unsupported and unaided. And now the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the globe, so the window to cross the ice to the majestic North Pole is closing quickly. In ANIMAL Planet's MELTING: LAST RACE TO THE POLE, Eric Larsen, one of the world's most accomplished polar explorers, and Ryan Waters, a veteran extreme mountaineer, risk their lives to reach the North Pole before that opportunity is gone forever.
The two-hour special premieres tonight, December 9, from 9-11 PM ET/PT and provides a self-shot first-person account of the explorers' unaided expedition to the North Pole - arguably the most dangerous, hostile place on Earth. Along the way, Eric and Ryan attack nature head on as they traverse through rapidly thinning ice and freezing-cold waters in an attempt to reach the North Pole faster than any of the explorers who previously have completed the trek. To reach their goal, the explorers must cover 480 brutal miles in a tight 48-day window while they pull everything they need to survive atop two 320-pound sleds. And that's not all! They must also keep a terrified eye out for polar bears and thinning ice. If Eric and Ryan can't complete the expedition in time, they stand to make history in another way by possibly being the last people on Earth ever to complete this quest. With the icecap rapidly melting as a result of global warming, future expeditions to the Pole might prove impossible. In fact, scientists believe this region could become an open ocean within the next few decades. With huge trenches in the ice and cracked surfaces already forming, Eric and Ryan's journey is an unpredictable, critical race against Mother Nature's ticking clock.Videos