Today was supposed to be monotonous and uneventful.  It didn't turn out that way.  Shortly after we left camp, the clouds rolled in, and soon it started to snow.  Then, once again, the infamous and dreaded katabatic winds picked up strength.  After about six hours, they were blowing so hard that we were forced to stop.  The snow was blowing in our faces at 70 kilometers per hour, and visibility was down to zero. 

Deciding to take shelter, we set out to raise the tent.  But a strong gust (which Alain later estimated at about 120 kilometers per hour) caught the tent and snapped a pole, instantly flattening the tent like a pancake.  While Alain secured the base of the tent to the ice, I crawled inside with my sled, standing it on its side to prop up the roof and create a little space inside.  It's not ideal, but it's shelter.  We crawled inside, swept out all the snow that had blown in, and clambered into our sleeping bags.  With about a foot of height to work with, Alain and I had space to lie down, but not much else.  So we lay there, barely moving for the next 15 hours until the winds had finally passed.

When we finally emerge and take a look, it's clear that the tent has seen better days.  It started the trip resembling a comfortable minivan, was flattened to a pancake, and is now more like a tiny sports car built for two...plus a sled. 

[Pictured: Larry and Alain's tent after the katabatic winds snapped a pole.] 

[Editor's note: Over the course of two weeks, Larry Lunt, a member of NRDC's Global Leadership Council, and Alain Hubert, a Belgian explorer and founder of the International Polar Foundation, will trek some 200 miles from the town of Qaanaaq across Greenland's Humbolt Glacier, the Northern Hemisphere's largest and fastest moving river of ice. Along the way, as special contributors to OnEarth's Greenlight blog, Lunt and Hubert will post dispatches from the ice: stories of a culture and wilderness in flux and lessons for what our own future may hold.  Follow the journey at our Destination: Greenland page.]

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