Polar Exploration

For a book project about 16th-century polar explorer William Barents, Andrea Pitzer needed to reach the remote Arctic island where he and his men came to grief. She booked passage on an expeditionary boat out of Murmansk, then headed north on a trip marked by unforgettable scenery, unexpected loss, and wild magic that changed her life.

Polar explorer Eric Larsen found inspiration in Robert Service's poem "The Call of the Wild" when he first read it

Nikita Ovsyanikov has spent decades studying polar bears on a remote Siberian island to better understand their behaviors

Colin O'Brady completed the first solo crossing of the Antarctic landmass under his own power and with no resupplies in 2018. In this excerpt from his new memoir, 'The Impossible First,' he reveals the moment that nearly ended his historic feat.

The explorer’s crossing of Antarctica put him in the spotlight. His skill in presenting himself to audiences hungry for vulnerable heroes will keep him there.

The political dispute between Russia and Ukraine combined with weather to close down the Barneo ice camp

On polar madness and other games the Arctic plays with the human brain

The renowned polar explorer is on a solo, unassisted, and unsupported South Pole speed record attempt

The Women's Euro-Arabian North Pole Expedition team made it to the North Pole on April 21, 2018, enduring minus 40 degree temperatures, the prospect of aggressive polar bears, vast open leads of water, and even the vagaries of the Russian government.

A new drama on AMC combines history and twisted fantasy to recreate the most infamous polar expedition in history

A new study has reignited the contentious debate about what led to the explorer's demise in 1912

Students in the Extreme Polar Training course, a two-week freeze-fest held near the Arctic Circle on Canada's Baffin Island, learn how to live in Earth's coldest conditions. Still, nothing really prepares you for 72 hours of a sled-pulling, pathfinding ordeal on a skinny pair of skis.

The true story of one Antarctica-bound boat and several unexpected crew members

Fear not winter’s harshest bite with these foul-weather friends

We caught up with the British explorer ahead of his attempt to cross a 1,000-mile swath of Antarctica hauling 300 pounds of gear—completely unassisted

Photographer and Filmmaker Abraham Joffe has always been drawn to places that see very few visitors and the polar region fits that criteria like nowhere else.

As a polar explorer, I've spent more than a year of my life living on the ice in one of the harshest environments on the planet. And I love it.

Since 2006, Art Woods, a marine biologist at the University of Montana, has made annual two-month trips to Antarctica to dive under the ice and study curiously large sea spiders. We asked him what it's like to do science when the ocean is freezing, the dives are deep, and there's only one hole to come up for air.

Cold-water swimmer Lewis Pugh has stroked across a glacial lake and around icebergs in the Antarctic. What’s his secret?

Pro adventurer Eric Larsen, who's spent the past 20 years exploring the Arctic, on why the President's move to protect the Arctic and Antarctic came just in the nick of time