British woman attempts to become first to sail solo around Arctic
She will brave icebergs, the threat of polar bears and 20ft ocean waves, but Ella Hibbert is determined to become the first person to circumnavigate the Arctic ice cap solo.
The 28-year-old yachtmaster and daughter of a Gulf war veteran, aims to sail Yeva, her 38ft boat, 10,000 miles alone over five months around the shrinking ice surrounding the North pole.
She will navigate both Northwest and Northeast Passages as she crosses the Arctic Ocean.
Setting off in two weeks' time, she will skirt seven countries including Russia as she navigates through the freezing iceberg-laden waters with only her sailing skills and hi-tech mapping and surveillance equipment to avoid collisions or danger.
At times, she will have to sleep in 20-minute slots, constantly waking herself up to check the horizon, her radar and the camera positioned on her mast for icebergs, other vessels or obstructions.
In preparation, she has taken a firearms course to learn how to fire flares to scare off the polar bears and medical training so she can do her own stitches and sutures or insert a cannula in her own veins for IV drips.
Her expedition – three years in the making – has only become possible because of the opening of the Northwest Passage over the past decade due to the melting ice from climate change.
The potential impact of this on the world's ecosystem is why she is attempting a solo circumnavigation that no other sailor has even tried.
'I've always dreamt of seeing the Arctic, and I've always wanted to see it before we lose it,' said Ella, as she sat bathed in sun on Yeva calmly settled in dock in Haslar marina, Portsmouth.
'This has become a way of raising awareness for it, while also being able to see it myself.
'People aren't as aware of how intricately linked we are to the survival of the Arctic, for our lives to continue as we want them to.
'If we lose the ice, that will then increase global warming at faster rates.
'The polar jet streams and the winds that normally blow around there are going to start travelling further south, like we've already seen over in America, and the currents around the ocean are going to change.
'If we lose the ice, we lose the kelp that grows on the inside of it. If we lose that, then we lose food for the fish. If we lose the fish, we lose the seals. If we lose the seals, we lose the polar bears. You see what I mean.
'And losing the ice brings predators like polar bears closer to human civilisation, where they shouldn't be.'
Ella has been sailing since her father, Rupert, an army helicopter pilot who served in two Gulf wars, 'chucked me in a dinghy in Alton Water reservoir in Ipswich' aged five or six. She left school at 18 with an International Baccalaureate from France where her parents had moved.
An accomplished horse rider, she initially pursued a top-level equestrian career, working with an Olympic dressage rider in Germany, but then returned to her first and current love: the sea.
She worked as a divemaster and deckhand for multimillionaire owners of superyachts but it was an industry she 'didn't like'.
'I didn't like the mentality behind it,' she said.
She spent her winters diving around the world, exploring sea life and reefs from Malaysia to Mexico and Australia.
'The more diving I did, the more I became aware of ocean decline, and that's what drove me back to sailing – to enjoy the oceans in a way I felt more aligned with,' she says.
By 25, she had become the Royal Yachting Association's (RYA) second youngest female yachtmaster instructor before, three years ago, hatching her plan to sail the Arctic – and buying Yeva, a 46-year-old steel-hulled ocean-going boat specially designed for ice-strewn seas, for £20,000. It is now worth £50,000.
Since December 2022, she has refitted and overhauled the entire boat including its engine, rigging and cabins – and slept in it every night since, except for a stint when it went into dry dock.
She has accrued 22 sponsors and been endorsed by the Scientific Exploration Society, a charity dedicated to exploration and conservation.
Her planning has been meticulous including everything from an eight-month, weekly food supply comprising 32 bags of 14 different types of freeze-dried meals (her favourite is vegetarian Tuscan stew) to a drone she can send aloft to scan for icebergs.
Her preparations have not, however, been without incident.
She only got visa approval on Tuesday from Russia to allow her to sail within its 12-mile coastal territorial zone – a critical necessity to enable her to harbour away from storms.
Without such permission, she admits she was 'not sure I would have still done it. It certainly would have been a big risk'.
She added: 'They sent me an apology email last week, when it was taking a while for the permissions to come through, saying visiting yachts are such a rarity in our waters, bear with us.'
A trial of the boat in the Barents Sea in the Arctic Circle last summer also exposed the perils of the northern seas.
Lashed by 20ft waves, her steering failed, leaving the boat going round in circles. Realising she could not fix it, she used her hydrovane, an emergency rudder and steering system to get back to port for repairs.
The biggest challenge of the five-month expedition is, she admits, sleep deprivation.
Around-the-world yachtsmen and women are 'offshore' in the open ocean which means they can sleep. 'Whereas I'm going to be very coastal for a lot of the trip,' said Ella.
'When I was out last year, I never slept for more than 20 minutes at a time, which I maintained for up to a week but any more than that would be quite difficult.
'Luckily, there are areas in the Northwest and the Northeast passages shallow enough to anchor, so I could get a longer rest and then keep going.'
Then there is the risk from icebergs, sea ice and wind chill with temperatures plummeting to minus 30C. She has an ice pick and snow shovel to clear ice that could destabilise the boat.
She has been taught to use radar for ice navigation but she admits: 'It's something you really can't practice for until you get there.'
Ella admits her father and mother, Nina, are nervous: 'I'm the youngest and their only girl, so they're probably more than slightly worried about it, but they know that once I've got my mindset on something, I'm going to do it.'
Her father is on standby to provide forecasts and ice routing if she loses internet on her satellite phone.
Through the trip, her boat will take depth soundings to map uncharted areas of the Arctic seabed for the International SeaKeepers Society, while Yeva will be auctioned on her return to raise funds for the charities Polar Bears International and the Ocean Conservancy.
Asked if she has any fear, she said: 'Not yet, but I will when I go. When I leave will be an emotional moment. I tell everyone that what happens with the ice and weather is out of my control but what I have been able to control is running a campaign without a boat or blip on the radar and a successful expedition that is setting sail in just under two weeks.'
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