Neha Patil (Editor)

RX II

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Name
  
RX II

Notes
  
NOR 12152

Launched
  
1977

Class and type
  
Fiberglass yacht

Builder
  
Designed by Jerry Cartwright, built at Oddington Yachts, Newport

Tons burthen
  
ca. 9 000 kg displacement

RX II is a 36-foot yacht in which a three-man Norwegian crew circumnavigated the North Pole over two seasons in 2009-2010.

Expedition leader Trond Aasvoll and crew Hans Fredrik Haukland and Finn Andreassenleft Vardø, Norway, on July 28, 2009, intending to make the first circumnavigation of the North Pole in one season and thereby demonstrate the effects of global warming in making this possible. The northern sea route proved ice-free and RX II entered the Bering Strait on September 24. The voyage had been projected to take 45 days. However, the Russian authorities stopped them in sight of Alaska and required them to sail south to satisfy legal formalities, leaving insufficient time to sail all the way around the Pole in one season. The expedition was interrupted in Nome, Alaska and returned to the home base of Arendal to overwinter. However, RX II was the smallest sailboat to sail through the Northeast Passage, and the first Norwegian boat to do so since Roald Amundsen in 1916-1919.

The crew returned to Nome the next summer and left on July 31, 2010. They successfully navigated the Northwest Passage west to east. Haukland had to leave RX II when she reached Greenland and fly back to his job as a firefighter in Alta. However, Aasvoll and Andreassen re-entered Norwegian waters on September 29 after sailing around the northern tip of Scotland, and returned to Arendal on October 9. RX II became the first Norwegian boat to sail both the Northeast and Northwest Passages with the same crew. Later the same year, the Norwegian Northern Passage and the Russian Peter I both completed the circumnavigation in one season.

The 36-foot fiberglass yacht with an open cockpit was designed by Jerry Cartwright and built in 1977.

References

RX II Wikipedia