John H. Wright

THE ROAD TO ANTARCTICA

What path leads from the hottest hell of the Magma Mine to the coldest spot on earth -- the South Pole?

That circuitous path began with a Help Wanted ad in the Durango Herald the summer of 1974: "Wanted. Resident geologist for a producing mine in Silverton, Colorado... No experience necessary."

I answered that ad and there began my career in underground hardrock mining, mining geology, and general mining practice which I conducted mostly as an independent, providing consulting and contract services. Having developed an expertise in arcane mining law, I found a lot of work in expert witness investigations. In fact the highest honor ever paid me was being twice invited to testify to the U.S. Congress on mining law reform... as an independent, certainly not as a lobbyist.

While a great honor to this citizen, participating in those mining law sessions in 1989 and 1991 felt like witnessing my own funeral. The mining laws and regulations changed in ways that made it impractical for the independent prospector to compete for mineral discovery and development against well funded corporate concerns. I gradually lost my client base - those small independents like me - and went back to winter's labor in the hardrock mines of the West.

The winter of 1992-93 found me at the bottom of the Magma Mine in Globe, Arizona. We worked at 4,000 feet below surface, 200 feet below sea level. There the rock itself was hot. Even in our air conditioned heading, the temperature was 110 degrees F. Our work clothes were simply loose jeans and t-shirts.

That spring of 1993, the occasion of a friend's funeral brought me in contact with a fellow mourner who was engaged in the US Antarctic Program (USAP). He said: "As long as you're working away in the winter, why don't you try Antarctica in its summer?" I asked what does Antarctica want with a hardrock miner? He said: "Well, you know something about explosives, don't you?"

For the next five years I performed as the USAP's explosives engineer. Then an opportunity came up to drive a tunnel through the ice at the South Pole. As a hardrock miner, I had to do that. Four years later that project was done, but while still at South Pole I received an e-mail from an old mining partner: "John... something's come up, it's underground, hardrock, in Kentucky... at Fort Knox. Are you interested?"

Are you kidding, I thought? Of course. We're going for the vault?

After the Pole job, my family and I set out from Silverton on a road trip to Kentucky. In Texas we found the funding for the Fort Knox job delayed. While crossing Tennessee, I had a call from the Antarctic Support office back in Colorado: "Hey... you want to come back and pioneer a road to the South Pole?"

It was the one job alternative that did not require us, my family, to uproot and move. The task called on all my education, experience and talents... not just a little here or a little there, but all of it. It was a job like no other.

In fact, there was no other job. That was the job.

And here is BLAZING ICE. Not a survival story, not a hero story, not a memoir, it is a tale of a great mission, and of the team that accomplished it.

Join us.