Pollock first blind Irishman at Pole

MARK POLLOCK, the first blind Irishman to reach the South Pole, says he is looking forward to returning home to “eat hamburgers”.

Pollock, who was born in Hollywood, Co Down, and lives in Dublin, has achieved this historic goal 10 years after losing his sight.

With team-mates Simon O’Donnell from Dublin and Norwegian Inge Solheim, he completed the final stages of a 1,000km ski race yesterday evening and was due to spend last night sleeping in a tent in minus 40 degrees Celsius.

He is due to return home via Cape Town, South Africa, later this week.

The trio were among six teams which took part in the first Amundsen Omega 3 South Pole race, which had been staged to mark almost a century since Norwegian Roald Amundsen reached the southernmost position on the globe in 1911.

Irish adventurer Sir Ernest Shackleton turned back from his attempt on the South Pole 100 years ago this month. The first Irishman to reach the pole was Kerry mountaineer Mike Barry five years ago on January 2004.

Commenting on Pollock’s achievement yesterday, Barry said that it was a “tremendous feat for anybody, but particularly for someone with a visual impairment. You spend so much of your time just trying to keep warm, and the difficulties in organising your gloves and your gear would be so much greater in Mr Pollock’s case,” Barry said.

Pollock, who is in his early 30s and is a motivational speaker, spoke on his website yesterday of how he stopped several times in the previous 24 hours and felt he couldn’t continue – but did.

He ate “endless chocolate” and still lost several stone in weight, he said. His team-mate Simon O’Donnell suffered frostbite on both hands, face and ear and was treated for this en route.

Norwegian guide and mountaineer Inge Solheim, who has been to the North Pole nine times and Antarctica four times, was in “very good shape”.

Pollock decided to participate in the challenge to mark 10 years since losing his sight at the age of 22. He has won medals rowing for Northern Ireland at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, has completed six marathons in one week in China’s Gobi Desert, and has competed against British adventurer Sir Ranulph Fiennes in the North Pole marathon.

The Irish-Norwegian trio, named South Pole Flag, came fifth among six teams competing in the South Pole Race which started on January 4th last.

The race was won by Norwegian team, Missing Link. The competitors had to complete a fortnight of intensive training before setting off across the Antarctic plateau on skis, towing 70kg sledges. Most competitors will have lost up to 20 per cent of their body weight during the ordeal.