Branson adds star power to Nunavut expedition
Last Updated: Thursday, April 26, 2007 | 10:50 AM CT
CBC News
British business tycoon Sir Richard Branson arrived in Nunavut this week to add some celebrity power to Global Warming 101, a dogsled expedition travelling across Baffin Island to raise awareness about climate change.
The expedition, led by American adventurer Will Steger along with Inuit partners, was scheduled to start its final leg to Igloolik on Thursday morning, after spending nearly two weeks in Clyde River collecting stories about environmental changes Inuit are seeing.
Branson, who is chair of the Virgin Group, has recently turned his attention to climate change issues. In February, he announced a $25-million US prize for the first person or group to find a way to remove billions of tonnes of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
Branson and his son Sam will travel with the team by dogsled to Igloolik from Clyde River — a 520-kilometre trek they are expected to complete in early May.
"I've been interested in global warming for a while now," Branson told CBC News from Clyde River on Wednesday. "Obviously [I'm] very worried about what's happening in the world and obviously the Arctic is under tremendous threat."
Branson's name was new to Theo Ikummaq of Igloolik, who is one of several Inuit hunters on the eight-member Global Warming 101 team. He said the billionaire businessman may be a celebrity elsewhere, "but to the people of the Inuit, he's just another human coming in to participate on this."
A South African film crew and various American media also descended on Clyde River this week to document the final leg of the 1,900-kilometre expedition, which started Feb. 14.
Ikummaq said he and several other Inuit will go to Washington in June to make a presentation to a U.S. Senate committee in a bid to persuade politicians and policy makers that greenhouse gas emissions from the United States need to be reduced.
