Former GB para-athlete aims to ski to South Pole in 40-day solo expedition

A former GB para-athlete is aiming to become the first disabled person to ski solo and unsupported to the South Pole.

Jonny Huntington, 38, from Kingsbridge, south Devon, suffered a stroke while serving as an officer in the British Army.

The bleed in his brain, which occurred in 2014, left Mr Huntington completely paralysed from the neck down on his left side.

After 10 years of rehabilitation and training he is set to ski 911km (566 miles) of Antarctic tundra – an expedition he anticipates will take 40 days.

He will be dragging all his equipment and food in a sled which will weigh in excess of 110kg (242lbs).

Mr Huntington, who is embarking on his journey from the UK on Monday, told the PA news agency: “No one with a disability has done this before so I find it quite exciting.

“I’ll be doing it completely on my own with no sort of help, no resupply, nothing like that.

“You sort of get thrown out of a plane at one end and you hopefully wind up at the other end, 40 days later.

“Existing somewhere which is fundamentally hostile to life, it’s the ultimate test.”

The former army officer was just eight weeks into his role when his brain bleed occurred.

It took years of rehabilitation before he was able to fully walk again, and even then he was left with restricted movement down his left side.

He has also been left with permanent brain damage.

“I lost a lot of that when I got injured,” said Mr Huntington.

“When I was about two years post injury and had just been discharged from the military, I experienced some pretty poor mental health.

“A significant aspect of it came about because I had lost sight of what I felt I was meant to be working towards.”

During his recovery, he became a member of the Armed Forces Para-Snowsport Team (AFPST), which ignited his love for skiing.

Mr Huntington went on to join the GB Para Nordic ski team, where he competed from 2017 to 2020 at World Cups in Lviv, Ukraine, and Vuokatti, Finland, as well as the inaugural European Paralympic Committee Games in Poland in 2020.

The idea for his South Pole expedition was planted after he stopped skiing competitively.

He has since taken on a number of challenges to prepare for the venture, including running the entirety of the 630 miles (1,014 km) South West Coast Path, from Somerset to Dorset, in one go.

He also undertook a 20-day solo expedition in northern Sweden in April.

For his Antarctic challenge, Mr Huntington will fly into Union Glacier where he will spend a few days on the ice to complete his final preparations.

He will then take a final short flight to the start of the expedition where he will set off from Fuchs-Messner on the edge of the Antarctic landmass and ski solo and unsupported to the South Pole.

“I know that I know what I’m doing, and I also know, having spoken to other people who have done successful expeditions, that I have done the right level of preparation,” Mr Huntington said.

“I’ve done everything I can to make it succeed, but I’ve never been to Antarctica before, it famously has quite strict conditions down there.

“There aren’t disabled explorers, it’s not a job, but I’ll just have to figure out how we can make this work.”