In June, Twillingate resident and nurse Sarah Rice captured grainy photos of what looked to be two people camping on an iceberg floating in an inlet near the community.
At the time, her photos made their rounds online and sparked a lot of questions and concerns from locals who know icebergs are unpredictable and dangerous even under the best conditions.
The pair of campers weren’t identified — until now.
They are Ammar Alkassm and Ethan Harold, who met just a few months ago but quickly realized they share a love of adventure.
They started a YouTube channel called the Orange Carabiner, and uploaded a video — their first — of their iceberg adventure on Wednesday.
Alkassm had visited Newfoundland before, spending some time on Fogo Island during the winter hoping to spot some icebergs. Unfortunately, as Alkassm found out, winter is actually the worst time of year for icebergs.
“After I shared my story and adventure with Ethan, my adventure in Fogo Island, I still had it in me that I did want to go back to Newfoundland and see those icebergs,” Alkassm told CBC News on Thursday.
“The idea initially was to honestly just get a kayak and just kayak as close as we’re able to to those icebergs, and just have that experience. It started from that idea and then it grew to thinking of maybe doing something a bit more interesting.”
The opening frame of the pair’s YouTube video shows a disclaimer warning others against attempting anything similar.
Ammar Alkassm and Ethan Harold, who camped atop a Twillingate iceberg in May, recorded their stunt for a YouTube video.
Harold said he’s not encouraging anybody to follow what they did. The locals they met on their Newfoundland excursion didn’t reference any safety concerns when they talked about their intention to climb on an iceberg, he said.
“We never met anybody that gave us a look sideways. They were just really enthusiastic,” he said.
“I’m sure that’s probably shocking but everyone I spoke to thought it was awesome and actually gave me some advice.”
The trip didn’t happen on a whim, he said.
“We did do a lot of research leading up to this,” he said.
“We spent a couple of months planning equipment, where we want to go, what to expect, what our criteria is for what we want to mount, are we going to be close to land, what’s the current like, what’s the wind speed, the water. We tried to take every possible factor into account but we also acknowledge, yes, it’s not an extremely safe thing to do.”
Alkassm said it took a couple of days to pick an iceberg. The one they chose in Twillingate, he said, was close to shore, in shallow water, and wasn’t drifting.
While Rice’s images were picking up steam online, the thrill-seeking duo had no idea of the controversy they had stirred up.
Harold said he had been searching for something on Google and found the CBC News story outlining Rice’s concerns.
“We didn’t anticipate anything like that. It came as a shock to us that this was making its rounds the way that it did,” he said.
The pair know how dangerous their stunt was, Harold said, but he pointed to other sports, such as combat sports, that have very real consequences but are celebrated and glorified.
“People that climb Everest — you lose a lot of people a year, but they do it because they’re pursuing something they truly love,” he said.
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