tv Edge of the Earth CNN May 14, 2023 10:00pm-11:00pm PDT
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>> [ sighs ] yeah . >> holy shit. i just went from "everything's fine" to, like, "we need to move." doing something that nobody has ever done before, there's no guarantee that your plan's going to work. >> agh. [ rapids rushing ] once you commit, there is no turning around. [ waves crashing ] >> we're entirely removed from civilization. >> look at this one. >> we know once we get there, we're on our own. >> climbing. we've chosen to live a life that does have risks. [ rock rolling ] >> oh, my god.
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>> [ sobbing ] >> one mistake, and you're dead. >> come on, now. >> if you harness that fear, you can do something that you never thought possible. >> whoo! [ water rushing ] >> is the pursuit worth the risk? [ wind whistling ] [ soft, dramatic music plays ] >> the trip started in juneau, alaska, which is -- there's roads here, but it's not connected to anywhere. the mountains are so radical that the only way to get here is on boat or plane. so we're going to get on a boat from here, take that boat about 25 hours up into glacier bay national park. we're going to get dropped off at the edge of a glacier, and then we're going to walk 15 miles to a base camp and, ideally, go and ride one of the most beautiful mountains in the world -- mount bertha. i mean, this is certainly one of
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the most ambitious missions i've ever attempted. you don't just walk into these serious mountains and be like, "that's where we want to go. it's sunny. we're going to walk up to it." it's this process. having the right crew is critical. when you're this far out on the edge, you have to rely on your team to make it back. >> very few people have tried trips like this before, and, i think, probably for good reason, where you're going in from the ocean, crossing these glaciers that have crevasses you can fall in, and then getting onto mountains that have avalanches that can come down on you. [ avalanche rumbling ] so there's no shortage of dangers. it's about being able to adapt to different things the mountain might throw at you. >> there's a lot of risks involved, and putting it all on the line is -- is where that feeling of freedom and excitement comes from.
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it's hard not to consider what could happen. you know, worst-case scenario is we don't come home. [ seagull calling ] >> all right. well, i got to go, but i love you guys. >> me too. >> love you, too. >> love you. [ soft, dramatic music plays ] [ waves lapping fishing boat ] >> epic. look at the glacier over there. we're in it now. >> jer's been in the game for 25 years, and he's kind of the guru of this style of trip. >> on belay?
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>> i don't know if there's any other person in the ski or snowboard world that i look up to as much. and his approach to planning a ski trip more like a climbing expedition really changed the game. >> whew. [ panting ] okay. >> at a very young age, i just fell in love with going really fast on a race board. >> next at the top, jeremy jones, 16 years old. >> by 21, i had success at every level. but pretty quickly, i got burnt out on it. my brothers went to alaska and were like, "you need to come to alaska." i get brought to this peak right near the helipad. i'm terrified, and i drop in, and it's like coming over the edge of the world. and i see this, like, the longest, steepest, most beautiful run of my life.
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and i just -- it was -- i'd never felt that feeling, snowboarding. it's like free-falling down the mountain. you're totally in control, but hanging on to the earth by just this narrow edge of your snowboard. that just opened up this -- this world, this universe that i didn't know existed. no question, like, this is -- this is where you'll find me. [ seagulls calling ] the size of that mountain is a little more substantial, looking at it from down here. eventually, i got really good at filming snowboard movies in alaska with a helicopter. and over time, more people started coming. we started racing people, the mountain. you know, it changed with that.
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i had been wanting to get past the heli boundaries to expand my snowboard universe. that's what led to this new phase, which was this foot-powered snowboarding. >> it's feeling more and more real. >> a little bitter. swell in the ocean. [ seagulls calling ] >> gulf low continue to bring onshore flow. thursday, friday, bigger storm with 3 to 4 feet of snow. >> we know we got a significant storm coming in. and the question is, "is there an end to it to come?" >> yeah. >> and if there's not an end to it, things get more complicated. we thought we were getting on the boat for like a 25-hour boat ride to where we were going to launch. and then this small storm that
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was coming in totally elevated, and we had to retrace our steps to hide in an inlet. well, the weather just cranked. ♪ mamá, growing up... you were so good to me. you worked hard to save for my future. so now... i want to thank you. i started investing with vanguard to help take care of you, like you took care of me. te quiero, mamá. only at vanguard you're more than just an investor you're an owner. helping you take care of the ones you love. that's the value of ownership. hey. what are you doing right now? you up for something impetuous? i'm a palm springs hotel. i got the desert air, sun-kissed pools, and shady hideaways.
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[ mid-tempo music plays ] >> i started snowboarding at 6, and started competing. [ crowd cheers ] when i was 12 years old, i was watching the 2002 olympics. i watched kelly clark win the women's halfpipe. that was, like, all i wanted to do. [ crowd cheers ] >> never been done, female or male. >> started winning contests. i went to two olympics and didn't have an olympic medal. on the last olympic year, i was like, "this is it." i had the tricks, but i totally cracked, and i didn't even come
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close to qualifying. for whatever reason, i was just, like -- couldn't get my head in the game. i don't know. maybe this is the end of my snowboard career. and then about a month later, i got a call from jeremy to go on this trip for a film he was making. i've never been winter camping. it was totally out of my comfort zone. sounds like a good idea in theory. we'll see. >> "what am i doing out here with this guy?" >> [ laughs ] >> [ laughs ] >> but i was like, "this is the perfect opportunity. i'm going to go walk through the mountains and figure out the rest of my life. like, [chuckles] "this is it." on the last day, i realized i hadn't thought about it much -- any of it, at all. i know. you could stay out here forever.
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it w it was a new focus for me beyond competition that i had never had before. that trip completely altered my future. "this is definitely what i want to do." [ waves lapping fishing boat ] woke up to that. look at that. [ soft, dramatic music plays ] the storm is here. this mellow boat ride turned into quite the experience. we hunkered down for a couple days because there was no way we'd be able to get on land, and we couldn't really hike in that type of storm anyways. boats and snow don't really mix. the extra weight is a hazard for sinking or just for leaks. we had to keep shoveling the boat because it was just coming down. >> well, i've been on this boat since i was 6 years old. and 51 years, i've never seen this much snow on this boat in
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my entire life, ever. i'm just absolutely freaking stunned, man. i wouldn't say it's a worst-case scenario, but it's about as bad as it gets, you know? >> days kept rolling by, and it became clear that we needed a window or we were going to have to abandon the mission altogether. >> to get to shore, we have to jump in this little munson, or smaller boat. you realize how big the waves are when you're in, like, a boat that size. >> this will be, i think, an impossible launch as well as impossible landing. i could get across with that munson, but i can guarantee you that everybody will be soaking wet and all our stuff will be wet. >> the classic pro-skier route is figuring out you have what it takes when you're maybe 15 or 16.
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but i was the opposite of that. i didn't even really become a pro skier until i was 23 or 24. before that, it was all about, you know, going to school. i got my mba from the university of denver, which gave me a lot of good assets to approach the business and skiing world. it was only the last couple years of college that i realized that there could be a different path. [ crowd cheers ] the first freeskiing contest i entered, i won. i was like, "oh, maybe this skiing thing can, you know, work out." >> griffin has made major descents in some of the most remote places on the planet and is just voracious studier of maps and routes and weather and just every little detail on a mission like this. >> big-mountain skiing has that combination of being in nature, that adrenaline rush, and that challenge. it checks all the boxes of what really does it for me in life.
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>> it's like we finally see the sun for really the first time since we've been here. and we got a really stiff wind that we can't really move in. all we can do is try to be right on the doorstep, and we're on the doorstep right now. >> i think we're at the start of the driveway. >> yeah. >> [ chuckles ] allergy headache pain? and the congestion that causes it! flonase headache and allergy relief. psst! psst! all good! i brought in ensure max protein, with 30 grams of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks. uh... here i'll take that. ensure max protein with 30 grams of protein, 1 gram of sugar and nutrients for immune health. ♪ ♪ you said close your eyes ♪ ♪ don't look down ♪ ♪ fall into me...♪
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>> whew. >> all right! >> first steps. let the games begin, ladies and gentlemen. in order to take on an objective of this size, we had a pilot drop a gear cache with supplies and food. and what we're walking in with is enough to sustain ourselves for a day or two tops. going into the trip, we always look at, the hike to our gear stash is two big days in the mountains. but due to this really tight break in the weather, we're going to have to do it in a single push. and as soon as we started walking, we realized this was going to be even harder than we thought. >> see that mountain way out there that looks really small? we're going behind that. so we got a ways to go still.
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>> it's just exhausting. we've been breaking trail in shifts probably 15, 20 minutes at a time because that's about as much as you can handle. >> oh, my hip flexors are on fire. >> we've been moving for nine hours. we're really kind of slowing down. we're still a ways out. >> here comes the storm. right on time or a little early. pretty far from camp, so not really what we were looking for. >> being out on the glacier on a cloudy day is like being on the inside of a ping-pong ball. you could just walk into a crevasse or a hole that will swallow you up. and so it's not an option to
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move during storms. >> the reality set in that this storm that's coming in could really pin us on this glacier. that is worst-case scenario. we don't have the supplies to stay out here for that long. and we're really in the middle of no-man's-land. there is no other option but to keep going. 14 hours now, working really, really hard. we haven't even really stopped. >> i was the most tired that i've ever been, and all i wanted to do was stop. but it was not an option . >> oh, my god.
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[ tent zipper unzipping ] [ laughing ] [ tent zipper unzipping ] >> rule number 32 -- "sleep with your shovel." [ soft, dramatic music plays ] [ sighs ] just the most epic snowstorm you could ever imagine. >> it's not often your skis almost get buried vertically. [ chuckles ] >> and all we did was dig our tents out, eat some food, sleep, and repeat. >> you get in your tent, and it's a safe little bubble. you can hear the storm raging
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outside. [ wind buffeting tents ] then all of a sudden, the storm stops. but it's not that it stopped, it's that you're buried. >> 200 centimeters of new snow and counting rapidly. i would assume it'll be more of the same when we wake up tomorrow. >> at this point, almost two weeks in on the trip, with the boat ride and being in juneau. and it's been a constant beat-down. [ tent flap rustling ] whoa.
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>> first time actually seeing the mountain, and it's so caked, so much snow. it's like the curtains being drawn on this amazing stage. pretty special place to wake up. [ vocalizing ] >> spectacular. beyond imagination. we've spent so much time trying to get here. then you see this view, and you're like, "oh, that's why we spent that much time, because you just don't see mountains like this every day." >> it's crazy, having been posted up here for three days and not seeing anything around us, and just waking up to, like, heaven. it's pretty surreal. it's all becoming real.
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>> for as beautiful as it is, we can't go up into the mountains because they're so avalanche-prone at that phase. you need to let the mountains heal. [ soft, dramatic music plays ] >> in 12 hours of daylight, we watched 200 avalanches fall. it just was the perfect combination of a lot of snow over a short period of time and then quickly rising temperatures and a lot of sun. >> this whole perfect place turns into this sloppy, dirty, dangerous mess of wet snow. >> yeah, it's scary, but really
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it's just more heartbreaking, thinking you've come all this way and might go home with nothing. high record temperature for juneau got smashed yesterday. >> wow. >> yeah, it was 70 degrees in juneau yesterday. >> holy -- >> whoa. >> we might hit 80, like, once or twice a year, you know? so to have 70 in april is smashed. >> at this point, there's a lot of concern with what we were going to do and how we were going to adjust our plan to be able to still have a successful mission. >> we did a recon skin up-valley, and walking around,
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you could tell it's so hot, humid. >> we got a view of bertha and really spent time just sitting there, watching it. how does it look? >> well, that summit ridge is, um -- that's pretty real right there. that is going to be -- that's pretty real. rated "r." >> yeah, it's really just a matter of what's snow and what's white ice. won't know until we're up there. >> yeah. hitting, like, un-edgeable ice on a mountain means you'll lose your edge and accelerate super fast and be really hard to catch a fall. it's like black ice on the highway. >> what would it be? 5,000 vert from top to bottom?
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>> nah, it's like 7,000. >> 7,000? >> do we want to go to the saddle? >> that serac is insane. >> yeah, it seems like it's pretty cold up there most days. >> it drops temps just getting right here. whoo! there's definitely a line that goes. >> there is a line that goes in that madness. now, that is a mountain. yeah, serious mountain, man. i mean that's, like, next-level stuff. but i think, with the current snow situation, like, we just got to put all our attention towards it and just one puzzle piece at a time, and we can turn, like, a bunch of noes into yeses. we might be able to stand on that thing and ride down it. >> i mean, there's a shot, for sure. if one person's feeling bad, like, turn around. >> yeah, we should do a little
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more scoping down there and then really think about timing with the heat. >> mm-hmm. [ avalanche rumbling ] >> oh, my god! >> whoa! >> look at that thing. oh, my god. >> ohh. >> whoo. >> oh. look at it. >> it's still going. >> that was humbling. >> that's why we don't hike under seracs. >> yeah. >> and we give them a wide berth. >> crazy. >> what do you guys think about the route up? >> it seems like we have to move in the twilight, and that means hiking that thing in the dark. [ soft, dramatic music plays ] that one really narrow, steep section just definitely turns my stomach to think about. >> the earth is just falling away on both sides of you. >> due to these, like, extreme warm temperatures, we were only
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comfortable with moving in the mountains, like, really early in the morning and late in the day, because in the middle of the day, that's when things get really warm and then become very avalanche-prone. >> we decided it would be best to leave camp in the evening, climb the first half of the mountain, have a quick nap at the ridge to the final approach. >> we're leaving at 5:00 p.m., which is so counter-intuitive. and it's just a matter of time before you're engulfed in darkness. >> we're doing this? >> let's do it. >> whoo! >> we will. >> yeah. >> being in the mountains in the dark is scary. you just get this feeling of like, "you should not be here right now."
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it's a shrine. oh! when you cross the bergschrunds in alaska, that's where the glacier and the mountain meets and you got to cross this crack. and that's generally when things get real. [ trekking poles tapping ] >> this ridge is safe, right? >> when in doubt, go right. may be a good time to get out one ax. >> not the terrain that gives you warm and fuzzy feelings. 45-degree slope that's ice. and if you fall, you're... yeah, you don't want to fall. >> whoo! 11:30 at night. took us about eight hours to get
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up here. >> this is going to be where i sleep tonight. be a little cold, but we're only here for like four hours, so just enough time to get a little shut-eye, make some water, hydrate again, and get going for the main objective. >> that was a good push. we can see, like, the outlines of our surroundings, but it's going to be an exciting morning. [ wind whistling ] >> we are moving by 6:00 a.m. we got to the boot pack pretty quickly. that entire next section was crampons and ice axes. we knew we were going to be facing a lot of variables. [ soft, dramatic music plays ] >> hopefully, our timing is right.
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>> the ice is just -- it's just, like, disintegrating underneath me. [ sighs ] >> proper tilt to this thing holds its pitch. >> definitely ice under there. >> yeah, definitely some ice. >> going to be sketchy on the way down, huh? >> oh, yeah, a little firmer. >> there were some firm spots back there, but not this firm. definitely some white ice. a little concerned about how we were going to get down that section without hitting ice and falling. hoping that the temps warm up just a little bit so that that snow is edgeable on my snowboard. >> just getting to the crux, once we get off this little bit, and feel way better.
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the last 300 or 400 feet of bertha, it's this really narrow strip that we call the plank. [ sighs ] so hot. >> holy shit. i just went from "everything's fine" to, like, "we need to move." the plank is like 10 feet wide. on your left side, you got a bunch of rocks. on your right side, you have 5,000 feet of air. if you fall anywhere on that, there's no rescue. it's just a recovery mission. [ sighs ] >> this is real deal to come down this. >> yeah. >> all of bertha is a no-fall zone. every step you take has to be a very sure step.
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mountains and to sleep under them, see every breath of wind and snowflake, the intimacy that you now have with the mountain is so much greater. these highs are on a totally different level. >> make you feel so small. but at the same time, so connected to everything around you. you feel like you're standing on the edge of the earth. >> it's pretty indescribable. but you can't forget that the
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from the network america relies on. [ wind whistling ] [ soft, dramatic music plays ] >> that ice kind of worries me a bit. >> oh, it should. [ sighs ] >> even though we climb the line, there was so much firm snow under the surface that we're like, "how's this going to ride?" and we needed to section it out. get in here. you know, speed is your friend. and then. >> mm-hmm. >> most accidents happen on the way down. and if one person goes from top to bottom, and something happens to the next person, they're not in a position to provide any rescue. and so there was three very
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natural points to stop and regroup. [ sighing ] >> okay. yeah, guys? >> yeah, elena. whoo! >> [ applauding ] >> elena, drop in three, two, one. >> whoo! [ soft, dramatic music plays ] [ snowboard skimming snow ] >> snow is edgeable. elena clear. [ beep ] [ snowboard skimming snow ] yeah, griff. whoo! nice. [ snowboard skimming snow ]
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>> whoo! yeah, team. trending skiers left along this ridgeline and then dropping fall line. >> yeah. >> watch the rocks on the right. it's going to be really exposed. >> yeah. [ snowboard skimming snow ] >> griffin dropping. hear that the ice is really grippable, so, you know, have confidence riding with that. [ beep ] so, the ice was pretty edgeable? [ beep ] >> yeah, for sure.
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chest pain, stroke or mini-stroke, heart failure in the last 6 months, irregular or abnormal heartbeat, if you have untreated sleep apnea, or take maois. zeposia may cause serious side effects including infections that can be life threatening and cause death, slow heart rate, liver or breathing problems, increased blood pressure, macular edema, swelling and narrowing of the brain's blood vessels, and increased risk of pml-- a rare brain infection that usually leads to death or severe disability. tell your doctor if you are pregnant or plan to be. don't let uc stop you from doing you. if you're living with moderate to severe ulcerative colitis, ask your doctor about once-daily zeposia. ♪ here's to the very first influencer in your life... mom! ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪
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presence, knowing that you can achieve things that you may not have thought possible is a sense of courage and freedom. >> packing up, heading to the ocean. really excited to see my family, but i will always remember this place. >> once you are out here, you really settle into this state of presence that i think is hard to find, and our every day lives because there's so many distractions, and how here we are completely in tune with the mountains and our surroundings, you definitely find yourself feeling like it's home here. >> it's something i never have done before, and i think 10,200 feet would take me on the longest run of my life.
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