Cambridge Bay helps keep Northwest Passage expedition moving

A handful of bolts and a little help from Cambridge Bay residents kept a Polish sailing crew from being stranded in the Canadian Arctic.

Captains Alicja Latoń and Andrzej Górajek, who work for the Polish cruise and expedition company Natango, arrived in Cambridge Bay on Sept. 12 with a damaged propulsion system and were stuck for about a week.

Alicja Latoń, left, and Andrzej Górajek, right, crew members of the Polish sailing yacht Ocean A, stand ashore in Erebus Bay on Sept. 21, during the yacht’s eastbound return through the Canadian Northwest Passage. (Photo by Andrzej Górajek)

“It became the place that determined whether the entire second half of the expedition would be possible at all,” Górajek said in an email to Nunatsiaq News.

The pair is attempting to complete a trip that began July 29 with seven crew members. Their goal is to sail the Canadian section of the Northwest Passage in a single navigation season, from Upernavik, Greenland, to Tuktoyaktuk and back to Maniitsoq, Greenland.

“We wanted to find out whether a small sailing yacht could make the passage in both directions without wintering in between,” said Górajek, who is completing the return trip with Latoń.

The crew is calling the expedition, on the 75-foot Ocean A yacht, the “first known and documented” voyage rather than the first-ever, because historical records may be incomplete.

In Cambridge Bay, the crew determined a bearing needed to be replaced. It hired Qillaq Innovations, which offers technical and mechanical services, to help with some parts of the repair in its workshop.

The crew also needed high-strength bolts that were not available locally.

After contacting other vessels docked in the community, they were directed to the Canadian Coast Guard ship Louis S. St-Laurent, which supplied the bolts.

A supplier in Yellowknife located a bearing and shipped it to Cambridge Bay, while Canadian North gave the package priority to get it there on Sept. 17, she said.

Ocean A left two days later.

Latoń said residents offered rides to the workshop, the airport and elsewhere while the crew searched for parts. Others came by in the evenings to check on the crew or have tea with them.

“I think that if circumstances had somehow forced us to spend the winter in Cambridge Bay, we certainly would not have lacked company,” Latoń said.

According to VesselFinder, an online marine tracking service, the yacht is expected to reach Greenland on Oct. 10.