Since 2008,
Under The Pole leads pioneering underwater expeditions,
discovering unknown worlds.
Good evening everyone.
I am often asked
how did I come to this explorer’s life,
and that’s a little bit of what I’m going to explain to you tonight.
I will tell you how
I found myself at 30 at the geographic North Pole
to dive, to go camping
in the most extreme cold conditions on the planet.
I will tell you how a child
who had a leg that was bending very badly,
ended up a few years later
to conduct exploration expeditions on the roof of the world.
I will tell you how
I found myself in the high Arctic diving with sharks from Greenland,
these fish so unknown that, it seems,
would be the animals that have the greatest longevity on the planet.
I will take you dive with me
at the highest latitudes of the Arctic
but also tell you three stories,
three founding crossroads that led me to this explorer’s life,
and who taught me a lot
So my life did not start with the breath of the great expeditions,
she could have been completely different.
In fact, the first crossroads of my life,
it’s even the story of a disability.
When I was 8 years old due to trauma,
I ended up with my left leg stiff,
very painful, the skin on the bones.
Specifically, I could not ride a bike.
I had to hop to go down the stairs.
I was running limping.
I limped while running.
and often, even sitting,
often even while walking.
These are things that are very disturbing for a child,
for a teenager and,
a little later for a young man
so much so that it obsessed me.
It made me obsessed.
I thought about it 24 hours a day during this period of my life
consciously and unconsciously.
Nevertheless, I had a normal sporting life
I was pretty good,
but of course I’ve moved away from some team sports
to get closer to disciplines like climbing, in which I performed.
And then at 15, I discovered diving
and it was an important event,
since that day,
I discovered a passion
in which I totally invested myself.
But with the passing of time,
the condition of my leg did not improve, on the contrary.
She stiffened and the pains were more and more important.
So, as you approach your twenties,
I decided to try an operation.
I remember before falling asleep in the operating room,
I had this vision to wake up a few hours later,
with the left leg open to the bone,
at the level of the thigh on both sides, and then,
the prospect of a year in a rehabilitation center,
with a lot of physio every day.
It was not folichon, folichon
but the operation was a miracle.
In fact, after a few tens of minutes,
the surgeon released my knee,
and suppressed the pains.
He stopped there
and I made this picture at the time
because I was so happy to recover 110 degrees of mobility.
I did not know if it was going to last.
So, I wanted to keep this picture in memory.
And a few months later,
coming out of my hospital stay,
I went to a field that I liked.
It’s not on the picture,
but there are the Alps behind with the Mont-Blanc massif.
I took a picture.
I put the camera on the hood of the car,
with this little sign on which he is marked:
“Day 0, Friday, April 7, 2000”
In fact, it was something fundamental for me:
a new life was beginning.
I managed to overcome a handicap that had forced me,
who had blocked me,
and at the same time who had forged me,
who had taught me some things about life,
especially the importance of certain things
and then the futility of others.
When I was a student,
I dreamed of adventures,
As many.
I dreamed of traveling the world,
I dreamed of traveling and doing diving expeditions
but I had been fed all my childhood,
by the odyssey of Calypso and Commander Cousteau,
by the expeditions of Jean-Louis Étienne in the polar regions.
But, student, it is a world that seemed to me inaccessible, unapproachable.
I spent part of my summers as a diving instructor,
and one day a young woman arrived,
Emmanuelle,
she was returning from an expedition to Clipperton
with Jean-Louis Étienne precisely.
And she inspired me passion, she inspired me adventure,
and also some form of freedom in which I found myself.
So, as a good diving instructor,
I went to see the director of the center,
and then I maneuvered to ask
that it is tilted in my group.
It was done.
At the end of the training,
we left the center together,
and then we never left each other again.
Some time later, I met Jean-Louis Étienne.
He was preparing an expedition to the Pole,
an expedition with an airship.
He wanted to cross the Arctic Ocean
and he was looking for a young, young engineer trainee
and I applied, I got the job
and I left my studies, in Munich in Germany at the time,
to join him in Paris.
I totally invested myself for the job, with passion.
I learned every day
and above all I was very grateful to Jean-Louis Étienne
to have trusted me.
He entrusted me with the organization of a polar mission
diving in the geographical North Pole sector.
It is also, in the plane that brought us back from this journey to the North Pole,
that I wrote the basics of the first expedition
“Under The Pole”
that I was going to realize a few years later
but that, I did not know it yet.
After two years at his side,
I had learned a lot about management,
on the organization of major shipping projects
and I went back to school
before getting fired
to complete the last year of studies that was missing.
And that’s where I started
to look for my first own sponsors.
In a few months,
at that time,
so I met my wife, Emmanuelle,
with whom today I have two children,
and with whom we direct these expeditions “Under The Pole”,
who have become a real way of life for us.
And then, I met Jean-Louis Étienne, who is,
and who will surely remain,
one of my biggest sources of inspiration.
While I was on track to lead me
to an engineering career,
at that moment, I made the decision to follow the path of my heart,
and a destination,
that presented itself to me
as one of the greatest opportunities of my life
and it was a founding opportunity.
3rd story,
the third crossroads that I wanted to tell you,
it is precisely the story of my flight
and these “Under The Pole” expeditions.
So, organize expeditions,
it’s something very long,
very complicated,
and all the more so since the project is ambitious,
like many things in life.
I often compare that to a frantic race,
a kind of giant marathon
which would aim to reach the top of a mountain.
So, a giant marathon, a frantic race,
because, ambitious project, colossal work.
It never stops, it’s 24 hours a day.
There is a lot to do.
And then, an obstacle course,
because in this quest, in this journey,
on the way, we will have a number of barriers,
a number of walls to cross.
And every time,
we’ll have to climb them, cross them, jump them,
stepping over them, and often we’ll stumble, we’ll fall,
sometimes we will hurt ourselves,
but always, it will be necessary to rise again.
And finally, this course, a sort of initiatory journey,
step by step,
will forge us,
will give us an inner strength,
will feed us.
And it is this strength that, when the time comes,
will allow us to reach the summit.
With Emmanuelle,
we experienced this situation in December 2012.
It’s been two years since we wrote
the second “Under The Pole” expedition,
a two-year trip to Greenland,
with a big team and a boat.
We had a lot of commitment to a partner,
who was to follow us.
And, a few days before Christmas,
we received a message that told us the opposite.
So, we collapsed.
We hit the bottom.
We had nothing, we had no money
and our project seemed to be wiped out.
We went a few days to the mountains,
for the holidays, to relax.
One morning, I woke up,
and I said to Emmanuelle:
“There is no problem, I found the solution. “
So she looked at me with big eyes,
because we were leaving very far,
but simply, I had told myself and realized
that we would achieve our goals,
simply, we would take a new path.
We had no money,
well it does not matter, we were going to sell our house:
it’s obvious when you have a child of ten months.
We made a bank loan,
negotiated favorable terms of purchase for the boat.
And then, the team could not be professional,
she would be a volunteer.
For a two-year project,
it’s not so obvious
but, nevertheless, that’s what we did.
Step by step,
dozens and dozens of volunteers joined us.
For a year, there was a colossal project.
Little by little, the team took ownership of the project,
and fought for the departure to take place.
Then, so that the expedition is realized, day after day.
In the end, we made a two-year expedition to Greenland.
We achieved our goals:
we sailed to the far north of Greenland.
We’ve been diving hundreds of times.
We made the first polar dives
in the 100 meter zone,
in summer and winter under the pack ice.
We have conducted many scientific programs
and the expedition returned to France
in September last year with remarkable success.
Last spring,
few months ago,
one of our biggest partners joined us,
to allow the realization of the next expedition “Under The Pole 3”,
who will leave next May
for a trip around the world by the polar regions, which will last 3 years.
So, why do I tell you all this?
Because these life experiences,
which led me to this explorer’s life,
also taught me three basic things.
The first is that we all have inner strength,
passion,
which can be a prodigious source of energy if it is awake,
on the condition of being able to listen
and capture this little seed sown by our encounters,
that will germinate in us,
and allow us to take off.
The second,
it is that we must never forget our deep aspirations,
and when the time comes, take the tangent,
take a tangent towards the unknown, towards infinity,
dare to put yourself in danger,
dare to step out of his comfort zone,
engage in taking measured risks,
bite the yellow line but never the red line.
Because it is by exposing
we will stimulate unsuspected resources
to respond to new situations.
The third thing I remembered
and certainly the most important,
is that the obstacles can be openings
and sometimes even stepping stones.
Because when we face
the tests we encounter,
the difficulty will feed us,
adversity will strengthen us,
will forge us
and little by little give birth in us a prodigious force
who does not invent,
who does not deceive,
which is called courage.
So today,
I still dream,
I dream of building a submarine,
worthy of Jules Verne,
an oceanographic exploration vessel of the 21st century,
turned to discovery and adventure.
So, I do not know if I’ll get there
because the future is full of unknowns and surprises
but in any case I’m working on it.
This is what I find the most formidable in the adventure,
you never know in advance what you will meet.
Thank you
and I wish you a good trip.
(Applause)
”
Be First to Comment