Ranulph Fiennes

Ranulph Fiennes in 2014

Sir Ranulph Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes, 3rd Baronet OBE (born March 7, 1944 in Windsor , Berkshire , England ) is a British researcher, author and holder of several endurance records. Among other things, he is the first person to reach both the North and South Poles by land.

Life

Ranulph Fiennes was born in the UK but spent part of his childhood in South Africa. The extensive aristocratic Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes family also includes the actors Ralph and Joseph Fiennes , the director Martha Fiennes , and the barons Saye and Sele . From his father, Sir Ranulph Twisleton-Wykham-Fiennes, 2nd Baronet, who died on November 24, 1943 in the Second World War, he had inherited the title of Baronet , of Banbury in the County of Oxford , which is associated with the address "Sir" is.

Ranulph Fiennes first attended Eton College in Eton before joining the Royal Scots Grays and later the British Special Air Service , of which he was a member for eight years. He later served in the private army of the Sultan of Oman .

Fiennes had been a researcher since the 1960s. He led expedition trips on the Nile and over the Jostedalsbreen Glacier in 1970. He undertook what is probably his most famous expedition from 1979 to 1982. Fiennes and Charles Burton traveled around the world along the polar axes, covering 52,000 miles (approx. 83,686 km). back and were the first people to reach both poles.

In 1992, Fiennes led an expedition that discovered the lost city of Ubar in Oman. The following year, a crossing of the Antarctic continent failed without a support team. Fiennes and his companion, the nutrition specialist Mike Stroud , had to call for a rescue on the 95th day of their tour shortly before the finish on the Ross Ice Shelf due to hunger and frostbite . Fiennes failed again in 1996 in an attempt to single-handedly reach the South Pole.

Despite suffering from heart disease and bypass surgery four months prior to the event , Fiennes and Stroud completed seven complete marathons in seven days on six continents in 2003. Your itinerary looked like this:

• October 26th, Marathon 1: Patagonia , South America
• October 27, Marathon 2: Falkland Islands , South America
• October 28th, Marathon 3: Sydney , Australia
• October 29th, Marathon 4: Singapore , Asia
• October 30th, Marathon 5: London , Europe
• October 31, Marathon 6: Cairo , Africa
• 0November 1, Marathon 7: New York , North America

The original plan was for the first marathon to take place on King George Island (Antarctica). The second would have been in Santiago de Chile ( Chile ). However, bad weather conditions meant that the plan had to be changed at short notice so that the first took place in southern Patagonia and the marathon on the Falkland Islands served as a substitute for the Antarctic marathon. After the seven-day race, Fiennes said that the toughest marathon would have been the one in Singapore due to the high humidity and pollution.

In 2013, Ranulph Fiennes wanted to be the first to cross Antarctica in the southern winter. His team included Richmond Dykes, Rob Lambert, Ian Prickett, Brian Newham, and Spencer Smirl. When repairing a defective ski binding , however, he suffered frostbite on four fingers on his left hand and had to be evacuated. In June the rest of the team gave up too.

In parallel to his career as a researcher and world traveler, Fiennes's reputation as a writer also increased. He has published 13 novels and non-fiction books to date. The last thing he published was a biography of the polar explorer Robert Falcon Scott , in which he resolutely defended Scott's achievements.

Fiennes was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1993 because of his social commitment . He had raised more than £ 5 million for charity during his expeditions. In 1995 he was awarded the Polar Medal .

After the death of his first wife, who died of stomach cancer in 2004 , Fiennes has been preparing to be the first person to climb the Seven Summits and cross both polar caps in 2016 . He collects donations for the British Palliative Foundation Marie Curie.

Works (selection)

• Where Soldiers Fear to Tread . 1975, ISBN 0-3401-4754-7 .
• To The Ends of the Earth . 1983, ISBN 0-340-25277-4 .
• Living Dangerously . 1987, ISBN 0-7515-0434-3 .
• The Feather Men . 1992, ISBN 0-7475-1049-0 .
• Atlantis of the Sands: The Search for the Lost City of Ubar . 1992, ISBN 0-451-17577-8 .
• Mind Over Matter: The Epic Crossing of the Antarctic Continent . 1993, ISBN 0-385-31216-4 .
• The Sett . 1996, ISBN 0-434-00267-4 .
• Beyond the limits . 2000, ISBN 0-316-85458-1 .
• Captain Scott . 2003, ISBN 0-340-82699-1 .
  • German by Harald Stadler: Scott. The life of a legend . mareverlag , Hamburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-86648-153-4 , new edition mareverlag, Hamburg 2020, ISBN 978-3-86648-618-8
• The Secret Hunters . 2001, ISBN 0-316-85869-2 .

Filmography (selection)

• 2011: Killer Elite (book The Feather Men )

Web links

• Literature by and about Ranulph Fiennes in the catalog of the German National Library
• Ranulph Fiennes in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Sir Ranulph Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes, 3rd Bt. On thepeerage.com

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ranulph Fiennes in the Internet Movie Database (English)
2. ↑ Off in the Arctic  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.   , Video on the Tagesspiegel website
3. ↑ Scott Rosenfield: The Coldest Journey Polar Expedition Halted , in Outside on June 11, 2013
4. ↑ Intriguing past of Sir Ranulph Fiennes's new wife . In: Mail Online . ( dailymail.co.uk [accessed July 11, 2017]).
5. ↑ JustGiving: Read Ranulph's story. Retrieved July 11, 2017 . 

predecessor	Office	successor
Ranulph Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes	Baronet, of Banbury 1944 – present	current title holder