Comment by stouset | Hacker News Reader

Comment by stouset | Hacker News Reader

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I made the mistake of going splitboarding in the backcountry a few years back in -20°C with -40°C windchill.

Going up the mountain was surprisingly fine. I even had taken off both my jackets and was just wearing thermals as the heat I was generating working to go uphill was enough to keep me comfortable.

Unfortunately when we reached the top, we also ended up directly in the wind with no available cover. Within the ten minutes it took to put my jackets back on and transition to go downhill, I was nearly hypothermic. I couldn’t even operate my fingers enough to bring the idiot-proof magnetic clasp on my helmet together. The whole group was on the verge of panic to get off the top of that ridge. If we’d stayed there five more minutes, I’m not confident we would have made it back home that day.

I can’t fully express how obscenely, unconscionably, and incomparably cold that was. I have never felt anything like it and I hope never to again.

I once encountered -30°F one winter in Fairbanks. I visited a hot spring where, for some cruel and unusual reason, the facility was designed so you needed to walk about 10 meters out of the (well heated) building to get to the water. And of course, you would do this walk in nothing but just your bathing suit. That was the longest 10m walk of my life.

The cherry on the cake of the experience was that you get into water that is 70+°F but every part of your body above the water line is exposed to -30°F winds. Fun!

Where I grew up, each winter there were a few days that started at -30-40°C. Walking is not too bad (in the squeaky snow) because usually there's NO wind. Cars usually had (plug-in engine-coolant) 'tank heaters' and battery trickle-chargers to keep engines startable.

But there were plenty of snowmobile riders in the area. Some of them who bundled up and attempted to ride at these temperatures learned that their lungs did not work well after a short time.

Living in Ulaanbaatar Mongolia for some time I experienced temperatures of -20 -30 -40 Celsius. Every ten degrees lower I thought it was going to be the same, but was I wrong.

My most notable discovery was when I wanted to jump start my car, because the battery died due to the cold. I was about to bring out my jumper cables when my local friend told me to bring the cables inside first.

I didn't understand why and naively ignored what he said only for the rubber jumper cables to literally crumble in my hand, breaking as I tried to straighten them.

Mongolians are so resilient and have so much knowledge on how to survive in extreme weathers with a simple yurt and a livestock of 100 sheep goats and horses.

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