Oldgreymare - John Blashford-Snell is one of Ran's longest and strongest supporters, so if you admire him, and he admires Ran...
Operation Raleigh has been a phenomenal success over the years, and has been specifically targeted at young people. Blashers is a one-off, and a good egg.
Ran's expeditions have had different motivations, but the inspiration happens nevertheless. This time, if you look at the website, you'll see there is some significant research which has never been done because the Antarctic winter is so vicious.
The money the expedition will raise (target £10 million) goes to a charity fighting avoidable blindness, so the efforts by Ran and the whole team will benefit large numbers of people very quickly. There aren't many people in the world who can raise that kind of money in a lifetime; Ran has done this many times over. I don't know the total sums he's raised for charities, but it's in the tens of millions, which I'd say was justification in itself – wouldn't you?
And may I say, gently, that as his expeditions are privately funded by business sponsors, and everyone on the expedition is a volunteer, and the contingency plans if rescue is needed are also privately funded, Ran doesn't need to justify himself to anyone. Nor does he need to prove himself, recognised the world over as an extraordinary achiever.
