Because of his sore feet, Fuchs often arrived more than an hour late to camp. Messner didn't want to wait so he preferred to put up the tent by himself. It was a difficult procedure in the high winds. Their occasional use of parachute sails increased their daily mileage. Once, before the Pole, Messner lost control of his sail, fell, and cut open his right elbow. "How easily you can break a leg or an arm," Fuchs commented later.
Finally, on February 12, after a journey of 92 days covering 1,550 miles, Messner and Fuchs reached New Zealand's Scott Base, on McMurdo Sound. That same day a team of explorers led by Will Steger and Jean-Louis Etienne was 3,300 miles into its own seven-month crossing of Antarctica, using dogsleds. Both achievements, though different in scale and concept, add to the heroic legacy of adventure and exploration left by such men as Amundsen, Shackleton, and Scott
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