Prince Albert II of Monaco embarks on a South Pole expedition with the Support of Breitling
With a special edition of the "Emergency", Breitling is supporting Prince Albert II of Monaco’s "Monaco South Pole Expedition”. On 4th of January 2009, Prince Albert II and his team will embark on an expedition to the South Pole. The expedition begins in the south of Chile and ends after 16 days in Cape Town, South Africa. Through this initiative Prince Albert II wants to draw attention to the continuing environmental damage, climate change and the melting of the polar caps.
During the expedition, Prince Albert II will be wearing the Breitling” Emergency”, a chronograph with built-in distress transmitter. The Breitling Emergency, which was launched in 1995 and especially designed for pilots and adventurers, is a quartz watch with built-in micro transmitter broadcasting on the 121.5 MHz aircraft emergency frequency. Over flat terrain or calm sea, the transmitter’s signal has a range of 167 kilometres, assuming the search aircraft is flying at 6,000 metres. The Emergency’s transmitter is activated by unscrewing a protective cap and pulling the antenna out fully. The special edition with a "Monaco South Pole Expedition" logo is limited to eight pieces worldwide for the participants of the expedition.
In 2003, two British pilots, Steve Brooks and Hugh Quentin-Smith, crashed their helicopter in Antarctica and were rescued after activating their Breitling Emergency transmitter watches. The world-famous American millionaire and adventurer Steve Fossett on the other hand was known to have owned a Breitling Emergency watch, but was not wearing the watch at the time of his disappearance on 3rd of September 2007.
The model which Prince Albert II will be wearing on the expedition will be put up for auction in October 2009 to raise money for charity. The watch which Prince Albert II was wearing on his expedition to the North Pole in 2006 was auctioned for 130,000 Euros. This was the highest price ever paid for a steel watch.
For any further information go to http://www.fpa2.com/.