Rhino Challenge 2003

2003 RHINO CHARGE REPORT CAR NO. 42 - Kindly Supported by Tony Down of Rhino Leisure & Safari, Nairobi; in Conjunction with MILE MARKER WINCHES The Rhino Charge - An event held in some of Kenya's most remote and spectacular locations in which 55 teams of drivers and crew try to navigate a 4X4 vehicle the shortest distance around a course revealed only the night before. This unique sporting event, entirely amateur in nature, has earned its place in the annals of fund raising history in Kenya. The purpose - To raise money for the Rhino Ark whose mission it is to build a 320 kilometre (200 mile) game proof fence around the entire Aberdare Conservation area. Each vehicle taking part in the charge must raise as much money as it can and all the money raised goes towards the building of the Aberdare fence. The Rhino Ark set out in 1988 to build the fence, which is intended to keep poachers out, and animals that were threatening crops close by in. The Aberdare mountain range is covered in indigenous forest, containing many diverse forms of flora and fauna and home to numerous elephants, buffalo, leopard and also the rare giant forest hog and bongo. In addition, it has become one of the last strongholds of the black rhino, poached so mercilessly for its horn in the 1980's, now enjoying the benefits of security that is provided by the ongoing construction of the fence which has reached its halfway stage. The Aberdares are also home to more than a million farmers who use its rich soils and rainfall to produce 70 percent of Kenya's coffee and 30 percent of its tea. Furthermore the Aberdares are also the major water catchment area for Nairobi and many other parts of the country as they are the source of several of Kenya's major rivers. With water fast becoming the most valuable commodity for the country, continuation of this fence must go on. Car number 42 - The car was once a Range Rover, but has been heavily modified to suit extreme off road driving in terrain that ranges from rock and boulder-strewn hills, deep gorges, forest, deep sand, rivers and swamps. The car has been shortened in the nose, at the rear and in the middle, the engine lowered slightly and moved back to centralize the Centre of Gravity and make the car ideal for such an event. The team is made up of a group of six friends all of whom played Rugby together, and have the combined might to lift an end of the car off the ground when even a Mile Marker Winch cannot do the job! Rhino Charge 2003 - This year's event was based in an area of Kenya known as the Laikipia Plateau, on the Mukurian Group Ranch, an area which comprises steep sided, boulder covered hills, thick cedar forest, deep washes and erosion gullys, rivers, acacia thickets, and patches of open grassland. This all combined to make for a very interesting Rhino Charge indeed! The straight line distance as set out by the distances between all13 checkpoints we plotted on the map given to us the night before the event was 40.7 Kilometres. The route was very cryptic as there were two approaches - clockwise around the course or anti-clockwise, both of which having its own virtues. After much debate, we decided to do the outwardly more difficult route (there were some very steep inclines to climb doing it that way, but we were confident in the abilities of the Mile Marker Winch), the virtues of which were that we would do the very technical stuff first then the open stuff later in case we needed to catch-up on time. It turned out the better option and only 3 other cars out of 55 did the same. We won by 2.5 Kilometres - a convincing victory considering the stiff competition! The Mile Marker Winch - We had to use the winch on two occasions. The first was in a deep, narrow and steep-sided seasonal river bed which we had reasonable access into, but the opposite bank was very steep, and about 15 feet from base to top. The river bed was too short and steep to get a decent run-up, and to make matters worse, we could not afford to slide back down the bank as we had about 6 inches to play with either side of the wheels - one side had a huge boulder, and the other side had a 15 foot drop-off. So we used what momentum and traction we could get to a point about 1/3 up the bank, then stopped (just!) and recruited the services of the winch. We found the power of the winch to be remarkable (having used other winches in previous Rhino Charges), as it hauled the car up the bank without a noticeable change in tone of the winch motor, apparently handling the task with ease. The second occasion was towards the end of our very last section where, determined to use the straightest line possible between the two checkpoints, we had to climb up over a very steep boulder, which had just been rained on and was extremely slippery. There was very little traction and the incline on the boulder too great for us to climb without a winch. The boulder was also littered with smaller rocks (but still large) all over and around it, which had to be steered cautiously around. This gave rise to the need for a lot of stopping and starting on the winch control. Again the pulling power of the winch was very impressive, but just short of the top, though past the worst of it, the solenoid/relay failed - we presume it overheated from all the stopping and starting, and this was confirmed when half an hour later the winch worked fine again. Fortunately the car and the strength of the team were able to manhandle it over the last couple of rocks. RHINO CHARGE 2003 - RESULTS GAUNTLET ADJUSTED BY A FACTOR OF: 10.0 POSN CAR No ENTRANT VEHICLE No.OF GPs VISITED DISTANCE COVERED (ADJUSTED) TIME TAKEN 1 42 McRae/W Carr-Hartley Range Rover 13 55.096 09:42 2 29 L. Svensson/L & F L/Rover 90 13 57.506 09:48 3 3 M Owen/G Le Breton Toyota L/C 13 58.267 09:38 4 49 Braeburn Bush Baby/T Childs Land Rover 13 59.502 09:44 5 11 Swedish Team / Jonas Gejke VolvoTGB 11 13 60.123 09:56 6 33 Rob Collinge Range Rover P/U 13 61.095 09:36 7 2 Manee Choda Toyota VX 13 62.226 09:49 8 6 Ian Duncan Toyota GX 13 62.564 09:40 9 15 Danish R.C. Team Toyota L/C FJ43 13 62.939 09:48 10 38 Avery/Dames Land Rover 13 63.527 09:51 11 12 Jas Semhi Jeep MB 13 64.045 09:48 12 7 Mahesh Bhatti Land Rover 90 13 64.243 09:55 13 19 D. Dass/ A. Gremley Mercedes G-Wagon 13 65.316 09:50 14 5 McKittrick/Knight/Stubbs/Trundell/Hutch R. Rover Buggy 13 65.659 09:54 15 26 Asit Patel R/Rover S/W 13 68.857 09:55 Also using a Mile Marker Winch, Car No. 29. We would like to thank Rhino Leisure & Safari for their generous support in helping us out with a Mile Marker winch, and congratulations to Mile Marker for producing an outstanding winch. The Rhino Charge raised US$ 343,000.00 in support of wildlife conservation in Kenya! Sincerely, Car no. 42 William Carr-Hartley (Driver) Neil McRae (Chief Navigator) Justin Larby Michael Carr-Hartley David Francombe Simon Evans Other MileMarker News.