<P> In 1988 a 13 - man strong team (9 Soviets, 4 Canadians) skied across the arctic from Siberia to northern Canada . One of the Canadians, Richard Weber became the first person to reach the Pole from both sides of the Arctic Ocean . </P> <P> On 4 May 1990 Børge Ousland and Erling Kagge became the first explorers ever to reach the North Pole unsupported, after a 58 - day ski trek from Ellesmere Island in Canada, a distance of 800 km . </P> <P> On 7 September 1991 the German research vessel Polarstern and the Swedish icebreaker Oden reached the North Pole as the first conventional powered vessels . Both scientific parties and crew took oceanographic and geological samples and had a common tug of war and a football game on an ice floe . Polarstern again reached the pole exactly 10 years later with the Healy . </P> <P> In 1998, 1999, and 2000 Lada Niva Marshs (special very large wheeled versions made by BRONTO, Lada / Vaz's experimental product division) were driven to the North Pole . The 1998 expedition was dropped by parachute and completed the track to the North Pole . The 2000 expedition departed from a Russian research base around 114 km from the Pole and claimed an average speed of 20--15 km / h in an average temperature of − 30 ° C . </P>

Where is the north pole and south pole