Explorer saw nature’s sheer beauty and power in Saudi Arabia’s Empty Quarter

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The Dubai-based Italian explorer Max Calderan crossed the vast, empty, undulating sand dunes of the Rub Al-Khali desert, the so-called Empty Quarter in the east of Saudi Arabia, on foot via an unexplored route. (Empty Quarter Studios)
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The Dubai-based Italian explorer Max Calderan crossed the vast, empty, undulating sand dunes of the Rub Al-Khali desert, the so-called Empty Quarter in the east of Saudi Arabia, on foot via an unexplored route. (Empty Quarter Studios)
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The Dubai-based Italian explorer Max Calderan crossed the vast, empty, undulating sand dunes of the Rub Al-Khali desert, the so-called Empty Quarter in the east of Saudi Arabia, on foot via an unexplored route. (Shutterstock)
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Updated 05 February 2020
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Explorer saw nature’s sheer beauty and power in Saudi Arabia’s Empty Quarter

  • Max Calderan has joined famous group of men who have crossed Rub Al-Khali desert
  • Calderan completed his 16-day journey on foot using unexplored West-East route

DUBAI: Rub Al-Khali, also known as the Empty Quarter, is the world’s largest uninterrupted sand mass, encompassing most of the southern third of the Arabian Peninsula.

It is a landscape of ever-changing endless dunes made famous by expeditions undertaken between the 1930s and 1950s by Bertram Thomas, Wilfred Thesiger and their Arab companions. Max Calderan, a long-time Dubai resident originally from Italy, has just become the latest man to join that famous group.

Previous explorers are known to have crossed shorter sections of Rub Al-Khali on camels or in off-road vehicles, whereas Calderan completed his journey on foot via an unexplored route.

With his latest feat, Calderan has realized at once a lifelong ambition and, as he puts it, “the dream,” not “a dream.” For the compulsive record-setter, the journey was also a humbling reminder of nature’s awesome power and beauty.

The father of three — and soon-to-be father of four — set off on his 16-day Empty Quarter expedition on Jan. 18 in Saudi Arabia, from Najran, located 880 km from Riyadh.

His plan was to cross on foot one of the world’s hottest and most-brutal deserts, one that covers about 650,000 square km and includes parts of Saudi Arabia, Oman, the UAE and Yemen.

“When I was only seven years old in 1974, I was reading the encyclopedia where it was written that Saudi Arabia’s Rub Al-Khali is the biggest sand desert around the world,” Calderan recalled during an exclusive interview with Arab News.

“No camels could enter that part of the desert, there was no water and even migratory birds were making diversions.

“So, I drew a picture and told my mother that I would be the first man to enter that area and understand why camels can’t. And on that day, I had a dream of an older man, just like me now, walking alone in the Empty Quarter.”

Calderan’s dream came true when he trekked through 1,100 km of desert from west to east, covering over 800 km of “virgin territory” armed with little more than a backpack and a sleeping bag.

He said on most days he trekked for an average of 18 hours in temperatures that ranged from 2.7 degrees Celsius in the early hours of the morning to 35 degrees Celsius during the daytime.

He routinely woke up at 1:30 a.m. and began his exploration in the darkness by 2 a.m., venturing out into the desert to cover about 80 km before setting up his sleeping bag for another night under the stars, often between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.

Despite planning 67 meeting points along his route, each 18km apart, his support team, which traveled by car and supplied him with food and water, was unable to ensure their paths crossed on a daily basis due to unpredictable weather conditions and diversions.

So Calderan’s exact location was tracked through his satellite phone every 15 minutes by a team based in London that oversaw his entire expedition.

FASTFACT

Rub Al-Khali is part of the larger Arabian Desert, covering 650,000 sq km and including parts of Saudi Arabia, Oman, the UAE and Yemen.

“From my previous experience, I was best prepared — and had the capability to stay totally alone in the desert — when I had enough food and water in my backpack to last at least 250 km,” he said.

About 200 km into his journey, Calderan encountered a community that he referred to as “original, pure and genuine Bedouin tribes.

“I stopped several times to talk to them because I needed as much information as possible about Rub Al-Khali, as what had been written in the books was not totally accurate,” he said.

He was advised to take either the north or south route across the Empty Quarter since these had been previously explored.

The tribesmen tried to convince him that walking straight down the middle of the largest continuous sand desert on Earth was extremely “unsafe” and nearly “impossible,” Calderan said.

“They said: ‘You have to understand that the more you will move ahead, the less you will find animals, trees and water. There’s nothing there.’”

Calderan said he remained undeterred by the tribes’ advice, having made up his mind to stay the course even as he began what he described as a “spiritual conversation with mother nature.”

He told Arab News: “I asked permission from Rub Al-Khali. “I said: ‘Please let me go inside, let me explore your land.’

“The desert replied: ‘Now I will gift you something so you can start to understand who I am.’”

After watching a beautiful sunset, Calderan was caught in a severe sandstorm and was unable to meet his support team at the next agreed point.

“During the sandstorm, you couldn’t see more than two meters in any direction,” he said.




It took Max Calderan 16 days to cross the Empty Quarter. (Photo by Max Calderan/Empty Quarter Studios)

“If you took seven steps and turned around, you could just about see your fifth footstep and, for sure, your seventh would be gone.”

Once the storm had passed, Calderan said he once again called out to nature.

“Dear Rub Al-Khali, I now understand your power,” he said as he as he ventured into a terrain that, to this day, has stayed largely out of humanity’s sight.

Calderan said the landscape was now barren and the silence was deafening.

“This section of the desert was totally empty,” he recalled.

“I didn’t see a single animal track. I didn’t see any other footprints or camel waste. I didn’t even see or hear the sound of an aircraft in the sky.

“If I tried to shout, the sound came out from my mouth, but within a meter from me it would be absorbed by the sand.”

Calderan said it was difficult to form clear thoughts about daily life during the journey. He felt the power of nature had had the effect of silencing his mind.

“The power of the mind cannot do anything in front of thousands of kilometers (of empty desert). You stop thinking and start communicating with nature,” Calderan said.

“I thanked nature for the sights I was witnessing and, at a certain point, I said to it: ‘Do as you want with me — clean my mind, clean my body, clean my thoughts. I have only one mission and that is to see myself with my family again.’ That was indeed my goal.”

After notching up over 100 Empty Quarter sites on his GPS instrument — areas that included waterbeds, wolf footprints and an oryx corpse — Calderan began what he calls the “toughest” trek of all: The final 200km of the expedition.




Max Calderan’s location was tracked through his satellite phone every 15 minutes by a team based in London. (Empty Quarter Studios)

He was mentally prepared for encounters with dangerous creatures ranging from wild cats to deadly scorpions. But what turned out to be the biggest danger was the desert itself, Calderan said, recalling a moment when he stood before a “mountain of dunes” as high as 300 meters.

“It was as if I had travelled to hell — and it was the first time in my life I started to pray in order to come out,” he said.

Reaching the finishing point involved negotiating many more monstrous sand dunes, as a result of which Calderan often found himself exhausted, dehydrated and in a hallucinatory state.

“I was destroyed, but what happened is I got the awareness to understand that we as human beings, with all our arrogance and technology, are nothing in front of nature,” he said.

“We are searching for water in Mars while we are destroying our water resources on Earth.

“At this point, all my training, my strength and my previous experience amount to nothing. All I can understand is that it is time to start giving back to the environment.”

As he poured out his thoughts and emotions about his epic journey during the interview, Calderan said he is still overwhelmed and will need time to fully absorb the lessons of the last couple of weeks.

His hope is that his feat will go down in history alongside other famous expeditions of the Empty Quarter, but with an important difference: The newly created west-east "Calderan Line" will be used by generations of explorers to come.


Israel army sets limits on nighttime movement in south Lebanon

Updated 3 sec ago
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Israel army sets limits on nighttime movement in south Lebanon

Residents will be barred from traveling south of the Litani River

JERUSALEM: The Israeli army announced restrictions Wednesday on people’s movements in south Lebanon after dark, hours after a ceasefire with Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah took effect.
Residents will be barred from traveling south of the Litani River, some 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the border, between 1500 GMT and 0500 GMT Thursday, military spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on X. They will also be barred from returning to villages the army has ordered evacuated, he added.

Lebanon’s Berri reprises key mediator role in ceasefire deal

Updated 6 min 55 sec ago
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Lebanon’s Berri reprises key mediator role in ceasefire deal

  • Berri said Lebanon was closing “a historical moment that was the most dangerous that Lebanon has ever experienced”
  • He appealed to Lebanese to show unity for the sake of Lebanon

BEIRUT: Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri reprised his role as a key interlocutor between Hezbollah and the United States as Washington sought to mediate an end to the war with Israel, drawing on decades of experience to help clinch the deal.
It has underlined the sway the 86-year-old still holds over Lebanon, particularly the Shiite Muslim community in which he has loomed large for decades, and has been seen as a steadying influence since Israel killed Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the head of the Iran-backed Hezbollah, in September.
Addressing Lebanese in a televised speech on Wednesday, Berri said Lebanon was closing “a historical moment that was the most dangerous that Lebanon has ever experienced,” and appealed to Lebanese to show unity for the sake of Lebanon.
Berri rose to prominence as head of the Shiite Amal Movement during Lebanon’s 1975-90 civil war. He has served as parliament speaker — the highest role for a Shiite in Lebanon’s sectarian order — since 1992.
Hezbollah’s new leader Sheikh Naim Qassem endorsed Berri as a negotiator, calling him the group’s “big brother.” US envoy Amos Hochstein met Berri repeatedly during numerous visits to Beirut aiming to broker an end to the hostilities which were fought in parallel with the Gaza war and escalated dramatically in September.
It echoed the role Berri played in helping to bring an end to the last major war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006.
Diplomats say his role has been all the more important because Lebanon is without a president, its cabinet has only partial authority, and there are few ways to access Hezbollah, which is branded a terrorist group by the United States.
“When you come to Lebanon now, he is really the only person worth meeting. He is the state,” a Beirut-based diplomat said.
He rose to global prominence in 1985 by helping negotiate the release of 39 Americans held hostage in Beirut by Shiite militants who hijacked a US airliner during Lebanon’s 15-year civil war.
His election as speaker after the civil war coincided with Nasrallah’s rise to leadership of Hezbollah. Together, they led the “Shiite duo,” a reference to the two parties that dominated Shiite political representation and much of the state.
A diplomat who frequently visits Berri said: “He’s the trusted partner of Hezbollah, which makes him very important, but there is also a clear limit to what he can do, be it due to Hezbollah or Iranian stances.”
Israeli fire has hit areas where Berri’s Amal Movement holds sway, including the city of Tyre.

IMPROVING SHI’ITES’ STANDING
Born in 1938 in Sierra Leone to an emigrant merchant family from Tibnine, Berri was raised in Lebanon and was active in politics by the time he was at university.
Many in the once downtrodden Shiite community applaud Berri for helping improve their standing in a sectarian system where privileges were skewed toward Christians and Sunni Muslims.
A trained lawyer, Berri took the helm of Amal after its founder, Imam Musa Sadr, disappeared during a visit to Libya.
Berri was behind the military rise of Amal, which fought against nearly all the main parties to the civil war including Hezbollah, which later became an ally.
After the civil war, Berri’s Shiite followers joined the state apparatus and security agencies en masse, and he appeared to move in political lockstep with Hezbollah.
When a 2006 US embassy cable raised questions over his true feelings toward Hezbollah on its publication in 2010, he dismissed it, declaring that Nasrallah “is like myself.”
In 2023, Berri’s Amal fighters joined Hezbollah in firing rockets against Israel in solidarity with Gaza when Israel began its offensive after Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel.
Foreign envoys began visiting Beirut and meeting Berri to try to halt exchanges of fire across the Israel-Lebanon border, and sought to convince Hezbollah to withdraw north of the Litani River running some 30 km (20 miles) north of the frontier.
Berri told one foreign official “it would be easier to move the Litani River south to the border than to push Hezbollah north of the Litani,” a source close to Berri told Reuters.
But Berri’s opponents have also criticized him as part of the sectarian elite that steered Lebanon into economic ruin in 2019, when the financial system collapsed after decades of state corruption.
Others blame him for refusing to call a parliamentary session for lawmakers to elect a president, leaving the top Christian post in government empty for more than two years.
Berri’s role as a diplomatic conduit has irked Hezbollah’s political rivals, such as the Christian Lebanese Forces, who say any negotiations must be carried out by Lebanon’s president.


Iran reserves right to react to Israeli airstrikes, welcomes Lebanon ceasefire

Updated 40 min 26 sec ago
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Iran reserves right to react to Israeli airstrikes, welcomes Lebanon ceasefire

  • Asked whether the ceasefire could lead to an easing of tensions between Israel and Iran, Araghchi said: “It depends on the behavior of Israel“
  • “Of course, we reserve the right to react to the recent Israeli aggression, but we do consider all developments in the region“

LISBON: Tehran reserves the right to react to Israeli airstrikes last month on Iran but also bears in mind other developments in the region, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Wednesday.
Araghchi told reporters during a trip to Lisbon that Iran welcomed Tuesday’s ceasefire agreement in Lebanon and hoped it could lead to a permanent ceasefire. The ceasefire between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah came into effect on Wednesday under an agreement brokered by the United States and France.
Asked whether the ceasefire could lead to an easing of tensions between Israel and Iran, he said: “It depends on the behavior of Israel.”
“Of course, we reserve the right to react to the recent Israeli aggression, but we do consider all developments in the region,” he said.
Israel struck targets in Iran on Oct. 26 in retaliation for an Iranian missile barrage against Israel on Oct. 1.
Ali Larijani, a senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, said in an interview published by Iran’s Tasnim news agency on Sunday that his country was preparing to “respond” to Israel.
Although Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday Hezbollah had been “set back decades,” Araghchi said the armed group had not been weakened by Israel’s killing of many of its leaders since January and by its ground offensive against the group since early October.
Hezbollah has been able to reorganize itself and fight back effectively, Araghchi said.
“This is the main reason why Israel accepted the ceasefire...every time they (Hezbollah) lose their leaders or their commanders, they become bigger in both numbers and their strength,” he said.
His remarks echoed comments by a senior Hezbollah official, Hassan Fadlallah, who said the group would emerge from the war stronger and more numerous.


Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire holds in first hours, Lebanese civilians start to return home

A driver waves the flag of Hezbollah while passing a building destroyed in recent Israeli strikes in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Updated 4 min 3 sec ago
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Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire holds in first hours, Lebanese civilians start to return home

  • Families return to their homes in the most heavily bombed ares of Lebanon
  • Lebanon’s army says it was preparing to deploy to the south of the country as part of ceasefire agreement

BEIRUT: A ceasefire between Israel and Lebanese armed group Hezbollah held on Wednesday after the two sides struck a deal brokered by the US and France, a rare feat of diplomacy in the Middle East wracked by two wars and several proxy conflicts for over a year.
The agreement ended the deadliest confrontation between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group in years but Israel is still fighting its other arch foe the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Lebanon’s army, tasked with ensuring the ceasefire lasts, said it was preparing to deploy to the south of the country, a region Israel heavily bombarded in its battle against Hezbollah, along with eastern cities and towns and the armed group’s stronghold in the southern suburbs of Beirut.
Cars and vans piled high with mattresses, suitcases and even furniture streamed through the heavily-bombed southern port city of Tyre, heading south. Fighting had escalated drastically over the past two months, forcing hundreds of thousands of Lebanese from their homes.
Israel’s military said on Wednesday its forces were still on Lebanese territory and urged residents of southern Lebanese villages who had been ordered to evacuate in recent months to delay returning home until further notice from the Israeli military. Israeli troops have pushed around 6 km (4 miles) into Lebanon in a series of ground incursions launched in September.
Israel said it identified Hezbollah operatives returning to areas near the border and had opened fire to prevent them from coming closer. There were no immediate signs that the incident would undermine the ceasefire.
The agreement, which promises to end a conflict across the Israeli-Lebanese border that has killed thousands of people since it was ignited by the Gaza war last year, is a major achievement for the US in the waning days of President Joe Biden’s administration.
Diplomatic efforts will now turn to shattered Gaza, where Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas, which led the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israeli communities.
Israel has said its military aim in Lebanon had been to ensure the safe return of about 60,000 Israelis who fled from their communities along the northern border when Hezbollah started firing rockets at them in support of Hamas in Gaza.
In Lebanon, some cars flew national flags, others honked, and one woman could be seen flashing the victory sign with her fingers as people started to return to homes they had fled.
Many of the villages the people were likely returning to have been destroyed.
Hussam Arrout, a father of four said he was itching to return to his home.
“The Israelis haven’t withdrawn in full, they’re still on the edge. So we decided to wait until the army announces that we can go in. Then we’ll turn the cars on immediately and go to the village,” he said.
Announcing the ceasefire, Biden spoke at the White House on Tuesday shortly after Israel’s security cabinet approved the agreement in a 10-1 vote.
“This is designed to be a permanent cessation of hostilities,” Biden said. “What is left of Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations will not be allowed to threaten the security of Israel again.”
Israel will gradually withdraw its forces over 60 days as Lebanon’s army takes control of territory near its border with Israel to ensure that Hezbollah does not rebuild its infrastructure there after a costly war, Biden said.
He said his administration was also pushing for an elusive ceasefire in Gaza.
Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters that the group “appreciates” Lebanon’s right to reach an agreement which protects its people, and hopes for a deal to end the Gaza war.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan said the US would start its renewed push for a Gaza ceasefire on Wednesday.
But without a similar agreement yet in Gaza, many residents said they felt abandoned.
“We hope that all Arab and Western countries, and all people with merciful hearts and consciences...implement a truce here because we are tired,” said displaced Gazan Malak Abu Laila.
Egypt and Qatar, which along with the United States have tried unsuccessfully to mediate a ceasefire in Gaza, welcomed the Lebanon truce. Qatar’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday it hoped it would lead to a similar agreement to end the Gaza war.
Iran, which backs Hezbollah and Hamas as well as the Houthis that have attacked Israel from Yemen, said it also welcomed the ceasefire.
Israel has dealt a series of blows to Hezbollah, notably the assassination of its veteran leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The Israeli military said on Wednesday Israeli forces fired at several vehicles with suspects to prevent them from reaching a no-go zone in Lebanese territory and the suspects moved away.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said he instructed the military to “act firmly and without compromise” should it happen again.
Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah said that the militant Lebanese group would retain the right to defend itself if Israel attacked.
The ceasefire would give the Israeli army an opportunity to rest and replenish supplies, and isolate Hamas, said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“We have pushed them (Hezbollah) decades back. We eliminated Nasrallah, the axis of the axis. We have taken out the organization’s top leadership, we have destroyed most of their rockets and missiles,” he said.


‘Shaking with cold’: tourists from Egypt boat sinking brought ashore

Updated 27 November 2024
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‘Shaking with cold’: tourists from Egypt boat sinking brought ashore

  • Egypt released video footage Wednesday of the latest tourists rescued from a boat that capsized off the country’s Red Sea coast, where at least four people lost their lives

CAIRO: Egypt released video footage Wednesday of the latest tourists rescued from a boat that capsized off the country’s Red Sea coast, where at least four people lost their lives.
Seven people remain missing more than two days after the “Sea Story” was struck by a wave and overturned in the middle of the night.
The vessel had set off Sunday from Port Ghalib, near Marsa Alam in the southeast, on a multi-day diving trip with 31 tourists — mostly Europeans, along with Chinese and US nationals — and a 13-member crew.
Thirty-three were rescued, including tourists seen in the video stepping off a speedboat, draped in blankets, at a marina near Marsa Alam.
“We were shaking with cold,” one unidentified man said in the footage.
The tourists who appeared in the video had spent at least 24 hours inside a cabin of the overturned vessel before rescuers found them Tuesday morning, according to a government source close to the rescue operations.

A military-led team on Tuesday rescued two Belgians, one Swiss national, one Finnish tourist and one Egyptian, authorities said.
Two survivors — one identified by authorities on camera as an Egyptian — were rolled out on stretchers, one of them conscious and speaking.
A Belgian tourist sobbed when she was greeted by an Egyptian general.
Red Sea governor Amr Hanafi said the boat capsized “suddenly and quickly within five-seven minutes” after being struck by a strong wave in the middle of the night, leaving some passengers unable to escape their cabins.
The Sea Story had been due to dock on Friday at the tourist resort of Hurghada, about 200 kilometers (124 miles) north of Marsa Alam.
Authorities in Egypt have said the vessel was fully licensed and had passed all inspection checks. A preliminary investigation showed no technical fault.
There were at least two similar boat accidents in the Marsa Alam area earlier this year. There were no fatalities.
The Red Sea coast is a major tourist destination in Egypt.
Dozens of dive boats crisscross between Red Sea coral reefs and islands off Egypt’s eastern coast every day, where safety regulations are robust but unevenly enforced.