After three weeks of pulling 150-pound sleds, UK's Prince Harry reached the South Pole with his trekking team as part of a charity expedition.
Harry was involved with the three-week-long Walking With the Wounded South Pole Allied Challenge, a charity event during which teams of wounded servicemen were supposed to race against each other. The challenge aimed to show support for wounded soldiers and raise awareness of their strength, but the competitive element was cancelled due to harsh conditions, which organizers thought would place unnecessary strain on the participants.
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Harry joined four injured British servicemen on one team; another included four wounded U.S. soldiers; the third and final team was comprised of Australians and Canadians. They arrived at the South Pole at 12:00 GMT on Friday and planted flags to celebrate their achievement, as the video above shows.
"Our aim was to show that, despite injury, young men and women from our armed forces can still achieve great things," said Ed Parker, the expedition's director, according to the BBC. "We came down here, determined to get 12 men and women, all injured in conflict, to the South Pole, and this is what we have done. The feeling is incredible." The challenge was organized to show the public that soldiers wounded in combat are still capable of great achievements. Some of the participants have lost limbs fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq; Walking With the Wounded raises funds for injured veterans and helps them return to normalcy after war and find new careers.
The teams' arrival at the South Pole marked the end of their 200-miles trek across Antarctica in minus 31 degrees Fahrenheit, made even colder by high winds.
Prince Harry, who also joined Walking With The Wounded's charity trek in the North Pole in 2011, became the first member of the British royal family to ever reach the South Pole.
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Image: Victoria Nicholson/WWTW via Getty Images