An occurrence a few years ago in Russia’s region of Arctic reminds us how a Company marketing extreme tourism in a positive light is not guaranteed to portray the activity honestly or realistically.
The glossy brochures that often seem so enticing when headlining a tour, soon become nothing but an expanse of glossy advertisements devoid of meaning.
One of the most shocking events took place during New Year celebrations in early 2026 when, whilst participating in a group ice-floating activity on the Tuloma River, located east of the Northern Arctic City of Kola in the southern region of Murmansk, where a 57-year-old Belarusian woman was declared missing after disappearing without a trace and later believed to have been taken away by the rapid moving waters of the river.
Authorities believe she was carried away by the river’s powerful flow, and there is a strong indication that she did not survive.
Those unfamiliar with the sport of ice-floatation would consider it to be an activity which promotes health and wellness. Ice-floatation participants don thick insulated flotation suits that are designed to maintain body warmth and buoyancy in very cold water. The idea is simple; you float on your back and relax while reclining on the ice-cold surface of the water (like you are on top of ice), only slightly submerged, and not strangled or drowned. Many tours also promote the concept of “there being zero chance of drowning.”
That promise now seems brutally ironic.
Unlike most visitors, tourists don’t know that these suits may keep you warm and allow you to float; they are very stiff, which limits users’ ability to move freely and quickly. Because of the limited mobility of their bodies, participants in this activity are almost always connected to each other or watched over very closely—particularly when they’re in a moving river because the water can behave unpredictably (and suddenly).
Because of the unpredictability of the Tuloma River at the location used for these types of activities, many locals warn that it is a dangerous type of activity to attempt. The Tuloma River has unpredictable behaviors that result from combination of factors such as underwater currents, tidal waves, and changes in water velocity. When it was reported that this woman was lost from her group, the river was at its lowest tide, and that had caused the water to be moving quickly downriver toward the ocean and would have placed significant strain on all objects floating above it.
She was floating in the water for less than 40 minutes before she disappeared.
As soon as they heard about this, rescuers immediately began searching both directions in the river, along with searching toward the ocean. The amount of snow/ice and freezing temperatures, combined with the extremely thick fog, freezing temperatures, extremely rapid velocity of the river, and total darkness, made it very difficult, if not impossible, for the rescue teams to search for her.
A volunteer who participated in the recovery effort said that rescue work was nearly impossible due to the severe weather.
The odds of surviving a minimum of 36 hours in cold water are extremely low. It is believed by most experts that this woman would have been unable to survive longer than about 3 hours, maximum, and therefore authorities are considering her dead.
This is not the first time that tourists in Russia have nearly drowned while attempting to engage with “floating ice.” There was an earlier incident in which tourists from India and China were rescued after they were swept away by a floating ice sheet in the same way as was the case during this incident.
Questions surrounding the safety of the activity will arise as a result of this tragedy. As a consequence of the investigation by the Investigative Committee of Russia, the trip organisers have been charged with negligence on the basis of the fact that the equipment used for this activity was not up to safety standards (they had been advised by the Investigative Committee of Russia that the safety equipment did not meet Russian safety standards) and that thermal flotation suits have been seized and will be used as evidence in the investigation.
There is a big difference between the adventure showing up on social media to attract tourists and the reality of nature’s unpredictability. While there is a perception in social media images of extreme adventure, however appealing they may seem to be, nature does not care about the images that were posted on social media.
The cold rivers and the unpredictable Arctic weather do not adjust for a marketing plan, and sometimes a tourist will find out the hard way how close the line separates between a unique experience and a real threat to their life when they are faced with the suddenness of nature’s force.
