In January 1925, doctors in isolated Nome, Alaska, diagnosed a deadly outbreak of diphtheria. Without antitoxin serum, the town's entire population faced devastation. With Nome's port frozen shut and crude open-cockpit aircraft unable to operate in sub-zero arctic gales, officials realized the only option was a sled dog relay across 674 miles of the frozen Iditarod Trail from Nenana.
Organized in record time, 20 mushers and over 150 dogs took part in the 'Great Race of Mercy.' Temperatures plunged below minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit, with gale-force winds pushing windchills to minus 85. The delicate serum was wrapped in padded quilts, but mushers still had to periodically warm it by roadhouse stoves.
Musher Leonhard Seppala and his lead dog Togo braved the deadliest stretch, taking a shortcut across the fracturing sea ice of Norton Sound in complete darkness. On the final leg, Gunnar Kaasen and lead dog Balto pushed through whiteout blizzards so severe that Kaasen could not see the dogs right in front of him. When a gust flipped the sled and buried the serum in snow, Kaasen searched frantically with bare hands to retrieve it.
The relay completed the entire grueling distance in 127. 5 hours—five and a half days—saving the town without breaking a single vial. While Balto received a statue in New York's Central Park, true insiders credit Togo for covering 261 miles of the treacherous route.