Spirit of Hong Kong Awards: explorer inspires youth through glacial field trips
Wilson Cheung’s unconventional path to career in glaciology helps him mentor young people through hands-on field science
When Wilson Cheung took Hong Kong secondary school students into the Swiss Alps this summer, terrain he had once been able to reach had become inaccessible.
Glacier melt and thawing ground had destabilised parts of the mountain, while rockfall made fieldwork more hazardous.
Only weeks earlier, Cheung had completed a roughly 1,700km (1,056-mile) scientific snowkite traverse across Greenland in 2026. The journey took him across the ice sheet while he continued collecting data in one of the world’s most extreme environments.
“We can see it in the measurements, but when we are actually there, we see the physical changes in front of you,” he said.
