HYDERABAD: Mom asks us to take care of the milk on the stove and we end up letting it spill and go bananas over it. And here is a millennial who is challenging the spilling volcanoes and literally falling into a soup (lava). Sai Tej Peddineni, a 25-year old, who just completed one volcano expedition is already gearing up for another. This time, he is going get into the volcano, he warns.
Having discontinued his BTech, Sai Tej volunteered to help the police department as a hacker. He took inspiration from Bill Gates. “I was born rebel. I felt I was not learning anything from my lecturers and thus dropped out. I later got into consultation and my clients were a few engineering institutions and international banks”.
Sai strongly feels that his path has always been the road less chosen. He wanted to break free from the run-of-the-mill routine and felt the urge to quench his thirst for adventure. It was then that Sai embarked on his journey of self discovery with travel, endurance running, base jumping, bungee jumping and parachute jumping. However, none of these were able to give him the break from the mundane routine that he was looking for. “These were being done by people across the world. I wanted to do something different. I wanted to be on top of the world,” he illustrates.
“And as I was searching, I came to look at volcano exploration movie which made me tremble. It hit me that I found my calling. That’s what I wanted to do. Onewarto, in Pacific islands, has a volcanic island called as Embrym which can burst anytime. I choose to go there, that was the ultimate thing I could do,” he adds. His parents were opposed to the idea at first, given the perils of such an expedition.
“My mom got sick and she got hospitalised. She was frightened about what I was going to do. But, eventually, she agreed because she didn’t want me to go mad dreaming about it,” he informs with pride.
Onwarto proved to be a great challenge to Sai’s mental fitness and made him ready to conquer bigger, more dangerous volcanoes. Sai went on to successfully finish an expedition to Dukono in Indonesia, a feat that cost him 10 lakh rupees that he paid for all by himself. His gear includes a tactical outdoor suit, thermal camera, drones, GoPro’s, most of which are imported and of military grade. Sai’s plans to head back to Onwarto near Australia but this time, he has added an additional agenda in his itinerary - getting into the volcano itself.
Says Sai, “Temperature inside the volcano is more than 1,000 degrees, and only two people have gone there till now. The volcano is explosive. I will be the first from Asia to go.”
Multiple suits will be used for his protection and a helicopter would be available to immediate rescue and evacuation if something were to go wrong. Sai plans on going 450 meters into the volcano. “We need to track weather and volcano activity. Constant 3-D pictures of the volcano will help us do this. We are going to use heat shields to protect the cameras. We are planning to get sponsors from international brands,” Sai informs. The cameras are being imported from Germany and Israel while the suit is being sourced from the US.
Sai’s achievements have not gone unnoticed. He was called upon by the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh, Chandrababu Naidu. “I was surprised to know that he was tracking my updates, I seeked help for diplomatic relations and sponsorships,” he shares.
Sai plans on meeting with the Chief Minister of Telangana, K Chandrashekar Rao as well and is also being felicitated by the Home Minister of Telangana, Naini Narasimha Reddy.