Australian millionaire busted while partying in newly ice-free Arctic. A sign of the times, the businessman chartered a yacht stocked with young girls, booze, and fireworks to cruise around the Arctic circle apparently just because he can. Canada seized illegal fireworks and fined him $10,000CA, which really is a water-drop in an  ocean of cash for this tycoon. He posted several pictures on his website, which were taken down early this week. I found the above thanks to google cache!

Aussie tycoon fined for using fireworks in Arctic 

An Australian millionaire has been fined $C10,000 ($9900) by Canadian authorities after a booze-fuelled party cruise in the Arctic.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police boarded a 34-metre, seven-stateroom luxury yacht moored in Cambridge Bay, Nunavut on September 7 and charged its owner, Paul McDonald, 51, with providing liquor to a minor and being in possession of liquor without a permit.

The federal police seized 200 bottles of liquor, as well as illegal fireworks, a Royal Canadian Mounted Police statement, issued on Tuesday, said.

The Nunatsiaq News said the resource businessman from Noosa, Australia, and his crew ignored warnings not to shoot off fireworks in the pristine Arctic environment and harassed musk ox and allowed a girl to dive off the boat.

Mr McDonald said in a statement that he regrets he was not familiar with the local laws or the restriction on fireworks or liquor at the time of the alleged incident.

Photos on the ship’s blog trackingfortrus.com showed the Fortrus crew jet-skiing among large chunks of ice near Canada’s Cornwall Island, lying on icebergs and posing with wild animals.

“This is the first time we’ve ever had this kind of thing happen,” a police spokeswoman told AFP.

Mr McDonald, who is leading the yacht on a circumnavigation of North America, is scheduled to appear in court on November 15, in the Nunavut community of 1500 where alcohol is banned.

Ballarat-born Mr McDonald made headlines in Queensland last year when concrete company Boral bought his Sunshine Coast Quarries business for an estimated $81.5 million, the North Queensland Register reported last month.

The article described him as a “wealthy and publicity-shy” man, who recently acquired a cattle stud.

The Fortrus blog says the yacht entered the Pacific Ocean via the Bering Straight one week after leaving Cambridge Bay and traversing the famed Northwest Passage. It is now headed for the Panama Canal.