The loser must never be bitten in the case. If a dog breaks the rule it will never go to the pit again and will spend its life enchained.

Despite several mishaps—including a polar bear attack that ended with one crewman bitten and two dogs dead—the first two years of the journey were oddly easy.

Doctors in France said they had performed the world's first partial face transplant, forging into a risky medical frontier with their operation on a woman disfigured by a dog bite.