A FORMER North-East schoolboy is looking forward to a working trip where the highest temperature will be one degree.

Geoffrey Elliott, 24, whose family live in the Dragonville area of Durham City, will set off on Monday for a four-month trip to the Antarctic.

He will work as an assistant health and safety advisor at the British Antarctic Survey's Halley base.

Mr Elliott went to Shincliffe primary and Durham Johnston schools before studying environmental management at Northumbria University, in Newcastle. He has worked for the British Antarctic Survey, in Cambridge, for the past three years.

The journeys to and from the base will take a month.

"It is summer over there at the moment,'' said Mr Elliott. "The temperature at Halley today is minus nine degrees, but on a good day, when there isn't much wind, it can get to just above one degree.''

The base is on the Brunt ice shelf, beneath the hole in the ozone layer. Scientists observe the stratosphere and monitor the effects of climate change.