BYRD'S EXPEDITION

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 54, Issue 95, 1 February 1934, Page 5

BYRD'S EXPEDITION

UNABLE TO MOOR. MUCH ICE BREAKS AWAY. GETTING STORES TO SAFETY. (United Press Association—Copyright). NEW YORK, Jan. 30.. In the broken and pitted pressure ridges and crevasses west of Little America forty-four,(marooned men are struggling with dog teams to save tons of winter supplies from going with the rapidly crumbling ice into the water. The four-mile ice front around' the Bay of Whales appears to be disrupting at an' accelerating rate. Since Wednesday the edge of the ice has moved a mile. In the past twenty-four hours myriads of cracks have opened in the raised flooring of the bay ice. A crack, inches wide, between the supplies and the permanent camp is rapidly widening. At seven o'clock in the evening the Jacob Ituppert was still hove-to in the bay. At least a dozen times she attempted to moor, but the ice was always unstable. Once the vessel anchored to the ice at the foot of the west barrier, south of Chamberlain Harbour, which appeared to be holding, and a party landed. Two hundred feet from the shore they noted a minute crack in the ice, and twenty minutes later they returned and focJnd it three feet wide. The party hurriedly re-embarked and the Jacob Ruppert cast off her moorings. Within half an hour the ice at the landing spot, one and a half 'miles long and 200 yards wide, broke off and drifted into the bay, with the floor of the bay, over which the ship had rested, raised twelve feet in the air. Menaced by Crevasses. From the bridge of the ship the tents at the Pressure Camp are visible. There the dog drivers are rushing sledges loaded with supplies through the pressure area to the barrier over-looking Little America. It is a run of three and a half miles, and it is verv exhausting to both men and dogs, winding through the . deep ice furrows, and around huge ice boulders. The continually appearing crevasses were ever a menace to the drivers and lumber intended to construct a broadcasting shack, nailed to telephone poles, "forms improvishecl bridges over several of the large crevasses. / Through this bottle-neck of a passage, crews' under June, Taylor and Demas, have already jammed upwards of 100 tons of stores. The dogs are only getting an occasional rest, and the men continue fighting with the toppling sledges, slewing round ice columns until exhaustion drops them. Three cooks,, including one of tnc New Zealand stowaways, are supplying food, and constant radio communication is kept with the ship. Captain English, of the Bear of Oakland, advised Admiral. Byrd that the vessel was within three and a halt lays' sailing of the Bay of Whales, apparently making a record run from Dunedin.