2,000 MILES IN ANTARCTIC ICE

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 29, 3 February 1900, Page 3 (Supplement)

2,000 MILES IN ANTARCTIC ICE

A SOUTH POLE WINTER,

The experiences of the Belgian Antarctic explorers, as told in "McClure's Magazine" for November, by Dr. Frederick A. Cook, the surgeon and ethnologist to the expedition, make a most interesting narrative. Dr. Cook, 1891-92, accompanied the first Peary expedition to Nortn Greenland, a year later he made a summer trip to West Greenland, and in 1894 he had charge of the Miranda expedition.

The members of the Belgica expedition numbered 19, including the commandant, Lieutenant Adrian de Gerlache; Captain, George Lecointe; and mate, Ronald Amundsen. Besides Dr. Cook there were also the following scientists:—Emile Recovitza, zoology and botany; Henry k Arctowski, oceanography, meteorology and geology; and Emile Danco, terrestrial magnetism. "The Belgica," says Dr. Cook, "was the Norwegian sealer Patria rechristenea. She is a strong vessel of about 250 tons, built some ten years ago. She was not: strengthened or altered on the plan or Nansen's vessel, the Fram, as has been so often stated. Nevertheless, she proved herself aJ craft of extraordinary endurance, withstanding the thumps of rocks, iceberg collisions and pressure In the pack in a manner perfectly marvellous. The object of our expedition," continues Dr. Cook, "was never clearly defined. In a general way we sailed on * voyage of scientific research and exploration in Antarctic seas."

The Belgica left Antwerp in August, 1897, and on 13th January, 1898, "took its departure from the known world" at Staten Island, not far from Cape Horn. When in sight of the South Shetland Island, a week later, a young Norwegian sailor fell overboard and was drowned during a violent tempest. On 23rd January, Palmer Archipelago was sighted, the vessel navigating a> new highway which in size compared favourably with Magellan Strait. . "To the east of this strait," says Dr. Cook, "we charted about 800 miles of land which had never before been seen by human eyes—part of a great continental mass, which probably surrounds the South Pole, it is buried even in midsummer under a ponderous weight of perennial ice." Passing out of the strait, the South Paciiic was entered, the course being shaped along the western border of Graham Land to Adelaide Island, and thence to Alexander Island, where an attempt was made to. enter the main body of the pack ice. On the longitude covered by the drift of the Belgica, Dr. Cook claims that no explorer had ever before entered the maini body of the pack ice, the previous, work or exploration there having been confined to the outer fringe of the drift along the edge of the pack. The expedition first encountered the south polar packice off the eastern border of Graham Land before crossing the polar circle. "While trying to keep the coast in view," says Dr. Cook, "we steamed among- a number of streams of small fragments of drift ice. An on-shore swell forced the ice together, and we were hopelessly held for the night of the 13th February, 1898. Hundreds of icebergs were on the horizon. The entire mass—icebergs, sea ice, and ship—rose and fell with the gigantic; heave of the South Pacific. On the.fol-i lowing morning, however, a change In the direction Of the wind separated the ice, and the Belgica was enabled to clear for the open sea westward. On 2Sth February, the vessel was forced to take to the ice to ride out a howling storm, during which the sun was invisible, and the atmosphere was thick with alternate squalls of rain, sleet, and snow. As night came on, the Belgica was headed southward. But the noise and commotion, which came to a climax every time she rose to the crest of a great swell was terrible. The wind beat through the rigging • like blasts out of a blowpipe, the quivering masts swept the sky with the regularity of the pendulum, the entire ship was covered with a sheet of ice. Over the side of the ship the sea glittered with the brightness of a winter sky. The sooty sky overhead formed a weird contrast. Here and there sparkling semi-luminous pieces of ice sprang from the darkness with meteoric swiftness, and were lost in the gathering blackness behind us. Every swell that drove against the ship brought with It tons of ice, which were thrown against her ribs with a thundering crash. When we had entered sufficiently, into the body of the pack, and were snugly surrounded by ice floes, the sea subsided, and the overworked ship rested for the night." By morning the- wind had changed, ana De Gerlache decided to make south, through open leads of water, where the ice had separated. After two days or ice-ramming, in which 90 miles were made, the ice became more closely packed, and the floes heavier. The vessel was, indeed, so tightly hugged, that movement in any direction became impossible. The vessel was then about 300 miles across the polar circle, and about 1100. miles from the geographical pole, and firmly fixed in the drift, with nothing stable on the horizon to enlighten the expedition as to their movements. The ship and her human cargo were compelled to rest thus on a huge cake or ice for nearly 13 months, during which time they drifted about 2000 miles in a zig-zag course.

"We had. been led to believe," continues the -writer, "that the temperature compared with the Arctic would be. more moderate, but in this we were disappointed. It fell tc 10 degrees below zero, then to 20, and finally 4.T below. The sun presented a curious face in its rise and descent, and the colour effects, though not gorgeous, were attractive fqr simplicity of shades.. The moon, too, had a distorted face. The Aurora Australis displayed its most rare giory." In the study of the strange sea, the sea icebergs and the scant life about them, the scientists now found much to do, the sailors assisting-, and also embanking the vessel with snow in order to protect her from the expected cold of the coming winter-long- nights. This work was completed by Ist May. No land was sighted during- the entire drift; but illuminated clouds were frequently reported as land. The only means of access to or exit from the ship was a little hole on the port side, from which a narrow rath led out about 100 yards to a circular hole i.'irou&h the ice, where sounding and deep fea temperatures were taiten. Nuutical observations were taken from a hut erected half-way between the hole and the vessel. The meteorological Instruments were placed on a convenient ice hummock, whence magnetic observations also were taken. A small house was placed about 200 yards off the port bow to capture the electricity from the aurora. Several long- journeys were made to neighbouring- icebergs, but there was always the danger of having the retreat cut off by the separating- of the ice.

"The sun set on 16th May, to remain below the horizon for 1700 long hours. For more than a month we had seen almost nothing- of the real sun. Storm after storm kept the sky constantly veiled by a frozen smoky vapour; the twilight shortened to a gloomy greyness, which gave place to a soul-despairing darkness, broken only at noon by a feeble yellow haze on the northern sky. I can think," continues Dr. Cook, "of nothing- more disheartening, more destructive to human ambition, than this dense unbroken blackness of the, long polar night. In the Arctic it has some redeeming features. There the white invader has the Eskimo to assist and teach and to amuse him. ffhe

weather there Is clear and cold, and in the region about Greenland where I had been engaged there is land—real solid land —not the mere mockery of it, like the shifting pack that was about us here. With land at hand prolonged journeys are always possible; but what were we to do on a moving sea of ice? On the day following the actual disappearance of the sun a distorted image of the-orb appeared at noon in the north, raised above the horizon by a refraction in the ice-laden atmosphere close to the sea line. Lieut. Danco was at this time somewhat indisposed." The last summer sunset was viewed from a berg cap; Dr. Cook thua describes it: — "A few moments before noon the cream-*coloured zone in the north brightened to an orange line, and precisely at noon a half of the form of the sun ascended above the ice. It was a distorted dull gemi-circle of gold, heatless and rayless. It sank again in a few moments, leaving no colour and nothing cheerful to remember through the 71 days of darkness which followed. ... We had all the latest inventions in condensed foods, but one and all proved failures as a steady diet. At this time we would have taken kindly to something containing pebbles or sand. How we longed to use our teeth! We became pale, with a greenish hue. All the organs were sluggish, and refused to work. The heart acted as if it had lost its regulating influence. Its action was feeble, but its beats were not increased until other dangerous symptoms appeared. The mental symptoms were not so noticeable. The' men were incapable of concentration, and unable to continue prolonged thought. One sailor, waa forced to the verge of insanity, but he recovered with the returning sun."

The condition of Lieut. Danco beg-an to give the party cause for anxiety. He suffered increasingly from difficulty of respiration. As the night advanced he became worse, and his death, which occurred on sth June, left a melancholy gap' in the little party of scientists. The general spirits of the men sank lower and lower, and about midnight—2lst June—to combat the feeling of dejection, the party took to a forced diet of fresh meat. "Fortunately," continues the narrative, "we had on hand a supply of penguins and seals stored in the banks of the snow. We sawed the frozen meat into steaks, and fried them in oleomargarine. The men improver rapidly on this fare, and afterwards voluntarily ate it to the exclusion of almost everything else." Penguin and seal steaks are, on the authority of the writer of the narrative, not bad—when once you have trained your nose to forget the odour and educated your palate to the direneeds of your system. But to eat them is a matter of education under pressure. "Imagine," he adds, "beef steeped in cod-liver oil for several months, and then fried in train oil, and you will have an idea of our most prized relishes."

Sunrise came to the little band on 25th July. Daylight at midday increased, until at 16th November the long polar day set in. The minimum temperature recorded during the night was 45.5 deg. below zero, on Bth September, and the men all agreed that the coldest weather was by far the most agreeable. The ice soon began to separate, the men finding sport catching1 seals and penguins, which came out of the fissures. In the large leads of .water finback and bottlenosed whales gambolled, but the "right" or black whale, wag not seen. It had been planned to leave the pack at the end of November, but at th& new year the vessel was still firmly, wedged 2000 feet from the shore line, the thickness of the ice varying from five to 25 feet. The party began to seek a way of escape. Experiments with tonite, an explosive said to be ■ more powerful-I.' than dynamite, were failures. "In low tempe» ratures it would simply make a cheerful bonfire without exploding." Several plans for extricating the .vessel-from .the p*ftils were tried. Dr. Cook finally suggested that there was nothing for it but to saw a canal large enough for the passage of the ship to the open water.. Every man. on hand bent to the task, all being strict equals and doing eight hours', work in 24. Explosives were also used, and after five weeks of toiling night and day, on 14th February the ship steamed out through the canal. After proceeding 40 miles.however, the disheartening discovery was made that the pack edge defied all the efforts of the explorers to secure; a passage for the steamer. The party was preparing to fit up second winter quarters; when after a month's detention the vessel secured an opening caused by a gentle southerly breeze, which forced her out beyond the line of icebergs. The ship then, steamed out into the open South Pacific, the date being 14th March, 1899.

The drift of the Belgica when in the pack was from about 80 to 103 deg. of longitude and between 70 and 72 deg. of latitude. In March and April the drift was westerly to longitude 92.25, Prom May to October the vessel drifted back again' to a place near the starting point, arid, from that time until the pack was left the drift' was rapidly westward. The winter drift, therefore, is eastward and the summer drift westward. The southernmost point reached was latitude 71.36-5 deg., lorigituda i 57.33-30 deg-., on 31st March. Various soundings taken prove the existence of se'ai where there was believed to-be land. A submarine bank, comparable with the bank off the coast of Newfoundland,- was also discovered. "The excellent series of magnetic observations by Mr Lecointe,"'. the article concludes, "indicate the magnetic pole to be about 200 miles east of its present assigned position.'^ The work of the expedition, Dr. Cook believes,. "will form the stepping-stone to future Antarc* tic exploration."