On Way To Russian Antarctic Base

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31249, 22 December 1966, Page 14

On Way To Russian Antarctic Base

Dr. E. E. MacNamara, a United States scientist who will spend 14 months at the new Russian Antarctic station at Molodezhnaya in Enderby Land, arrived in Christchurch yesterday with no apprehension whatever about virtual isolation for that long period.

“At the end of six months I may think it is seven but at the end of 14 months I am sure I will wish I could stay 18 months,” he said. Dr. MacNamara regards his present project as “further rounding out as a scientist.” He took a bachelor’s degree in soil science at Rutgers University, a master’s degree at the University of South Dakota, and then his doctorate at Rutgers. His theses were largely on s- T research at the United I States Navy’s Arctic Research Laboratory at Point Barrow, Alaska. But Dr. MacNamara has since been:—

Marine biologist for the State of New York —“It just comes naturally through heredity .My father is a marine biologist.” Environmental scientist in Central America “This rounded me out on the total environment.” Director of Research for the State of New Jersey —“The Governor says he will turn out the’ band when I come home.”

For the purposes of his stay at the Russian base, Dr. MacNamara has been seconded to the Arctic Institute of North America at Washington and has received a grant from the National Science Foundation. He will return to his New Jersey post in about two years after writing up his Antarctic findings.

Dr. MacNamara is interested in the Antarctic because it is “the last frontier of science to be explored, the last great unknown.’! He sought appointment to the Russian base because “nobody has worked there until this year and nobody has wintered over.” A party of 17 is expected to remain there next winter.

Tte Russians were “falling over forwards” to help him and would send an ice-breaker back from the Antarctic to Freemantle specially to collect him. Dr. MacNamara expects to study soils, rocks, drainage water, meteorology, and climatology. In the last few months he has learned “enough Russian to get by” but he has language books by his bedside in Christchurch. Dr. MacNamara will be in Christchurch until about January 7 for briefing and outfitting at the United States base at Harewood. After 12 hours in Christchurch this environmental scientist described the city as “really clean with a tidy people.”

The Blue Star Line's motor vessel. Empire Star, which has been delayed at Lyttelton for over a week because of a defective main generator armature. is expected to sail for London from Cashin quay today. The repaired armature was hoisted aboard the vessel by an ordinary wharf crane at Cashin quay late yesterdiy afternoon.