TO ANTARCTICA.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1118, 4 May 1911, Page 5

TO ANTARCTICA.

THE GERMAN EXPEDITION. By Telceraph-Press Associat:on-oopyri2ht Hamburg, May 2. Prince Henry of Prussia, brother of the Kaiser, has inspected the exploring ship Deutchsland, in which the German Antarctic expedition, under Lieutenant Filchner, will make its voyage to the Far South. • The expedition, which will sail for Buenos Ayres on May 7, is taking supplies sufficient for. an absence of three and a half years.

The German Antarctic expedition, under the command of the Bavarian explorer, Lieutenant Filchner, is to leave tor Buenos Ayres, from which port it will proceed at the beginning of October via South George and the Sandwich Islands to the Weddell Sea. The route has been chosen so as to allow ol ! oceanograjjhical research on the way. On arrival in the Weddell Sea it is proposed to establish a bnse station on the eastern coast as far south as possible, with the necessary equipment for a year's research. A party of ten men will bo landed, of whom six—a geologist, a metorolagist, an astronomer, a doctor who is also a biologist, a cook, and a sailorwill stay in the station, while the remaining four will undertake a long sledge expedition into the interior of the South Polar continent. Meanwhile the ship will return to the Atlantic Ocean to cany out coastal observations and oceanographical work. The main geographical objects of the expedition are to determine the distribution of land and water, to establish the coast line of the Antarctic continent, and to study the conformation and direction nf the ice. On the oceanographical side it is proposed to make systematic observations of the temperature, the saltness, and the oxygenation of the deep levels along certain lines in the Sargasso Sea, in the Brazilian current, and in the high latitudes. Soundings will be taken on the Atlantic swell between latitudes zero and 10 U., where none such are at present available. Further soundings will be made in Hie Argentine basin and further south. Observations with regard to ocoan currents will be carried out from an anchored boat. The meteorolodcal section of the expedition will be fully equipped with apparatus for registering air pressure, temperature, moisture, and wind, and magnetic observations will be mado both at the base station and on the sledsins expedition.