EIGHTEEN MONTHS ON ICE

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 55, 28 November 1928, Page 10

EIGHTEEN MONTHS ON ICE

BYRD EXPEDITION DEPARTURE FOR ROSS SEA ON FRIDAY Dominion Special Service. .Dunedin, November 27. Provided the ice reports from the whaling ships in the Ross Sea are favourable, the barque City of New York, with Commander Byrd and fifty members of his expedition aboard, will leave Dunedin on Friday direct for the Bay of Whales in the Antarctic. “We will be on the ice one and a half years,” said Commander Byrd. When the expedition was passing through the embryonic stage the commander expressed the hope that if conditions on the ice plateau were propitious he would be able to do all the planned flying in a few months, and with success achieved return to civilisation again before darkness settled over the Antarctic for the long winter. However, that plan or hope has now been definitely abandoned. As the commander emphasised once again, the expedition is not a dash or “stunt” exploit, but an expedition for scientific exploration.

The second supply ship, the Eleanor Bolling, will stay in Dunedin till about Christmas, when she will sail for the south. Should the Ross Sea provide a good passage, the steamer should be hack in Dunedin thirty-five days later, and is expected to reach the base camp again on March 1 with the remainder of the supplies and equipment. With the City of New York, the Eleanor Bolling will then return to winter quarters nt Dunedin, and leave again at the breaking of the pack ice in the early summer of 1929, with fresh provisions for the ice party. This announcement was made to-day by Mr. R. G. Brophy, business manager and second iu command of the expedition.