BATTLE WITH STORMS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 21 March 1929, Page 5

BATTLE WITH STORMS

EXPLORERS’ ORDEAL.

ON ANTARCTIC RANGE. PLANE WRECKED BY GALE. Bv Kassel Owen, copyrighted, 1928, by the ••New Yoil; limes'- company and "St. Louis Post and Despatch." All rights for publication reserved tnrougn me world. Wirelffjb to "'Aflw \ oiU -1 imps. BAY OF WHALES, March 20. The long silence of Gould’s party at Rockefeller Range was explained by their battle with a terrific storm which on Saturday wrecked then-plane. The wind tore the-plane from the snow and from the lines by which it was anchored carried it a mile and dropped it a splintered wreck on the glacier ice. The men had worked for hours in the gale Avhich at times blew them straight out from the lines they were holding. Finally the plane Avas lifted straight up in the air and disappeared. •V hole opened in the clouds to the cast yesterday and despite the Avmd, which made a flight hazardous, Commander Bvrd fIeAV through to the three men in the mountains. All three Ayere safe and Avell despite hours of fighting terrific storms. The rescue plane returned in trie darkness with* Balchen and June. Bvrd, Gould and Hanson, the radio operator who flew with the chief are remaining until another flight can be made to bring them back 'to Little America. , . ~,, The wind is blowing the drift sno\A and it is cloudy out there, hut there is some hope that the flight may b® made later in the day. Those on the mountains have plenty of iood shelter and fuel. There is no doubt- the men discovered a new Antarctic storm area comparable to that of Adelie Land, Avhere Sir Douglas- Mawson had such apalliug storms. When resting outside Gould and his companions had to lie flat and hold themselves, in. place by the aid of knives and ski sticks stuck in the ice. Only its sloping, wall pre-A-ented their tent from being bloivn array.