BYRD’S DISCOVERIES

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 22 April 1935, Page 9

BYRD’S DISCOVERIES

ANTARCTIC EXPLORATION CONTINENT SINGLE LAND MASS NO CHANNEL BETWEEN SEAS (United Pros* Association —By Electrio Telegrapt Copyright). . ''' - "NEW YORK, April 20/ Mr Harold June upon the arrival /oh Rear-Admiral JR'. E. Byrd’s expedition from the Antarctic prepared a review of the work. A "map shows that despite difficulties mutii more was accomplished by this expedition than on Admiral Byrd’s former visits to the south. »

The possibility of land was eliminated from the ice-covered sea north of Marie Bryd Land and the coast line was delineated for about 300 miles to the .east o'f Eisdel Ford Range. The Queen Maud mountains extended far to the eastward, it was discovered. They blended into the plateau, and this plateau was graced at a height of 4(?0 feet from tho coast to the Queen Maud Range. This lii.nl accomplishment makes it certain that there is no channel between the Bess and the Weddell Seas and that the Antarctic Continent is a single laud mass.

f. When the area explored at sea is added to that on ice or land the results of the expedition are more farreaching as far as geographical 'work is concerned than those of v.»y expedition since that of Ross about 100 4years ago.

“Soundings,” said Mr June, “proved the accuracy of Amundsen’s deduction that the land south of the Bay of Whales and on the eastern .'side: preserves for a long period the same relative shape as ,tho bay. An island that Amundsen suspected was just south of the Bay of Whales was found to rise.' more than COO feet above- sea leVel,. the remaining 700 feet consisting of shelf ice anchored on its even keel.

: AMUNDSEN’S JUDGMENT “The outlines of this island we»v traced and Amundsen’s uncanny judgment was shown by tho fact that ho pitched camp directly north of if, so that he was protected from the advancing ice from the south. The laud also rises above sea level and anchors the barrier ice between Amundsen's camp and Little America and the cape that runs north of Little America out into the Bay and serves as a protection is also resting on land. “The eastern side of the bay is vcy much the same as when we were there before, although the pressure on the bay piled wp such a mass of ice that it was impossible to get ini., Little America by the old route. The western side of 'the bay, however, was moving north at the rate of about five feet a day in summer. It is probably slower than that in winter, but this steady movement and the land under the bftrrier which forms the eastern side of the bay explain many of the great upheavals and ice canyons to the south which puzzled us so much before. “There is no doubt that tho base in which. Little America lies is between two anchored parts of the barrier and is supported only by water. The accumulated weight of snow and our .stores made it break loose at the end of o;;r first summer, so that up and down movements were definitely seen, hut the cape to the north prevented it moving out to sea, and when winter came it quickly froze fast' again to the sides of the. barrier which surrounded it.

; BLEND INTO A PLATEAU “From observation flights and sledge expeditions there is no longer any. possibility that the Antarctic is divided by a frozen strait. Both the Queen Maud and the Edsel Ford Ranges' qpafently blend into a plateau, and the Queen Maud llange far to the east seemed completely covered with ice flowing down from the polar plateau. I think myself that the Queen Maud Range comes out again in Graham Land and on the western shore /of the Weddell Sea and is a continuation of the Andean chain.

“The Edsel Ford Range, the Rockfeller mountains and the Scott Nunstaks are all part of the same mountain chains that outline the northern coast line of the Antarctic. This section of the coast line runs just west of the Rockfeller mountains, turns south and runs, in a gentle curve to Queen Maud Range. There is one break in it to the south-east, where there are apparently several islands above sea level which cause a break in the ice that continued far westward in a tremendous chain of crevasses.

“We have all our position well marked and have "taken hundreds of celestial observations. I think our maps show nearly all the mountain ranges and the other landmarks within a mile of their true position. We are well satisfied with the results of the expedition. We would be happy about the whole trip if it were not for. 'Admiral ByrdVs illness. (He is not. well at all; although naturally he is gratified with the results of his plttn.” Ai;

TWO ARCTIC EXPEDITIONS OXFORD CLUB’S PLANS LONDON, April 20. The Oxford Exploration Club is planning two Arctic expeditions, says the New’s Chronicle. Mr Augustine Courtland, who was marooned for five months ‘ dp Greenland, will revisit Greenland in iShackleton’s ship the Quest in order,to climb the highest mountain. Mr R. A. Glen, aged 22, will lead a party whose average age is 23, to Northeastland, supported by the Geographical Society.