ADMIRAL BYRD

Hokitika Guardian, 29 April 1939, Page 6

ADMIRAL BYRD

STORY OF FIVE MONTHS. :g ALONE IN THE ARTARTIC. < / live terrible months, of loneliness in a Polar, *‘.night’’.j five?months of frightful monotony in a frozen continent; five months of illness when an icechoked stove-pipe filled his hut. with deadly carbon monoxide fumes.' ! ' Admiral Richard Byrd; the only living man who has. ever stood at both the North Pole and the South, tells the story in : “Alone.” . He . ,waited.:- four years before lie faced recalling memories which-no other man in history haV lived to write, •

It is a memorable story, and the-; Sydney “Daily Telegraph has exclusive rights to its*serial publication. •*-. In 1934, the Byrd Antarctic Expel; dition had established its main-base ’at Little America, in the Ross Sea. Byrd decided to remain in a frozen continent at Advance Base. • •

In the interests of meteorology and long-distance weather forecasting, it was essential that somebody should bury himself in the Polar ice and darkness for several months to learn something of tho atmospheric phenomena- In these high southern latitudes. .

The An tar tic is an ice-bound continent upon which the welfare and prosperity, of our pastoralists. and fanners depend to a far greater extent than anybody can yet determine.Me# teorologically, the middle of Antarctic* is, a blank. It must be.filled before I'ongfdistanee forecasting can be lifted to an accurate seienee.

* 44. * That was why he endured five months of unparalleled terror. Advance Base was no reckless whim, ft was the outcome of four years of, careful, planning, yet one small miscalculation nearly changed the prospective triumph into another Captain Robert Scott-tragedy. .... It was on the same Barrier,, at approximately the same latitude, that Captain Oates , walked out .into the rag* ing blizzard and .died,, like ' “a very gallant gentleman’,.in the hope that Scott and two, companions might live.,. That is probably, the most heroic story that ever came out of the Aritartic; and Pry cl’ s book provides a perspective which . enables one .to appreciate more fully Scott’s Oriessey-of suffering and the action,of.-Oates'. Bvrd had arranged that the main base should be at Little America, in the Ross Sea. Advaneo Base was 159 miles south, below the Ross' Barrier, In the summer a hut had been erected, and Byrd intended that three trusted observers should be stationed AhereK^ But the storms broke before their time, and at the last moment it was found imossible to transport the foodstffs, the scientific instruments, and, otnef requirements for three men across the Barrier.

A. quick decision was necessary, so rather than imperil the life of any man of his party, Byrd decided to remain • He was fully qualified to collect the scientific data, aud he was the leader On him must fall the responsibility. ;

At the end of March he found him self alone, for perhaps seven months Wirless linked him with the main baseat Little America, but during the long winter night it was utterly impossible; for any man to cross the Barrier.

Whatever happened, there must;-be no attempt at rescue, for that hiust in evitably end in -a frightful tragedy, bringing disgrace upon his name and his eypendition. Those were his final orders..

Everything at Advance Base was as perfect as science could make it. Buts even,. science can miscalcuata -when groping in! the unknown. It was so in this instance.;.

In the hut was a stove to provide the necessary heat. The pipe that was to carry off, ; the fumes was. installed to inept all emergencies of,weather. ;But the blizzard chocked the pipe with ice, and soon Byrd was being poisoned by carbon monoxide fumes.

1 - • * * From the middle of May. until August,, lie fought death-.day and night. Sometimes he was too weak -even to brew a cup of. tea, yet he crawled twice a day on hands and knees to reach his scientific- instruments.

. ‘‘Sometimes I felt like , a-,crawling thins on the . edge of a disintegrating .world,” he says. - About the middle of .July,Little America was ,a ble.. to, tell by his erratic Morse that something very,serious.was wrong. -He would not admit it, but his scientists at the other end knew he was very ill. , . Five times, a , relief party . tried to cross the Four times it was thrown back. \.

J.t length, a month, before it. should have set out,: the relief party,: got through,, found Byrd at the point of death,.mursed him, back ,to life , over a period of two months, and. sent him by aeroplane to the main base.. A. ... .., Graphically the.,story is told in “Alone,” perhaps because it is told simply: : VByrd makes his readers feel with, him the horror of standing,i,putside the hut, beating futilely against a door that had been slammed by the jvind,..and cemented by. ice, within a few seconds. . The dreadful sensation of being lost in the polar night, only, a few 'yards' from the hut, and criss-crossing an area for hours in a darkness that could be felt uptil ,he reached the wall of the hut: the terror of living in a silence.

so intense that the tickings 'of tho chronometers leaped but of the; sounds lessiness -like beatipgdrtmis; thelnten- .r", ; isity of the cold, when" one’s' breath,, floated away; makirig .a';s“o'u'hd in ; the’’ brittle air like the crackle of Chinese crackers. ; , ' j- ‘ * -* ifc * •' 1 •He -describes the deceitful -Antarctic mu age winch comes beckoning tne uhua. j to destruction, just as does- its couoiii, the lUnct mirage, bn thd wide plains, and the Aurora Lights, the reflections seen in. Austral-■-Only by ;sheer-will ! power, aided by records- and -his bccasp.iOiiaii wireless, talks- with Little Amerw > S ea, Byrd .was able to -stave off any •, .of insanity -but at‘times -fie could almost hear - the “beating -of the wings of.theiAngel'ofrLlieath, shotefling S .V around ; in the! insensate and vindictive bltfzards; and -he- began; hagainsCv'his will,. U>< wish that some effort might be made to rescue him. ' V ' T! -r: v i v - • ' . ‘ ' L _ * ..... ... .. L ;■!*.* *«' 11 'v *, ;. By sheer determination, he refrained from, his condition; - % . ;dhen- one; day.; a wireless message curtly told him thaVinjdefiance of‘his . orders; a relief , exedition • hadstarted. , .1 rorfprs; of. • suspence followed as expeditions, failed*,, :■ -,r At times he was frantic with anxiety least tlierb:shoind be.a tragedy. '■ t . Again and again the tried to get m , touch vwit'h Little, i America^, .but. jofteh " ' he,,had not T the strength jolhaiidle.the.,... instrument. . . - ... :<- v . ;-«•* :•

His hopes tant .star .on the. . horizons then." wouldiidrop to zero as he realised he was ar|istaken, - ,\'y /•’ Then one midnight a search-light nut

through the drifting,mists. Byrd-crawl-ed, to the hatch and lit a flare.> .Back *> came the answering. .searchlightVviind in the distance he heard the honking of a powerful trolly. : 'H' ■ ■■ ' . The party had crossed the crevasses v in, fog and storm., They were at Advance Base. He collapsed, • and it was two days before they could- send. J»i*h back-by plane to Little America.. ‘‘A man dnesn’t-bogin to attain W.is-,>, dom until lie recognises, that fnj is.no longer -indispensable/ is his summing ■ m i - ■ i ‘‘ £