BEAR OF OAKLAND.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIV, Issue 88, 13 March 1934, Page 6

BEAR OF OAKLAND.

STORMY VOYAGE ENDED

Per Press Association. DUNEDIN, March 12

After 14 days of gales, hurricanes and mountainous seas, the Byrd supply ship, Bear of Oakland, arrived in Port Chalmers this afternoon looking little the worse for her experience, except for the loss of the bowsprit, which snapped off while the vessel was forcing her way through the pack ice in the Bay of Whales. “Serious gales, broken only by hurricanes,” was how Lieutenant English, who is in command, described the trip. Sometimes it was bad, and when it changed it got worse. The Bear of Oakland established contact with the Discovery, which left Dunedin early in February with a doctor and stores, in the Ress Sea about February 21 or 22, and the doctor and stores were transferred to the Bear of Oakland, which then returned to the Bay of Whales. The bay was frozen in and the vessel had difficulty in getting out,. a.s the ice was fast freezing up. The temperature was 30 degrees below zero for 50 miles north of the Barrier.*

The Bear of Oakland was in the bay for eight hours and was none too soon in getting out. Battling continually against the elements, she found herself being blown down on the icefield in a gale reading 75 miles a.n hour, with intermittent gusts of 100 miles an hour, while the ship was rolling oO degrees to each side and shipping green seas. After two days of this she fought her way to the east, where she had a continuation of the gales. The Bear of Oakland will remain at Port Chalmers till December.