BOUND SOUTH

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21697, 12 January 1934, Page 10

BOUND SOUTH

BYRD SUPPLY SHIP BEAR OF OAKLAND .SAILS BRIEF CALL AT DUNEDIN LARGE QUANTITIES OF STORES [BY TELEGRAPH —OWN COIUIESPONDKNT] WELLINGTON. Thursday" 1 The Byrd expedition supply ship Bear of Oakland left Wellington this evening for Dunedin, en route to join the Jacob Ruppert in the Antarctic. Practically all the space on board the vessel was stacked with a wide range of provisions and equipment for the expedition's winter camp. The loading of foodstufls and coal had been expedited (hiring the lost three days and, although the ship had been intended to sail in the mid-afternoon, additional coaling necessitated a delay and it was not until seven o'clock that the vessel left for Dunedin. Coaling operations were finished soon after four o'clock, when 250 tons had been taken in, and the Bear of Oakland moved over to the Railway Wharf, where a largo motor-tractor was hoisted on board and fastened seourely. Excluding the tractor, which weighs 5J tons, approximately 50 tons of general equipment is being carried south, and five tons of foodstuffs is also being taken.

Given favourable weather, the Bear of Oakland should reach Dunedin on Saturday evening, and she will probably leave New Zealand shores immediately loading there is finished, at any rate, not later than Monday. A few miscellaneous supplies and a number of huts, packed in sections, wilJ be taken on at Dunedin.

LITTLE AMEBIGA BASE EVERYTHING FOUND INTACT NEW YORK, Jan. 10 A wireless message received from Rear-Admiral Byrd's Antarctic Expedition on the Jacob Ruppert is as follows: 5 The Jacob Ruppert this afternoon is crawling through the " Devil's Graveyard," where nearly two weeks ago she narrowly escaped disaster. Through dark thick fog the faintly luminous outlines of enormous icebergs appeared and disappeared as the ship crept past. The Jacob Ruppert was forced to change her course frequently to avoid " growler icebergs." Members of the crew, unmindful of the daubers involved, had their minds focussed on a wireless message which Rear-Admiral Byrd received from Mr. Lincoln Ellsworth's expedition announcing the arrival of the latter at Little America, the Byrd party's base in the Bay of Whales four years ago Mr. Ellsworth reported: "Little America is as you left it. The aeroplanes are in good condition. Except for the need to dig out radio masts all is 0.K." Rear-Admiral Byrd, who was in the radio shack when the message was received, could not conceal his emotion, saying: " That answers the question I have wanted to know for years—the question that thousands of people have asked me—will Little America be found, or- will the snows have buried it as they buried Amundsen's Camp Framheim, in the same place? Well, here's the answer."