CROSSING THE SAHARA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18768, 23 January 1923, Page 8

CROSSING THE SAHARA

ADVENTUROUS .MOTOR TRIP. 500 KILOMETRES WITHOUT WATER. 'The attempt of a French expedition to reach limbuclon from Mouggort in specially constructed motor cars will interest lovers of good adventure and servo the gravci interests of their country, writes William Ryall in the Manchester Guannau. due Sahara sunders two great fragments of the French colonial empire. H excites the Trench imagination that botn are on the fame meridian as Paris. But no satisfactory way of communication between them has yet been found. The desert is a more terrible obstacle than any sea or .my forest. Mhe actual journey lias been done several times, but it is a ;<_■ ng, cosov, ■ .m-:-11 css; the camel caravan is the only means, as it was in the '.lays ol Monanuueci -md Pharaoh. Yet ihe alternative in getting from Biskra to Timbuctoo means a sea voyage half round At idea, completed by a journey by cart or train at both ends for hundreds cf miles. Overland the places are 2690 kilometres apart. By the only route at present the distance is more than twice as long. After the war an attempt was made by French aviators to open up the overland route by air. General Lapperine and Major Vnillemin, experienced men. tried to fly over the desert in January, 1920. Vuillemin, after terrible adventures, succeeded, but Genera) Lappenne nied miserably halfway, after a forced landing, it was found that, before this method became anything more than a mad and costly adventure something like the Atlantic crossing by the English airmen, depots of petrol would have to be constructed all along the route. As it was, Vuillemin only succeeded because of the aid given by the Government, who, at enormous expense and toil, had organised part of the route. The heavy motor lorries stuck in the sand, and most of task of carrying petrol had to be done by camel transport commandeered from the natives. Fifteen hundred animals died in this work, and their owners, brougnt to the brink of ruin, revolted and tied into the desert with what remained of their beasts. The sure lesson drawn from the disastrous expedition was that before flying machines could pass, the road under them would have to be organised thoroughly. In the future the aviator will have lus role in the conquest of the Sahara, but for the present he must wait for the motor car. . At this point, the French Colonial Office received an application from two engineers, one of (hem. M. Kermesse, at one time attached to the Russian Ministry of War, who had invented a caterpillar wheel, primarily for use over the snow, but which had been perfected for sand transport by his friend M. Hinstin, a young manufacturer who bad already to bis credit a wellknow'n cycle car. ’Hie authorities took the matter up, and motor oars fitted .with the twin back wheel “catea'pillars,” similar in look to those used commonly for motordrawn ploughs, wore produced by the Citroen Company and tested. Experiments were made with little 10 h.p. cars fitted in this way over the worst country in Franco. They succeeded brilliantly, and the Kermosse-Hinstin wheel made light of the “sand-sea” near the Forest ot &enlis and made the ascension—at 15 miles an hour—of the worst sand dune in the Basque country. An expedition was fitted out with lour of the cars and taken to South Algeria by M. Andouin-Dubreuil last year. It started from the terminus of the Biskra railway at Touggort, and headed due south over the desert. In a previous attempt to solve the great problem a sort of road had been made ior some hundreds of kilometres out of Touggort, but the expedition intentionally avoided tins road, and pursued its way over the open country. It reached In Shalah, a Saharan town roughly half-way to Nigeria, without mishap, and returned safely to Touggort, having accomplished almost with ease, 20,000 kilometres in the open desort, over shitting fine sand and rooky wastes. The experiment was thus a complete success, and the new' “sand-car, ’ which is nothing but tlie well-known Citroen touring car fitted with Kermesse-Hinstin wheels, had proved itself. The next expedition is being fitted out, and may be expected to start in a short time. It is being placed under the charge of the same leader, M. Andouin-Dubreuil. The greatest difficulty remains to the south of In Shalah. for ihe Great Thirst, 600 kilimetres without a single well, has still to be conquered. The expedition proper consists of three cars, with specially constructed body-work. The motor is the same as accomplished the In Shalah trip; The manufacturer, M. Citroen, insists with pride that it is the ordinary four-cylinder block motor installed on all his 10 h.p. touring cars. There are seats for two, and a dickey seat. Oyer the back axle there are two reservoirs toi petrol, containing each 150 litres, arjd a chest with two compartments, holding munitions, food, water for (he time the chain of wells is passed, tools, and camping equipment. Each car carries two folding beds of duralumin, and sleeping-bags—for the temperature often falls lie-low zero at nightfall in the desert, however burning may have been the day. Two of the cars are fitted with machine guns, aviation model, ready for instant use against marauders. The most interesting change in the “works” of the car is the multiple speed gear, allowing of six changes, and giving a speed-range of from throe to 40 kilometres an hour, according to the ground passed over. The main part of the new “road” that has to bo traversed is only vaguely known if at all. It includes every variety of surface, from the fine clinging sand that gets into the axle joints, to the rock}' stone-bestrewn waste lying under black desolate plateaux, whose sides are scarred with deep chasms. In the best part there is one well every hundred kilometres. At worst there is the SCO kilometres absolutely dry of the Great Thirst that skirts the Hoggar. The expedition will pass the famous table mountain of Gara Krimm, where, in the midst of hundreds of miles of sand, once flourished a prehistoric community who have left their traces in a litter of uncounted flint arrowheads. For this Sahara was 'not always the abomination of desolation. The whole road is 2500 kilometres, and M. Dnbreuil expects the crossing to take a fortnight, at an average speed of 200 kilomelres a day. If he suceeds, a new trade and military route will be opened, for the first time in history. . Depots of petrol will be established and. maintained all along the route; perhaps later there will Lj built a railway.