ANTARCTIC EXPLORATION.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20455, 9 July 1928, Page 11

ANTARCTIC EXPLORATION.

COMMANDER BYRD’S PREPARATIONS. IN NEW ZEALAND IN DECEMBER. AEROPLANES TO BE USED. (Prom Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, May 30. It seems possible that New Zealand will again be used as the jumping-olf ground for an Antarctic expedition. It has been known for some time that Commander Richard E. Byrd, the hero of a notable transatlantic flight in 1927, and an explorer who has made one successful trip to the North Pole, contemplated scientific work in the Antarctic. According to a correspondent of The Birmingham Post. Commander Byrd has been busy making his plans in America, and he expects to be ready to set out from New York in the whaling ship Samson about September 10, and his venture southwards—which incidentally is to be the most ambitious he has yet essayed—will in all probability occupy well over a year. The immediate destination of the party will be Discovery Bay, in Ross Sea, and the route as at present planned is to be by way of the Panama canal and thence to Wellington, and in the due southward direction. The expedition has been organised almost entirely by the commander, and he proposes to take with him two extra pilots, who have considerable experience of flying in polar latitudes to their credit. The total personnel of the new expedition will probably he about 50, and every mqmber is to be a specialist. THE THREE AEROPLANES. It has been a firm belief of previous explorers in the frozen seas that accurate observation cannot be made from aeroplanes, and that only satisfactory results can be achieved by the employment of lighter-than-air craft. Commander Byrd’s views do not coincide. He proposes to take three heavier-than-air machines, with which he anticipates being able to make a complete and reliable survey of the Antarctic continent. The aeroplanes to be taken are representative of the multi-motored, and also the low-motored, classes. The most important machine is to be a Bellanca monoplane, equipped with three Wright “ Whirlwind ” engines, each of POO h.p. This will be the chief observation craft, and its fuselage will have, a glass floor, constructed for the pu-pose. A Ford aeroplane will be the second craft, and this will also be fitted with reserve power units. The aerial equipment is also expected to include a small, relatively low-powered craft of the biplane type, and this will be used for solo work over short distances. Each of the machines is to have au interchangeable undercarriage, to whick skis can be fitted for landing on frozen surfaces and floats for alighting on the sea during the warmer periods when the icefields have broken up. In this way the chief danger of flying in the polar regions will be minimised, if not actually eliminated altogether. THE FINAL FLIGHT- ~ The final flight across the polar circle will not be embarked upon until the exploration party reaches a point some 500 miles from the South Pole itself. At that stage the machine will fly right across the Antarctic basin and back without landing, and Commander Byrd hopes during the course of this penultimate trip to survey in addition a considerable belt of territory beyond the actual polar point. For such a uon-stop flight a machine with an adequate radius of action is requisite, and in the craft chosen this essential is found. During the trip the few experts who will be selected to participate in the ultimate triumph will take readings and soundings, as well as photographs, and—depending upon the degree of visibility prevailing when the vital attempt is made—the party intends to secure as large and as varied a collection of new facts about this little-known region surrounding the end of the earth’s axis as possible. Certainly the thoroughness of the preparations would augur some success in this respect, for it is doubtful if a polar exploit has ever yet been planned on such complete and workmanlike lines as this. Nothing has been loft' to chance, and, while the < ( npositiou of the party has been settled with wisdom and insight, it will have at its command an entirely self-contained equipment with which it is thought it can contend effectively with every imaginable contingency.