THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3495, 8 March 1921, Page 37

THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY.

AN EXPLORER HONOURED. (Fbom Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, December 23. It was unfortunate that Dr W. S. Bruce, head of the Scottish Ocanographioal Society, Edinburgh, was unable to be present at the meeting of the Royal Geographical Society, which was held to present to him the gold medal of the American Geographical Society of New York, for his distinguished services in the interests of scientific research. Sir Francis Young - husband waa in the chair, and Mr Davis (American Ambassador) paid a warm tribute to Dr Bruce’s work as Arctic and Antarctic explorer, naturalist, botanist, and zoologist The medal was accepted on beihalf of Dr Bruce by Dr Rudmoro Brown, lecturer in geography at Sheffield University. CAPTAIN SCOTT MEMORIAL. Subsequently a paper on the “Future of Polar Exploration” was read by Mr Frank Debenham, who announced that the trustees ol the Captain Scott Memorial Fund had decided, with a portion of the funds, to establish a Polar Research Institute. The institute will be attached to the Department of Geography at Cambridge, and its aims will include the encouragement and assistance of future Polar expeditions and the provision of facilities for the publication of research work. Mr Debenham justified the continuance of polar exploration in the interests not only of science, including meteorology, but of commerce, pointing to the £20,000,000 realised by the whaling industry in Antarctic waters, which had been made possible by South Polar discoveries. After showing that in the past polar exploration had more than paid financially by the new industries it had revealed or opened up, and that from the scientific side it is of no less practical value —meteorologists cannot learn hmv to foretell the weather accurately until they know more about conditions at the poles,—Mr Debenham turned to future methods of polar travel. Up to now, he said, tho dog has proved paramount as a means of locomotion. Mechanical transport had been tried in tho form of wheeled motor cars, an aero engine* fitted to a sledgo, and a caterpillar tractor; but mechanical transport would necessarily ’.e c'nfined to comparatively level areas wi + u s litable surface. In his view the airship might at once bo dismissed as being far too expensive and fragile except when working from civilised and inhabited centres. For detailed work the heavier-than-air machine was much more likely to be of value. But the. chances of a safe landing with an aeroplano on such country would he very small. By seaplanes from ships excellent work could bo done, ani they might add considerably, not only to speed of manoeuvre in packinfested waters, but to tho chances of survival of a beset ship. Tho seaplane would have a very definite value as a pilot alone, even though it could orilv lie employed in comparatively loose pack-ice. As an auxiliary for plotting coastlines if. would be invaluable. The enclosing of both engine and crew in a suitably shaped body would overcome many practical difficulties of temperature and air-blast; tho evolution of special alternative landing-gear to adapt tho seaplane to emergency landing on sea iee would ho another line of experiment likely to produce fruitful results.