SINGLE LAND MASS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18687, 22 April 1935, Page 7

SINGLE LAND MASS

ANTARCTIC CONTINENT THE BYRD EXPEDITION RESULTS OP OBSERVATIONS (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) NEW YORK, April 20. iMr Harold June, upon arrival, was prepared to review the Byrd expedition's work. His map shows tlrat, despite difficulties, much more was accomplished this time than on Admiral Byrd's former trips south. The possibility of land was eliminated from the ice-covered sea north of Marie Byrd Land and the coast line delineated for -about 300 miles !o the east of the Edsel Ford range. The Queen Maud mountains were found to extend far to the eastward. They blended into a plateau and this plateau was traced to a height of 4000 ft. from the coast to the Queen Maud range. This final accomplishment makes it certain that there is no channel between the Ross .and "Weddcll Seas, and that the Antarctic continent is a single land mass, and when the area is explored nt sea, it is added to that on ice or land. '

The results of the expedition arc more far-reaching, as far as geographical work is .concerned, than those of any expedition since that of Ross about 100 years ago. The soundings proved the accuracy of Amundsen's deduction that the land south of the Bay of Whales and on the eastern side preserves for a long period the same relative shape as the Bay Island that Amundsen suspected was just south of the Bay of Whales. It was found to rise more than 500 ft. above sea level, the remaining 700 ft. consisting of a shelf of ice anchored on its even outlines. AMUNDSEN'S JUDGMENT

This .island was traversed and Amundsen's uncanny judgment was shown by the fact that he pitched camp directly north of it, so that he was protected from advancing ice from the south. Land also rises above the sea level and anchors the barrier ice between Amundsen's camp and Little America,.and the cape that runs north of Little America out into the bay, and serves as a protection, is also resting on land. 'The eastern side of the bay is very much the same as whon the expedition was there before, although the pressure on the bay has piled up such a mass of ice that it is impossible to get into Little America by the old route. The western side of the bay, however, was moving north at the rate of about sft. a day in summer time. It is probably slower in winter, but 'this steady movement, and the land under the barrier, which forms the eastern side of the bay, may explain many of the great, upheavals and ice canyons to the south, which puzzled the expedition so mu'ch before.

There is no doubt either that tho base in which 'Little America lies is between two anchored parts of the barrier)' and is supported only by water. The accumulated weight of snow and our stores made it break loose at the end of our first summer, so that up and down movements were definitely seen, but the cape to the north prevented it moving out to sea, and, when winter came, it quickly froze fast again to the sides of the barrier, which surrounded it from observation flights and sledge expeditions.

There, is no longer any possibility that Antarctica is divided by a frozen strait. Both the Queen Maud and the Edsel Ford ranges apparently blend into a plateau, and the Queen Maud range far to the east seemed to be completely covered with ice flowing down from a polar plateau. CONTINUATION OF ANDES *'l think myself," said Mr June, "that the Queen Maud range conies out again in Graham Land and the western shore of Waddell Sea, and is a 'continuation of the Andean chain. The Edsel Ford range, the Rockefeller mountains, and the Scott nunataks arc all part of the same mountain chains that outline the northern coast line of the Antarctic. This section of the coast line runs just west of the Rockefeller mountains, turns south, and runs in a gentle curve to the Queen Maud range. There is one break in it to the south-east, where there are apparently a number of islands above sea level, which cause the break in the ice that continued far westward in a tremendous chain of crevasses.

"We have all our positions well marked, and have taken hundreds of celestial observations. I think our maps show nearly all the mountain ranges and other landmarks within n mile of their true position. We are well satisfied with the results of the expedition and would be happy about the while trip if it were not for Admiral Byrd's illness. He is not well at. all, though, naturally, he is gratified with the results of his plan."