FOR ICY SEAS

Southland Times, Issue 20011, 27 October 1926, Page 6

FOR ICY SEAS

WHALERS ARRIVE ROSS SEA FLEET j ■ SIR JAMES CLARK ROSS IN PORT CHALMERS EXTENSIVE OPERATIONS PLANNED TWELVE SHIPS AND 400 MEN A fleet of twelve ships manned by a crew of 400 men will shortly be leaving Stewart Island for the lonely Ross Sea dependency to the far south of New Zealand. This will be the third and largest expedition to be sent by the Ross Sea company to Antarctic i waters in search of whales. The first unit of the fleet to reach the I Dominion was the 12,000 ton factory ship, Sir James Clark Ross, which berthed at ■ Port Chalmers on Monday morning after I an uneventful fine weather passage of 58 ' days from her home port, Sandifjord, in j Norway. The other big ship, the C. A. Lar- , sen, is expected in about a fortnight’s time : and the whole expedition will weigh anchor I early nextj month at Patterson’s Inlet en I route for the Ross Sea. | “FISHING” PROSPECTS DISCUSSED. I Captain G. Thorstensen, who was chief i officer on the vessel last season ween Cap- ! tain C. A. Larsen lost his life, is now in command. Discussing the prospects for the coming expedition with a Southland Times reporter yesterday, he stated that it was hoped to capture between 800 and 1000 whales. It is understood that the oil and other products from 1000 of the mammals is worth nearly 3,000,000 kroner. The fleet, Captain Thorstensen continued, wotild be operating over the same area as in previous years—a field of 500 square miles. By the time the whaling grounds were reached all the drift ice which in win- ; ter extended in vast fields from the pack ■ ice surrounding the pole would have been : carried away to the northward. This would leave the grounds more or less clear of bergs and the fleet would sail for warmer seas again as soon as the ice drifted back. About three months would be spent on the whaling grounds. Last year the ships spent , an anxious time just before leaving when ■ they were caught in the grip of an exten- • sive ice field in mid sea. After some diffi- . culty a passage was broken through to clear water and the fleet escaped without i serious damage. HABITS OF THE WHALE. | Captain Thorstensen was asked about the danger of exterminating whales in the Ross : Sea, concerning which Mr Amery sounded a : warning at the Imperial Conference in London a few days ago, stating that the ship ■ Discovery’s investigations disclosed the fact ! that a large proportion of the mammals ! were sexually immature and incapable of ■ breeding. i The Captain replied that from his ob- ‘ servations the whales killed were all fully 1 grown. Young whales were not worth the trouble of catching and w'ere not molested, ' their blubber being thin and the yield of ’ oil negligible. On the other hand, female • whales were sometimes killed with young inside. ; Whales did not breed in the icy waters I surrounding the polar cap but travelled ’ amazingly long distances to warmer seas. • Here the calves were suckled and later ' migrated to the Arctic or Antarctic oceans ' themselves. They were of a roving disposition and travelled frequently from one corner of the seven seas to another. It must be remembered that the water coverl ing the earth’s surface was of much vaster ' proportions than the land, and there were ' furthermore no barriers between the oceans ! confining races of whales to any particular j area, as was the case with animals on dry land. Being free to roam whales were constantly exploring fresh seas, and though there might? be extensive slaughter in one area, fresh whales were always arriving to take the place of the killed. On several occasions during the past two years’ fishing in the Ross Sea whales were captured with old harpoons embedded in their bodies. There were probably relics of old time whalers, as the types of harpoon found was not used nowadays. They might have been thrown by some muscular harpooner 50 or more years ago in New Zealand waters or perhaps off the Falklands, the Horn, the China i seas, or some other lonely wastes of water. ■ These heroes of lost chases in the old days suffered no discomfort from the weapons, which were merely lodged in the thick layer of blubber surrounding their bodies. The lance, and not the harpoon, was used for finishing off a wounded monster. Had they been struck by an explosive bomb from a modem whale chaser it would have been a different tale. The final argument raised by Captain Thorstensen against the suggestion that the whales might be exterminated was that if only a few were left it would not pay companies to equip expensive expenditions for the purpose of capturing them. They would be left unmolested, except perhaps by a small stray whaler or two, until they were once again plentiful. People, even sailors, did not realise the huge number of whales in the ocean. This was due to the fact that only the trained eyes of a whale-man could distinguish a “fish” in the distance. For example, while on the voyage from Panama Canal whales were seen almost daily, while many of them would not have been visible to unexperienced eyes. Seamen fresh from a merchantmen had to have a month or two of training before they could go to the crow’s nest on a chaser to sight whales. Many humpback whales were seen as the Sir James Clark Ross entered New Zealand waters, one being sighted just outside Taiaroa Heads on Sunday. The whales appeared to be heading for the south. THE SHIP AND HER CREW. As she lies at Port the Sir James Clark Ross still bears the scars of her ordeal in the pack ice last summer. The paint on her flat looking bows, which are sheathed with strong iron sheets, is grooved and the metal rusty. The steamer is more rakish and is set lower in the water than an ordinary merchantmap.

Viewed from alongside the vessel has no remarkable features about her, and it is not until one steps aboard that her unusual portions are noticeable. Even then, to a landsman, the huge digesters and boilers would have no insignificance. Passing along the j interior, however, one becomes aware of a faint, rancid odour of whale oil. The boilers are placed fore and aft and are heated by steam from the quadruple expansion engines below deck. The steam pipes can be seen stretching in a network over all parts of the vessel. The biggest boiler, a wrought iron tank about 30 {eet | long, is placed aft, while forward there are several more square or circular digesters. The decks of the vessel are at present loaded with timber, iron piping, and machinery, which will be used for various purposes when the whaling grounds are reached. The quarters of the officers and crew, however, are surprisingly well appointed and comfortable. Below decks, both in the fore and after parts of the ship, are the tanks in which the oil is stored after it has been through the digesters. Situated in the waist are the engines, with a maze of dark narrow passages, reminiscent of the bowels of a battleship, leading down to the bilges. The hot draught from the engines makes the life of the stokers and engineers more enviable than that of the crew once the ship reaches the bitterly cold wastes of the Antarctic. An importane department of the ship is the surgery, presided over by Dr. Didrikpen,. a Norwegian medical man. Illness and

accidents on such an expedition as that to the Ross Sea are fairly common, and the ship is fully equipped, with instruments and medical stores for possible cases of frostbite, or accidents with flensing knives which may happen when the slippery body of a half frozen whale is being dealt with. The complement of the Sir James Clark Ross numbers 195 men, all of them fairskinned Norwegians and many of them, even the officers, surprisingly youthful. Captain Thorstensen has under him the following officers: —Chief officer, Mr P. Jorgensen; second, Mr C. Jacobsen; third, Mr A. Christensen; fourth, Mr A. Berantsen; chief engineer, Mr Svensen; second, Mr Hansen; third, Mr Abrahamsen; wireless operator, Mr Westagard. A casual visitor to the ship, after an inspection of the comfortable saloon and cabins, will realise that modern whaling, even in the seas near Mount Erebus and Mount Terror, has lost many of the discomforts and dangers of the old days. PREPARING FOR FINAL DASH. The Sir James Clark Ross is at present taking aboard 2400 tons of fresh water. She is expected to leave for the Stewart Island base this morning. At Kaipipi, in Patterson’s Inlet, where seven chasers are wintering, she will take on bunkers and be put in readiness for the final dash to the south. The whereabouts of the 17,000 ton oil fuel ship, 0. A. Larsen, is unknown, but Captain Thorstensen expects her to reach New Zealand in about a fortnight’s time. She will be under the command of Captain O. Neilsen. Three new whale chasers are expected to reached Bluff at any time from Norway. An incorrect report gained currency recently that four American whalers, Pol 1, Pol 11, Pol in and Pol IV, were on thenway to New Zealand. Captain Thorstensen stated that these vessels belong to the Polaris company, a rival venture, and are bound for their base at Hobart. This company has no licence from the New Zealand Government to whale in the Ross Sea. The Polaris fleet will consist of five vessels—a factory ship of 14,000 tons named the N .T. Neilsen Alonzo and the four “Pol” chasers. Although whales are plentiful near Adelie Land, Wilkes Land, King George V Land and King Edward VII Land, which are close to the Ross Sea, the best fishing is to .be obtained in the latter area.