POLAR EXPLORATION.

Wairarapa Age, 15 March 1934, Page 5

POLAR EXPLORATION.

PREPARATIONS FOR WILKINS EXPEDITION. CONSTRUCTION OF SUBMARINE. WELLINGTON, March 14. Details of a new submarine he intends building shortly for his next Arctic trip were revealed by Sir Hubert Wilkins, who arrived in Wellington from the South Island this morning. Plans had been prepared, he said, and he hoped the construction would bo begun at the end of this year or the beginning of next. The submarine, Nautilus 11. would have a surface displacement of 850 tons, with a surface speed of 14 knots and would be driven at the rate of 3 knots when under the ice. It would be propelled by four 10-horse-power Deisel engines. It would probably have a crew of seven and would carry three scientists. Mr. Lincoln Ellsworth, who had been associated with him on a previous trip and from whom he had received much help, i would not be with him on the next expedition, when the scientists would ibe engaged in taking deep sea soundings and forming a biological collection. The North Pole was not his goal, Sir Hubert stated. The main point at which the expedition was aiming was 400 miles away, the “Inaccessible Pole,” so called because it was the farthest known point from any land area. “I am personally convinced of the feasibility of using a submarine in the polar regions, but perhaps the Royal Meteorological Society has yet to be convinced,” he remarked. “I will convince them, lam sure. The value of polar exploration to meteorology needs no stressing,” Sir Hubert continued. “In conjunction with continuous meteorological observations in other parts of the world it will give us fuller knowledge as to the causes of weather changes.”—(P.A.)