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Questionable
in Byrd's mind was the condition of the two
airplanes left at Little America in 1930 upon
conclusion of his first expedition. Thus, a new
Curtis-Wright Condor was secured. The twin-engine
long-range biplane, named the William
Horlick, was equipped with skis and floats and
was powered by a pair of supercharged Wright
Cyclone engines, each capable of 725 horsepower.
Specially designed fuel tanks were installed giving
the plane a range of approximately 1300 miles with
a full load of 19,000 pounds. Two smaller
single-engine monoplanes, a Fokker and a Pilgrim,
were lent to the expedition. Additionally, a
Kellett autogyro was lent for use in high altitude
and short-range reconnaissance flights.
Motorized
transportation was supplied by a Cletrac tractor,
two Ford snowmobiles and three Citroëns
originally designed for desert work. The 40
horsepower Citroëns had the front wheels
replaced with skis. Since motorized transportation
still had not proven itself in the Antarctic, 153
sledge dogs were collected from Alaska to Labrador
and taken to the ice.
Dr.
Thomas Poulter, physicist, was chief of the
scientific staff and second in command of the
expedition. William Haines, chief meteorologist,
was third in command while Harold June, chief
pilot, was chief of staff and George Noville
executive officer. The wintering party of 1934
consisted of 56 men which included five pilots,
three physicists, two geologists, a geophysicist,
two meteorologists, three biologists, four radio
operators, two navigators, an aerial photographer,
a surveyor, a physician, two carpenters, an artist,
a newspaper correspondent and two Paramount News
cameramen. The rest were mechanics and dog /
tractor drivers. A total of 45 officers and crew
made the outbound voyage on the Jacob
Ruppert in 1933 and 33 assisted with the
homeward voyage in 1935.
Both voyages were under the
direction of Commodore Hjalmar Fridtjof Gjertsen,
an ice pilot with the Norwegian Navy. On the
outbound voyage, the master of the Jacob
Ruppert was Lt. (jg) W.F. Verleger, USNR. He
was replaced on the homeward voyage by S.D. Rose,
who had served as first officer on the Bear of
Oakland. The Bear of Oakland was under
the command of Lt. (jg) Robert A. English, USN,
with Bendik Johansen as sailing master and ice
pilot. Of all the men involved with Byrd II, 18 had
participated in the First Byrd Antarctic
Expedition.
There
were four primary objectives concerning
geographical exploration: the delineation of as
much as possible of the coastline of Marie Byrd
Land; additional research in the Ford Ranges;
determination of an ice-filled strait connecting
the Ross Sea with the Weddell Sea; determination of
the extent of the Queen Maud Mountains beyond the
Ross Ice Shelf. Meteorological observation was also
an important part of the expedition with Byrd
proposing the construction of a weather station as
far inland as possible which would be maintained
throughout the long winter night. The scientific
program included proposals to measure the thickness
of the Ross Ice Shelf and polar plateau, extensive
biological investigation ranging from plankton to
the seals in the Bay of Whales and surveying of the
front of the Ross Ice Shelf to determine what
changes had transpired since the last survey made
by the Terra
Nova Expedition in
1911.
The
Bear of Oakland embarked from Boston on
September 25, 1933 since she was the slower of the
two vessels. Unfortunately, the ship ran into a
hurricane off the North Carolina coast and was
damaged to an extent which required her to enter
dry dock at Newport News. The Jacob Ruppert
left Boston on October 11, stopped at Newport News,
and left for the Panama Canal eleven days later.
Meanwhile, the Bear of Oakland finished her
repairs and sailed south on November 1. After
passing through the Panama Canal, the Jacob
Ruppert called at Easter Island on November 16
and reached Wellington, New Zealand on December 5.
The ship's engines were overhauled and the
William Horlick readied for flight. Another
eighteen men were added to the crew before she set
sail on December 12, 1933. Additionally, three
stowaways were soon discovered.
The ship reached the ice pack
on December 20 and proceeded along the edge for the
next three weeks. On December 21, at 10:53 a.m.,
Admiral Byrd, Harold June (pilot), William Bowlin
(co-pilot), Carl Petersen (radio operator) and
Joseph Pelter (aerial photographer) lifted off in
the William Horlick on a successful
four-hour preliminary test flight. Further flights
and reconnaissance took place until eventually
entering the Bay of Whales, where she was moored on
January 17, 1934. The Bear of Oakland passed
through the Panama Canal on November 17 and stopped
for coal reserves at Tahiti on December 12. She
arrived in Wellington on January 6, took on
additional supplies, and then sailed for Dunedin
where more stores were taken aboard. The Bear of
Oakland sailed for Antarctica on January 19 and
moored in the Bay of Whales at 10:30 p.m., January
30.
 Admiral
Byrd led a landing party to the site of Little
America I on January 17 where they found the camp
buried under a deep blanket of snow with only the
radio towers, stove pipes and a few other
protruding objects visible. The communication and
lighting systems were still functioning and the
stored food was still in preserved condition.
Through great difficulties, the old camp was
reestablished as Little America II.
By the time the Bear
of Oakland arrived on January 30, tremendous
amounts of equipment, supplies and stores had been
relayed inland. Sixteen teams of nine dogs each,
along with the Citroën and Cletrac, ferried
several hundred tons of supplies to Little America
II. The Pilgrim monoplane hauled 24 tons of goods
before she was grounded due to the landing gear
exhibiting signs of strain. When the Bear of
Oakland arrived, the third Citroën was
quickly put to use. By February 4 both ships were
unloaded. At 10:10 p.m. the next day, the Jacob
Ruppert left for Port Chalmers, New Zealand,
where she arrived on February 18. On the evening of
February 6, the Bear of Oakland sailed out
of the Bay of Whales with Lt. English setting a
course for Cape Colbeck where an investigation for
the possible existence of an archipelago would be
attempted. Heavy pack ice had prohibited such
exploration on Byrd's previous expedition in 1929.
Up to that time only two
ships had penetrated the ice beyond Cape Colbeck,
which had originally been discovered during
Robert Falcon Scott's
1902 Discovery Expedition. In 1912, Lt.
Shirase
sailed the Kainan Maru to 76°07'S,
151°20'W. It was a successful trip for Byrd as
they passed the easting of both prior efforts. At
1:30 a.m., on February 9, they made their farthest
easting at 75°06'S, 148°08'W, from where
the northwesternmost peaks of the Ford Ranges were
dimly visible to the southeast. Evidence was
gathered to support the existence of a submarine
ridge extending northwestward from Edward VII
Peninsula. The Bear of Oakland arrived back
at the Bay of Whales on February 15. A rendezvous
was made with the Discovery II on February
21 to receive another 21 tons of supplies and a
replacement physician, Dr. Louis H. Potaka. She
arrived back at the Bay of Whales on February 25
and the next day, at 8:35 a.m., the Bear of
Oakland departed Antarctica, leaving behind a
winter party of 56 men. The ship arrived in Dunedin
on the afternoon of March 12, 1934 after a very
difficult voyage.
Admiral
Byrd became alarmed by a series of cracks
developing in the vicinity of Little America II so
an emergency cache of food, gasoline, tents and
supplies were established on higher ground, named
Retreat Camp, about a mile southeast of base camp.
Over the course of the next few weeks, depots every
25 geographical miles were layed in preparation for
the field season the following spring. Intense
blizzards were fought until the final depot,
155-mile depot, was established on March 14. One of
the objectives of the expedition was to establish
an advanced weather base where three men would
spend the Antarctic winter making daily
meteorological observations.
Originally, intentions were
to establish the base on the Polar plateau or the
foot of the Queen Maud Mountains. However, do to
the difficult, prolonged unloading of stores and
establishment of the base camp, time constraints
required the Bolling Advance Base to be built at
100-mile depot. Tractors, sledges and aviation were
all used as the men struggled to establish the
base. The Pilgrim monoplane made three flights but
the Fokker, Blue Blade, crashed on take-off
and the weather closed in before the William
Horlick could be made ready. Construction of
the hut began on the morning of March 22 and at
11:55 a.m. Admiral Byrd was flown in by Bowlin and
Bailey aboard the Pilgrim monoplane. Work on the
site was under horrible conditions as temperatures
plummeted to -60°F. Throughout the trips to
and from Little America, the tractor party was
plagued by water condensing and freezing in the
fuel lines. They frequently stopped to disconnect
the lines and blow the ice out. Fingers and hands
suffered from the bitter cold with intense pain
experienced by all. The dog teams left Advance Base
for Little America II on March 25 and on March 28
the tractors departed, leaving Admiral Byrd alone
to man the meteorological station for the winter.
The prefabricated hut measured 9 feet by 13 feet
and was 8 feet high. The structure was completely
buried in snow by the time the tractor party pulled
out. Only the bamboo poles used to support the
radio antennae, the 12-foot anemometer pole and the
instrument shelter protruded through the snow.
Advance Base was located at 80°08'S,
163°57'W, 123 statute miles from Little
America II.
Little
America settled into a routine program as the sun
set for the last time on April 19. Meteor
observations, under Dr. Poulter, were conducted
during the four months of darkness; the biologists,
Dr. Perkins, Paul Siple, Alton Lindsey and J. M.
Sterrett carried out their investigations of
plankton, bacteria and the Weddell seals in the Bay
of Whales; preparations were made for the spring
campaign in the field. Meanwhile, Admiral Byrd took
meteorological observations twice daily at Advance
Base and maintained a radio schedule with Little
America II three times a week.
Once the sun set in April,
Byrd also maintained a regular schedule of auroral
observations. Unfortunately, Byrd was unaware of
his impending carbon monoxide poisoning. Although
aware of water condensing and freezing in the
ventilator pipe, stovepipe and exhaust pipe of the
engine which drove the radio generator, Byrd's
precautions failed to maintain proper ventilation
within the hut and he gradually became more ill
until finally collapsing during the radio schedule
on May 31. He remained critically ill for more than
a month as his recovery was impaired by the
inability to keep himself warm and properly cared
for. In spite of his weakness and subsequent
relapses, meteorological observations were
continually recorded. Although he tried to hide it,
Byrd's health was obviously deteriorating. The
unusual radio transmissions alerted the men back at
base camp so an unscheduled journey to Advance Base
was soon in the works.
The first two attempts to
reach Byrd ended in failure as darkness, snow and
mechanical difficulties overcame them. Finally, Dr.
Poulter, E. J. Demas and Amory Waite, aboard
tractor No. 3, reached Advance Base just before
midnight on August 10. Byrd's physical condition
was too poor for the return journey. The men
remained, making regular observations, until
October 12 when Bowlin flew out in the Pilgrim and
picked up Byrd and Poulter while the others
returned in the tractor.
A
number of geological and biological scientific
programs were accomplished during the Second Byrd
Antarctic Expedition. On September 27, Harold June,
Ken Rawson, J. H. Von der Wall and Carl Peterson
set out on tractor No. 1 pulling two sledges with
7600 pounds of cargo. On October 11 they sighted
McKinley Peak and the Haines Mountains to the
north. The next day the men climbed to the summit
of McKinley Peak and determined, after making sun
and star observations, that the mountain was
approximately 37 miles west of its previously
estimated position. The party arrived back at
Little America on October 18 after completing a
round trip of 525 statute miles. This had been the
first time that exploration had been carried on to
such an extent in Antarctica by means of mechanized
land transport.
On
October 14, the Marie Byrd Land party, made up of
Paul Siple (biologist and leader), F. Alton Wade
(geologist), Stevenson Corey and Olin Stancliff
(dog drivers), set out from Little America II
following the path of the previous tractor party.
Six days were spent on McKinley Peak, under cruel
weather conditions, examining the geology of the
mountain. Additionally, magnetic observations were
made. They continued on to the Haines Mountains for
more geological investigations and later crossed
the Hammond Glacier and camped at the base of Mount
Woodward. November 20 was spent investigating Mount
Woodward, the southernmost mountain in the Ford
Ranges, where Siple found mosses.
On November 21 they crossed
the Boyd Glacier and camped at the foot of Mount
Rea. The next day was spent studying the geology of
Mount Rea and Mount Cooper. At this point the
supply of dog food was running short so to cover as
much ground as possible in a short period of time,
the men split up into teams. On November 23, Siple
and Corey left Mount Cooper, rounded Mount Rea and
headed north to Saunders Mountain. By the end of
the 24th, they were overlooking Crevasse Valley
Glacier, a great outlet glacier. Inclement weather
prohibited their crossing of the glacier until the
27th. They camped alongside the Chester Mountains
and charted many of the surrounding mountains. On
December 2 they reached their limit of the outward
journey and abruptly turned around. While Siple and
Corey were on their journey, Wade and Stancliff
carried on geological observations in the vicinity
of Saunders Mountain, Crevasse Valley Glacier and
the Haines Mountains. The teams met up again at the
Haines mountains and the Marie Byrd Land sledging
party arrived back at Little America II at 3 p.m.
on December 29 after 77 days of exploration
covering 862 miles.
Extensive
additional scientific programs were conducted by
other members of the base camp party. A geological
party of three men and two dog teams was to explore
the Queen Maud Mountains to the east of Supporting
Party Mountain at 85°27'S, 147°33'W, the
easternmost point reached by the geological party
of the First Byrd Antarctic Expedition. A
geophysical party of four men with four dog teams
expected to climb the Scott Glacier and determine
the thickness of the Polar plateau icecap. The
combined parties left Little America II on October
16. The geophysical party reached Advance Base on
October 22 and the geological party a day and a
half later. By October 31 both parties were at the
edge of a belt of crevasses at 81°10'S,
161°05'W. After considerable obstacles were
overcome, significant magnetic, geologic, and
seismic investigations had been completed. From the
top of the Rockefeller Plateau, Morgan calculated
the glacial ice to be 1000 to 2000 feet thick.
Where the surface elevations vary from 2000 to 3000
feet above sea level it was obvious that the
greater part of the height of the plateau in this
sector was due to ice.
Exploratory flights were
conducted by Byrd and the aviation group. On
November 15 Byrd, June, Bowlin, Bailey, Rawson and
Pelter took off in the Condor William
Horlick for an exploratory flight to the
southeast in an attempt to close the gap of
unexplored land between Supporting Party Mountain,
at the base of the Queen Maud Mountains, and the
eastern trail between Little America II and the
Ford Ranges. Much new territory was photographed
and on their way home, they flew over the
Rockefeller Mountains where they spotted the
wrecked Fokker plane abandoned in 1929. The flight
lasted 6 hours and 43 minutes covering 777 miles. A
number of other flights were made over the course
of the next month and a half. As the exploratory
flights were being made, Dr. Poulter carried on
important scientific studies of the Ross Ice Shelf,
a project which proved to be one of the major
accomplishments of the Second Byrd Antarctic
Expedition. A resurvey of the shelf (originally
taken during the 1929 expedition) in the vicinity
of the Bay of Whales showed that the portion of the
ice shelf east of the bay was moving westward while
the west of the bay was moving northward, the
latter at a rate of 6.6 feet per day. Consequently,
the bay has now been obliterated and replaced by a
large bite in the ice shelf.
During
the winter layover in New Zealand, both the Bear
of Oakland and Jacob Ruppert were
reconditioned and loaded with coal. The Bear of
Oakland left Dunedin on January 2; on board was
Charles F. Anderson, U. S. Postal Inspector, to
handle the cancellation of mail at Little America.
On January 18 they entered Discovery Inlet and
picked up the seismograph crew. The next morning
they moored in the Bay of Whales. The Jacob
Ruppert left Port Chalmers on January 16 and
arrived in the Bay of Whales on January 27. The men
hustled to get the cargo loaded aboard but with the
ice threatening the thin plates of the Jacob
Ruppert, ferrying was necessary between the two
ships as the Jacob Ruppert hove to out in
the bay. This process continued until only the
heavy tractors and planes remained at the edge of
the bay. Too heavy for the Bear of Oakland,
the Jacob Ruppert slipped in long enough to
haul aboard all but Citroën No.2, two
snowmobiles and a small amount of various supplies.
The two ships moved out of the Bay of Whales on the
afternoon of February 5, 1935. On board, headed for
the Ford Museum in Dearborn, MI, was the Floyd
Bennett. . .the plane in which Byrd had flown
to the Pole in 1929. Both ships stopped in
Discovery Inlet long enough to pick up some
penguins destined for American zoos and then, on
February 7, the two ships departed for Dunedin. The
Bear of Oakland docked at Dunedin on
February 20.
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