AMUNDSEN'S DRIFT.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1911, 20 November 1913, Page 7

AMUNDSEN'S DRIFT.

-4 —. TO THE NORTH POLE. EXPEDITION SAILS IN JUNE; By Telegraph—Press Assoolatlon-Oopyrlfiht "Times"—Sydney "Sun" Special Cables. London, Novoraber 18. Captain Amundsen, the Norwegian explorer, has completed his crow of fourteen, besides tho scientific staff. He is'equipping the Fram with seven years' provisions. Tho expedition will sail from San Francisco in Juno next, entering tho ice-drift in tho foll6wing September. ' The cost of equipping the Fram will be £33,000. Half of this has already been received, and Amundsen hopes to provide tho balanco out of earnings from lectures, the-sale of postcards, photographs, and stamps. Itis anticipated that tho lectures will be a financial success."In the spring of 1914," said Captain Amundsen in a recent interview, "I will sail in the Fram, Nanscn's old ship, pass into the Arctic Ocean, through Behring Strait, and into the ico pack somewhere north of Point-Barrow, at latitudo 72<leg. and the :north-western point of the American mainland. I hopo on this coming northern trip to take the staunch old vessel to the North Pole itself. I shall ' carry provisions' for a seven years' voyage. I hope to drift with the icepack directly across the Pole. If., I • don't, I anticipate that I'll get so near the Polo that a dash to it will be an easy matter. I expect to come, out into the Atlantic , Ocean through a passage between Spitsbergen and Greenland. I have stood at the South Pole, and ray ambition now is to stand also at She-North Pole; but the Pole will not he the sole object of my expedition. It has been discovered by. Peary, and therd will be no special glory in attaining it again." . IS STEFANSSON LOST? Vancouver, 'November 19. Captain Backland, the American Arctic navigator, thinks that Stefansson is not lost, but merely pent in the ice, while the expedition is camping on the floes. ■ Stefansson declared that he expected to do this if .caught in the ice, but he did not anticipate any danger. (Ree. November 19, 11.20 p.m.) ' Ottawa, November 19. The Canadian. Marine Fisheries Department attaches little credence to the reported losb of Stefansson's expedition, which,' it states, possesses every equipment for camping on the ice, oven if the ship were lost. . Messages received on November 10 from Doctor Anderson, onboard the Alaska supply ship, gave no indication that anything was wrong. The Government is now seeking to communicate with the expedition to secure information, and a mail will be sent overland ' from Edmondt'on (Alberta), by dog team, to Herschell Island. PROFESSOR DAVID. London, November 18. Professor David departs for England on Saturday next, with the object of arranging for the publication of the geological memoir of the Shack'leton Antarctic Expedition. ■-