FIRST AIR SERVICE TO ANTARCTICA BY AUSTRALIA DISPUTED

Grey River Argus, 7 August 1948, Page 3

FIRST AIR SERVICE TO ANTARCTICA BY AUSTRALIA DISPUTED

P.A. NAPIER, August 6. The claim to have provided rne first air-mail service in Antarctia, made yesterday, on behalf of the Australian Catalina, that landed at Wigram, after visiting Macquarie Island, has been contested. At least twice in the past, the sub-Antarcnc region has been visited by New Zealand aircraft, calling at Campneli Island, almost due south of Dunedin The first call at Campbell Island was made on June 17, 1945, by a Fludson aircraft of the R.N.Z.A.F Mail was dropped to a party of weather observers occupying the station, on what is New Zealand’s loneliest outpost. The second visit to Campbell Island was made some time after the end of the war by a Catalina flying boat of the R.N.Z A.F.. On this occasion, a landing was made. Mr J. H. Sorensen, former leader of the Camnbell Island weather expedition, said: “If Macquarie Island is in Antarctia,” he said, “then the first airmail service to the area was provided by* an Hudson, which dropped mails by parachute to men on Campbell Island, in June. 1945 during a navigational flight. In the following year a Catalina was flown to Campbell Island to pick up a member of the staff of the meteorological station there, who had beesuffering from appendicitis. He wa< brought back to New Zealand wnere he was successfully operated on (> The Catalina also carried mails.