INVADING ANTARCTICA.

King Country Chronicle, Volume III, Issue 143, 29 March 1909, Page 5

INVADING ANTARCTICA.

Tk« Ntarod's Voyag*. Ratara of Explorers. Tho Nimrod arrived at Lytteltcn on her return journey from Antarctica on Thursday last. The Lyttelton Harbour Board tug met the Nimrod at the Heads, and hearty greetings were exchanged. Lieutenant Shack let on, who » naturally proud of his accomplishment, has supplied the following narrative of his dash for the pole;- - "We started from Cape Royds on October 29 with provisions for 91 days. Those provisions were pemmican. biscuits, cheese, chocolate, plasmon. and small bottles of emergency oxot. We had also four sledges, four pontes, two tents* and four one-man steeping bags. The tents were made of light Wilfesdenduck, and the whole, including poles> etc., weighed only 30tb. The sldeges were lift stedges, each weighing 60lb. equipped with straps, and a box for carrving oil and instruments. The instruments were theodolite prismatic compasses, cameras, thermome* , tors, and boiling point thermometers. The food of the four ponies was maize. •ndi a ration called manje—• dried rattan, eonsistnig of carrots* currants. sugar, plasmon, and meat. —Departure from Hot Point.— We left Hot Point en November 3 with a supporting party, provisioned for 14 days. They were to go nine days with us and re turn in five days. but owing to the soft snow and a four days' blizzard I sent them back on November 7. We were then in a maze of ttivasßc*.off White Island, about 30 miles south of Hut point. Joyce, who had been on the Discovery, was in charge of the supporting party. When the supporting party left the weather cleared for half an hour, and we were under way, when one of the pontes. which was being ted by Adams, suddenly got on to a hidden crack, and went down to its middle with its leader in the soft snow. Wild, who was going astern with the other sledge. saw the danger, an nulled the sledge along, enabling Adams to haul bis pony out just where the crack opened into an apparently bottomless cavern. Another three or four feet and we would have tost Adams, the pony and half our provisions. We were going then on an apparently level plain, full of crevasses radiating in alt directions. When the weather cleared we were able to see where these were. We camped there for a day, when the weather cleared.

Caring foi the Ponies. — Id pitching camp, the pontes have first to be tethered out. and for that purpose there is Ta wire made fast on to on* sledge, then another sledge is brought up about 25 feet away, and the wire stretched between these two •ledges. The ponies arc tethered by the heels to the wire. The reason for this is that if we had an ordinary tether they would bite through it and eat the rope. These Manchurians prefer buckles and leather and each others* tail* in preference to good, ordinary food. Quan, my pony, was particularly keen on these dainties. Having got the ponies tethered, they are brushed down, and the horselcoths put on. and then fed. They get lOtb of food per day, and if they finished that, and seemed to want more, they got it. We then pitch our tents. Each tent ha* five bamboo poles, three poles put to windward and two poles for the door. and all made fast at the top. Then the tent is hauled over the top like a belt tent only with five poles. With a shove) we dig snow and pot it on the snow cloth around the bottom of the tent. This keep* the tent from blowing •way. In a bliaaard the harder it blows fbe more drift gets round, and the noitt secure the tent becomes. -How the Meals were Prepared. - Then come the meals. The cook for the week would spread the cloth inside the tent, light a primus, and the cooker, made of alluminium, was passed in to Mm, then the food bag, and generally in half an hour the meal was ready. We made what we called "hooshv" That was made of pemmican and powdered biscuits, and each man got a pannikin full. A pannikin would hold about a pint. Then tea was made. We put the tea in with the snow in a strainer, and when it boiled we served it with sugar. Sugar is one of the staple things, because it is heat giving, and at! our food is calculated by Dr Marshall according to its food value and heat giving properties. The ration when we started was 52 ounces of food a day. We all got ino one tent for the meal—the cooking tent—and it was the best tent to be in in cold weather. The meal over, the men belong ing to the other tent filled the cooker again with snow, and if there was any water over, that helped to melt the snow, and save a certain amount of oil by the time the nexs cooking was required. The sleeping bags were spread, and the men got Inside them, clothes and alt. I never took off my r clothes for 126 days. While we had the ponies we marched nine boors a day—from about 8 turn, to 8 p.m.— allowing one hour for lunch. It was always 8 or 8.30 p.m. before we got into bed, and we got up at 4.40 a.m. It was daylight, of course, all the while *h« weather being so cold, it look us all this time to get dressed, the meat cooked, and the 'ponies ready for another day's start. We had breakfast at 6 a.m.. consisting of "heosb/' biscuit and tea; lunch at 1 p.m., consisting of chocolate or cheese, biscuit, and tea; dinner at T p.m., eonftytog of ''hoosb," biscuit and cocoa. —Monotonous Travelling.— During this period we were going over windswept snow with sand furrows. We started in the morning, each man leading a pony, and taking turns every hour to break the trail. The other horses stepped in the tracks of the first horse. Every hour we bad &y» minutes spsH- The work area hard hotp on man and borse, especially after the first 15 days, because the horses were sinking right op to their middles in soft snow. We were not walking in eki or snow boots, but we wore fiimeskoe. that is, fur boots made of the skin of the'reindeer, with the fur outride. We sank into the snow sometimes well above our ankles, and the horses, of coarse, sank in. much deeper Zjgjf were Tfaeggttg •# ***b weigh.

It was monotonous work travelling. The men would travel about 12 or 15 | feet apart,, for fear of accidents with ' the sledge or ponies. —Establishing Depots.— The journey did not become particularly intersting until we began to ►sight new land. This was done about November 22. Then we saw new mountains stretching away to the south beyond Mount Longstaff. We were separated from these by a broad expanse of plain. We had different depot-* One depot. "A," bad been laid out previously, and we reached that on November 15th, some days before we sighted the mountain The depot was a mere spot on the great white plain. The next depot was made in lat. 81 deg. 4min. south—that was to pick up on the way back. It was 88 mites from depot "A." There we shot the first pony, cot him op. and made a depot of oil. biscuit, and pony meat. Then we took about 'five pounds of j*my meat to eke out our provisions. We saw at depot "A" that to do any big joomey owing to the surface of the snow being so bad we must reduce our daily ration, and we supplemented with horse half a ration of ordinary food. We started using the horse meat about November 23. We were using up for the ponies 40lb of food per day. and when one was shot the man who had been leading him put on his own harness, and helped to poll the extra loai given to another pony. The sledge that had been emptied was made into a depot mark, placed end op in the snow, with a bamboo rod and black flag attached. —Pontes* Splendid Work.— On November 22 we bad sighted the new mountains, and were still moving due south. On November 28th we shot another pony. We were getting short of food for the ponies, and it was therefore necessary to decrease their number, in order that the others might be kept on foil rations. We always mad* it a point of keeping the pontes on full rations, so that they never needed the whip. The ponies were doing splendid work, and we treated them as well as possible. The third pony was shot on November 30. By this time the mountains had trended oat to the southeast, and as our coarse was due south we decided to take advantage of any gap. From November 22 to 30 nothing particular occurred excepting that we had very thick weather and the snow was getting softer ail the time. Then we made a reronnaisance up the mountain about 3000 feet high, leaving the tent and the last pony in camp. From the top of the mountain we saw an apparently smooth glacier rising with a gentle gradient to what was apparently inland ice or a plateau. We at once decided to go up this glacier. We called the mountiain Mount Hope and the entrance between the two mountains the Southern Gateway. The last pony we took with os. —Six Hundred Yards in One Day.— We started on December 5 to go op the gtacier. Our general direction now was between southwest and southsouthwest, and at once we saw we were not going to have such an easy time of it, because he apparently smooth glacier was smply honeycombed with crevasses. We managed to get the pony in on the rock-*. Of course we could not draw the sledges over the rocks, as that would tear the wooden runners. On the 6th we had to onload the sledges and relay them with a little equipment, one at a time. and on that day we were all day doing 600 yards—that was the slowest travelling experienced yet. Up to then we had been doing 12 to 15 statue miles per day. - Pony Falls down a Chasm.— On the 7th one section of the party, three men. went on ahead with one sledge, whilst Wild, leading the pony, followed in our wake with the other sledge, we looking out for crevasses and altering our course to avoid them, tfhe object was to get a perfectly safe course for the pony. Suddenly we heard a shoot during tho afternoon from Wild, and on stopping and looking round we saw the sledge tilted, and Wild with bis arms and shoulders on the edge of the crevasse. He was sunk to the shoulders right on the edge of be crevasse, and keeping himself up by the arms. No pony was to be seen. We at once went to his assistance, and found that the pony had stepped on the snow lid of a hidden crevasse, and gone straight down an enormous chasm, snapping the swingletree, and thus saving both Wild and the sledge. There was no sound to be beard below, and Wild said he felt a sodden rush of wind and then it was all over. —The Plateau Reached.-

From this tinu* ouwards we were crossing crevasses the whole time. The under runners of the sledges suffered badly by the hard ice tearing the wood. Now, a sledge to travel well on snow surface such as we had eventually on the plateao, ought to be absolutely smooth, because friction is so great. Ultimately we bad only one whole runner—and that woui —*»n our last sledge, the runner on the other side having worn away almost from the middle, and the pulling then became very arduous. We reached 6500 feet op the glacier, about December 10. and there we could see the plateao ahead of us. From 9000 feet upwards we had a constant blizzard wind from the south dead in cur face, with »be temperature 2?7 a y? below aero. Sometimes""we~had 60deg. of frost. The clothes we were now wearing consisted of two pairs of socks, two pairs of jaager trousers, which we wore because they did not chafe so much, a singlet a shirt and a guernsey, then burbery overalls. The whole outfit weighed 9 to lOtbs. By titi* time w» had rrdued our daily ration of food to 20©*. per man per day, and in this climate, with the temperature and winds prevailing, coupled with the high altitudes, it was not sufficient to keep the necesesary heat in our bodies. All this time we were sighting new mountains. Adams was continually taking meteorological observations, and it was ip )*u *Meg. aoiin. sooth that Wild discovered, on going np a mountain to look at the plateau, seven distinct seams of coal. This was a most interesting discorvery, as showing that Antarctic regions once bad a very different climate. Dr Marshall, who had charge of the surveying, bad a very cold job at every camp. He was taking theodolite angles and putting in a great 'deal of time on tnls work. Me atao took all the photographs on this Journey.

—The Last Stage.— On January 4 we decided to risk leaving a depot on the plateau. We bad no plan then to take bearings by. and hai to trust to Providence to find our depot, with the help of guiding poles. These we made by all bands using one tent, and dividing the tent poles of the second tent for posts. On the poles we put flags made from provision bags. Thus lightened, we pushed rapidly sooth, till, on January ! ?, we had reached latitude 88deg. 5 min. south. The constant blizzard from the south south east developed then into one of extreme violence, the wind travelling at 70 miles an hour. The temperature was down to 72 deg. of frost. This continued for 60 hours, and many times we had to take our feet out of the sleeping bags to have them restored to feeling after being frostbitten. We were very cramped in the one little tent, the four of us being in a tent made to accommodate three. By this time our food was getling very low, and when the blizzard was over we realised that it would be j impossible for us to continue sledging i further sooth, both from lack of food j and or diminished strength. Oar body temperature showed only 93deg. It was therefore decided to leave the camp an make a forced march to the south, taking food with us, and in 88 i deg. 23min. we hoisted the Union Jack which Her Majesty had given us in England before leaving.