THE ANTARCTIC.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 151, 5 October 1910, Page 5

THE ANTARCTIC.

CAPTAIN AMUNDSEN'S PLANS. Bj Cable.—Press Association.—Copyright. Christiana, October 3. A sensation has been caused by the announcement of Captain Amundsen's altered plans. Dr. Nansen declares Amundsen is the man to realise gigantic ideas and that his expedition will be of great scientific importance. Captain Road Amusden is prepared for a five years' drift in the Arctic regions. He has bad experience of this work before. On June 16, 1903, he left Christiania in a small vessel with an auxiliary engine, the Gjoa, and, entering tht Arctic along the west coast of Greenland, he, m three years, drifted alon& the north coast of America. Eventually he reported himself from Cape Nome, Alaska, on August 31, 1906. Although tiie primary object of his wanderings was the location of the North Magnetic Pole—and in this he succeeded—he also accomplished the North-west Passage, being the first to perform that journey in a vesseL Captain Amusden recently explained the scheme of his expedition as follows:—"Aboard the Fram, with a selected equipment, ami fitted out for seven years, I shall leave Norway in August of 1910. We start for San Francisco, going round Cape Horn. In San Francisco coal and provisions will be taken on board. From there we set out for Point Barrow, from which the last news will go home. From Point Barrow, I start with the smallest possible crew. The course for the drift ice is north-north-west. We shall try to enter the compact ice at the most favorable point to begin our drift, calculating to last four or five years, over the polar basin. During all this time we shall make oceanographic and other observations, through which I hope to solve some of the yet unexplained problems of the polar regions." Captain Amunsden hopes to reach open water between Greenland and Spitzbergen in 1015 or 1916. The cost of the Fram equipment was £15,000, which was collected privately in Norway.