SCIENTISTS’ QUEST

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 March 1939, Page 2

SCIENTISTS’ QUEST

/ PROPOSED ANTARCTIC STATION.

SIR DOUGLAS MAWSON’S PLAN.

Closely following the announcement of the proposal of Mr Lincoln Ellsworth, American Antarctic explorer, to spend an entire winter encamped at the South Pole, an Australian plan for the establishment of a permanent scientific station approximately at the South Magnetic Pole, has been submitted to the Commonwealth Government by Sir Douglas Mawson. His proposal is that scientists from Australia should be landed there each summer by the Wyatt Earp and should be replaced in the following summer. Sir Douglas Mawson discussed Antarctic questions with Mr Ellsworth and Sir Hubert Wilkins in Sydney and made a thorough inspection of the Wyatt Earp. “The ship is ideal for An-

tarctic work,” he said. “The old Discovery I was more elaborately built, but the Wyatt Earp is a splendid sea boat, and, whether used for polar work or fishery surveys, is a sound investment. Now that Australia has this ship, we should be able to find out much more about this great continent to the south. It is as large as Australia itself. We are only a small number of people, but we are the only ones in the world whose territory extends from the equator to the polar regions!” Sir Douglas Mawson said that he doubted whether he would be able to take the active leadership of an An-

tarctic expedition in the Wyatt Earp. He was not now able to make the long sledging trips as he did 20 years ago. “But I should like to go back down there for a year,” he added. “What I want to do is to co-ordinate the scientific work to be done there, and to establish a permanent station. Men at Sydney University are doing a great deal of research into the ionosphere and terrestrial magnetism, and we could thus have men highly trained in this work. The ionosphere is the uppermost layer of the earth’s atmosphere which reflects wireless waves and makes broadcasting possible. It comes down to earth near the magnetic poles and thus Sydney men who are already leaders in this field of research could advance their investigations considerably.” Sir Douglas Mawson said his proposal was to form a club of the younger scientists who were keen to continue their researches in the Antarctic and who would give a year of their time with little prospect of monetary recompense. He also said that Sir Hubert Wilkins would like to go for a winter to the Indian Ocean sector of Australia’s Antarctic territory.