Iron County record. [volume] (Cedar City, Utah) 1893-1982, 1921-08-05
ART|C EXPLORER
TO USE WIRELESS
CAPTAIN AMUNosEN TO INSTALL
MODERN MEANS OF SHIP
COMMUNICATION
South Pole Dise-verer Proposes To
Keep in Touch With World Civ.
ilization BY Use Of Air
Route

Seattle. Wash. From the remotest
most inaccessible spot on earth-the
North Pole--a wireless message will be
flashed to the civilized world, if the
plans Of Captain Ronald Amundsen,
,iiscovercr of the South Pole and fam
Gus Arctic explorer are carried out.
Captain Aundseu's schooner Maud.
Oh which he hoped to drift past the
pole with the Ice floes, was disabled
by broken propeller off Cape Serdze
Siberia after he had spent two years
In pushing around the eastward Arctic
passage from Norway. The explorer
left his vessel and her crew to await
break I'm the Ice and proceeded to
Nome, later comlug TO Seattle on a re-
cent ship.
The Maud has no wireless apparat.
rs but Captain Amundscn expects to
install one when the craft Is brought
rere, sometime this summer to be
spaired and refitted. Captain
Amundsen explained that his party
had been cast off from communica-
lion with other human beings for
wo years, with hut one break-hls
rip out to Nome last year-two years
" icebound horizons, OF bitter cold,
II almost endless night.
"The war was raging in it's most
critical period when we left the world
most of you know" he recalled, land
for many months we specialized In
| vain on the course Of events. 1t was
| In December. 1919, more than year
after the signing OF the armistice.
that we. finally met Russian trader
who told us what had happened. Then
determined we would carry wireless"
Captain Amundsen has said that he
would spend the next year in the
United States, probably most of 1t
around Seattle, and would sail from
| This port next summer. He will strike
back for Cape Serdze, he said, rust
ing to meet with better luck than the
furious Arctic storm which last year
lured the Maud into an icebank on
the Siberian coast
The explorer affirmed that his voy-
age had tended only TO confirm his
previous theories about magnetic
Of the !OlaJ basin. He expressed
faith In his belief that an ocean cur
rent running nOrtheasterly from Cape
Serdze would carry him past the pole
and eventually into the Atlantic
ocean.
nl.A1
ago, and started back" he said, "the
trouble was that an unprecedented jam
| IF ice prevented us from pushing far
enough north. We drifted too much
| TO the east--and the currents east
ward from Siberia are extraordinary
Il Is a sort of whirlpool, where one
wanders around In circles instead of
following any course"
at will take three years perhaps
onger," he predicted.
Captain Amundsen said that an i'm
,ortant part of his equipment con
sisted of books, hundreds of them.
II read mostly fiction" he said.
'Under such circumstances mans
lllnu netuS ulNtISioIs N'h'
thing light--but not too light, u
must he plausible"
The party experienced no serious
Illness the entire trip. Nor did the
cold cause suffering the explorer
said, for all were well equipped. ON
The tortuous voyage from Norway 10
eastern Siberia they encountered few
natives.
at Is II desolate shore on the north
Of Siberia he pointed out. 1--WE saw
few signs Of life except occasional
polar bears. At one point we shot
forty, skinned them and used the
meat for steaks. If we had been
trapping for skins we could have made
small fortune"
The Maud's crew includes DIR. IL. v.
Sverdrup. n SCIENTIST Oscar Visiting,
e. OlOnikin. and seven natives. They
Icft Norway in 1918 and remained bur-
ia f.. 49,, ,oo .,ipatnnn Vnnnthg