Bernt Balchen Bernt Balchen ( 23 October 1899 – 17 October 1973 ) was a pioneer polar aviator , navigator , aircraft mechanical engineer and military leader . A Norwegian native , he later became a U . S . citizen , and was a recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross His service in the U . S . Army Air Forces during World War II made use of his Arctic exploration expertise to help the Allies over Scandinavia and Northern Europe . After the war , Balchen continued to be an influential leader with the U . S . Air Force , as well as a highly - regarded private consultant in projects involving the Arctic and aviation . Early years . The son of a country doctor , Balchen was born at the farm Myren in Tveit , just outside of Kristiansand , Norway . After having finished Norwegian middle school in 1916 , he attended a Forestry School from 1917 – 1918 , he enrolled in the French Foreign Legion with his unit assigned to the Verdun front in World War I , In 1918 , before seeing action , Balchen was called back to Norway , transferring to the Norwegian Army , and was sent to an artillery school , where he graduated shortly after . Under an assumed name , Balchen fought as a cavalryman with the White Guard s in the Finnish Civil War that followed the end of major hostilities . During a cavalry charge , his horse was shot from under him and he was left for dead on the battlefield . Receiving serious wounds that necessitated a lengthy convalescence , Balchen turned to an early interest in athletics and trained strenuously as a boxer to represent Norway in the 1920 Olympics . Besides being a championship boxer , he was also an expert marksman and an accomplished skier . Balchen was very knowledgeable about wilderness and northern survival , skills that he would later exploit . While waiting for his acceptance as an Olympian , Balchen received word that he also qualified for flight training , resulting in his decision to become a pilot in the Royal Norwegian Navy Air Service in 1921 . Aviation . Gaining recognition as an accomplished pilot , the Norwegian Defense Department selected Balchen in 1925 to become part of the Amundsen - Ellsworth Relief Expedition , a rescue mission for the missing explorer Roald Amundsen under the command of Flight Lieutenant Lützow - Holm . The expedition consisting of two seaplanes , was sent to Spitsbergen on the Svalbard archipelago . This assignment would make Amundsen , already a family friend , a lifelong friend and confidante . During the next year , Balchen became part of a ground party led by Lieutenant J . Höver , providing technical services for the Roald Amundsen , Lincoln Ellsworth and Umberto Nobile Arctic Expedition , ultimately a successful attempt to fly the lighter - than - air airship , " Norge " , over the North Pole from Svalbard to Teller , Alaska . Although he was a highly regarded mechanic , Balchen ' s main role was to provide survival training to the Italian crew members as well as to teach them to ski . In a last - minute decision by Amundsen , he was not chosen to be on the record - breaking dirigible flight as Nobile was in charge of picking the crew , which already had a complement of 23 . After observing the futile efforts and eventual crash of a Fokker trimotor belonging to one of his competitors , Commander Richard E . Byrd of the U . S . Navy , Amundsen asked Balchen to help in preparing the " Josephine Ford " trimotor for a flight to the North Pole . Under his supervision , the damaged aircraft skis were repaired with improvised wooden supports from a ship ' s oars . Although Commander Byrd and his pilot , Floyd Bennett claimed to have flown to the North Pole and back on 9 May 1926 , historians such as Walter Boyne allege that the first flight over the North Pole was actually carried out three days later by Amundsen , Nobile and their crew on board the " Norge " . In his autobiography in 1953 , Balchen further discounted the Byrd account . He had taken meticulous notes of the activities at Spitsbergen and based his assertion on calculations that he made from Commander Byrd ' s own written airspeed and navigational data . Later researchers who have studied the data recorded by Byrd and Bennett have decisively confirmed that those aviators could not have made it to the North Pole , due to mechanical breakdowns ( including a failed aircraft engine and broken sextant ) and that they had carried out a fraud by announcing that they had flown over the North Pole . In 1926 , under the sponsorship of Joseph Wanamaker , Balchen officially joined the Byrd party , as the co - pilot and navigator , with the pilot Floyd Bennett , flying the " Josephine Ford " on a tour to more than 50 American cities , thereby promoting commercial aviation as a safe , reliable and practical means of transportation . Following this tour Balchen was hired by Anthony Fokker as a test pilot for the Fokker Aircraft Company at the Teterboro Airport , New Jersey . On 29 June 1927 , Balchen , as the co - pilot with the chief pilot Bert Acosta ; the flight engineer , George Otto Noville and the navigator and air flight organizer , Commander Byrd , flew an U . S . Post Office airmail aircraft , Fokker trimotor " America " , across the Atlantic Ocean from Roosevelt Field on Long Island . Due to Acosta ' s reported lack of ability to successfully fly via aircraft instruments , and the foul weather for most of this flight , Balchen did nearly all of the flying . Bad weather and low visibility over France made landing at the Paris airport impractical , despite their repeated attempts . When their aircraft was running low on aviation gasoline , Balchen decided to fly back to the western coast of France , and there he landed the Fokker Trimotor that was not designed to land on the water , on the ocean just off the coast of France , and without any injury to the occupants . On 28 – 29 November 1929 , flying a modified Ford 4 - AT Trimotor , Balchen became one of the first four men to fly over the South Pole . Balchen was the chief pilot , and he was accompanied by Harold June , his co - pilot and radio operator ; Ashley McKinley , the flight ' s photographer ; and Commander Byrd , the navigator and organizer of the Antarctic expedition . Due to his reputation as a polar , transatlantic and aviation expert , Balchen was hired in 1931 by Amelia Earhart as a technical adviser for a planned solo transatlantic flight . In an attempt to throw off the press , Earhart turned over her repaired Lockheed Vega to Balchen who was assumed to be planning an Antarctic flight . Balchen flew the Vega to the Fokker Aircraft Company plant at Hasbrouck Heights , New Jersey . There , he and the mechanics Frank Nagle and Eddie Gorski reconditioned the Vega for the upcoming record flight . Its fuselage was strengthened to carry extra fuel tanks that were added to provide a 420 - gallon capacity , and some additional flight instruments were also installed . After modifications had been made , Earhart flew this Lockheed Vega across the Atlantic Ocean on 20 May 1932 , landing in Ireland . In the mid - 1930s , Balchen returned to Norway to work with the Norwegian Airlines . Later , he was part of a team to create a Nordic Postal Union , and as war seemed inevitable in Europe , Balchen helped negotiate an aviation treaty with the United States . World War II . In 1939 , Balchen was in Helsinki , working on a contract to provide U . S . fighter aircraft to Finland , when the Soviet attack on Finland took place . Enlisting with the Norwegian Air Force , he made his way to the United States on a crucial mission to negotiate " matters pertaining to aircraft ordnance and ammunition with the question of the Norwegian Government ' s possible purchase of such materials in the United States of America . " With his status of holding dual Norwegian and American citizenship and his extensive contacts in the aviation industry , his instruction from the Norwegian Government - in - exile in London changed to a new directive : to set up a training camp and school for expatriate Norwegian airmen and soldiers in Canada . Balchen negotiated directly with Canadian government officials to obtain an agreement to use available airport facilities at the Toronto Island airport on Lake Ontario known as " Little Norway " . During the war , over 2 , 500 Norwegian aviators of all categories : pilots , navigators and mechanics , were trained in the various bases of " Little Norway " . During 1940 , with the " Little Norway " facilities under construction and his administrative duties taken over by others , Balchen requested permission from the Norwegian Air Force to fly ferrying missions for the British , teaming with Clyde Pangborn , a contemporary record - breaking pilot of the era . In early 1941 , while engaged in a ferrying mission , and on a layover in the Philippines , a representative of General Henry " Hap " Arnold sought out Balchen . Arnold asked Balchen to join the US Army Air Corps as a colonel to oversee the establishment of the USAAF polar airfields at Qaanaaq , and Sondre Stromfjord Greenland . These highly secretive bases would serve to ferry fighter aircraft across the Atlantic by air , rather than having to disassemble them and send them overseas by cargo ship . The airfields also served as bases from which long - range Consolidated B - 24 Liberator patrol aircraft could fly far out over the North Atlantic Ocean in search of the German " Kriegsmarine " U - boat s that were menacing American , British , and Canadian ships taking war supplies and troops across the ocean in preparation for the then undecided location of the cross - channel invasion of Europe . This latter air base had the code name " Bluie West Eight " during its operational life . Between September 1941 and November 1943 , Balchen trained his personnel in cold weather survival skills and rescue techniques which enabled them to carry out many rescues of downed airmen on the Greenland icecap . On 25 May 1943 , flying in a Boeing B - 17 Flying Fortress , Balchen led a bombing raid that destroyed the only German outpost remaining on Greenland , a forward station at Sabine Island on the eastern coast of that island . This destruction hindered the ability of the German armed forces to maintain a presence on Greenland that not only had been used to send deceptive radio messages to Allied aircraft as well as establishing a weather station required to provide accurate weather reports for the German forces operating in the North Atlantic . Balchen then was posted to the European Theatre to run " Operation Where and When " , based at " Luleå - Kallax " Air Base in northern Sweden . The base was set up for harassing and denying air superiority to Nazi Germany ' s " Luftwaffe " over Finland and occupied Norway . Balchen commanded a clandestine air transport operation , using 10 Douglas C - 47 s and helped to set up an escape route between the United Kingdom and Sweden that enabled numerous important diplomats and others to flee the Nazis . From March to December 1944 , Balchen ' s " Operation Balder " using six B - 24s manned with OSS crews , safely evacuated at least 2 , 000 Norwegians , 900 American intern ees and 150 internees of other nationalities from Sweden . Police troops ( Norwegian refugees trained in Sweden ) were also airlifted from Sweden to Finnmark . The air operation also shipped strategic freight ; from July to October 1944 , 64 tons of operational supplies such as ammunition were transported from Scotland to the underground in occupied Norway . Life necessities like bales of hay and fodder for livestock were brought to areas in the north of Sweden and Norway , once even paradropping a hospital complete with a doctor and nurse . Between November 1944 and April 1945 , Balchen also transported 200 tons of Arctic equipment and operational supplies from England to Sweden that were used to make secret overland transport from Sweden to Norway possible . During winter 1945 , Balchen shipped communications equipment into northern Norway that was of inestimable value to the Allied Expeditionary Force ' s intelligence operations . The leading Norwegian wartime ace Sven Heglund was acting military attaché and served with Balchen , later writing about his time at Kallax . Another Norwegian at Kallax during the same period , who became a good friend , was marine biologist and explorer - to - be Thor Heyerdahl , later of " Ra I and II " and " Kon - Tiki " fame . Postwar activities . From November 1948 to January 1951 , Balchen commanded the 10th Rescue Squadron of the U . S . Air Force , which was located in southern Alaska but which operated across all of Alaska and northern Canada rescuing crashed airmen . Balchen led this squadron in the development of the techniques that became widely used in cold weather search and rescues . He was also directly responsible for persuading the U . S . Air Force to purchase the de Havilland Canada DHC - 2 Beaver bush aircraft , one that became an important search and rescue aircraft for the Arctic . In May 1949 , while commanding the 10th Rescue Squadron , Balchen flew a Douglas C - 54 Skymaster from Fairbanks , Alaska , via the North Pole to Thule Air Base , Greenland , and hence he became the first man to pilot an aircraft over both geographic poles of the Earth . Balchen was primarily responsible for the pioneering and development of the strategic air base at Thule , Greenland , built secretly on his recommendation , in 1951 under severe weather conditions which , by extending the range of the Strategic Air Command , increased the capabilities that made the SAC a significant deterrent to Soviet aggression during the Cold War . After retiring from the U . S . Air Force in 1956 , Col . Balchen continued to serve the Air Force on special assignments and aviation and energy industries as a consultant . He joined General Precision Laboratories as a consultant in 1959 , as well as working with a host of other companies including Hughes Aircraft , General Dynamics , Canadair and the Electric Boat Company . Working for Canadair in 1966 , then the parent company , General Dynamics , from 1966 – 1971 , Balchen had authority over projects as diverse as ice - breakers , tankers , new epoxy materials for submarine construction , seagoing electronic weather systems and over - snow vehicles . In 1962 , he also worked with the USAF presenting a proposal on the Apogee Intercept Defense System ( AIDS ) in 1962 and later , was the leading advocate for " Project Iceman " , a proposed system of intermediate range ballistic missiles ( IRBMs ) stationed in Greenland . As one of the world ' s foremost Arctic experts , Balchen was sought out by numerous companies and government agencies including Canada and Norway . Balchen was hired as a consultant by Hercules Oil , then Phillips Petroleum and Moran Towing on plans to extract oil from Alaska using pipelines . According to a 1972 article in the " Christian Science Monitor " , Belchen asserted that " a general warming trend over the North Pole is melting the polar ice cap and may produce an ice - free Arctic Ocean by the year 2000 . " In his native Norway , Balchen was a driving force in the establishment of " Det Norske Luftfartselskap " ( D . N . L . ) ( " The Norwegian Airline Company " ) , with which he pioneered commercial Europe – US airline flights across the North Pole . D . N . L . later merged with Danish and Swedish airlines into the major carrier Scandinavian Airlines . Balchen continued to work in consultancy until his death . In his final year , he was diagnosed with bone cancer , and he died at Mount Kisco , New York in 1973 . Honors and tributes . Balchen was a winner of the Harmon Trophy in aviation , as well as a recipient of the following military decorations : Following his death , Balchen was buried at the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia . He is buried in Section 2 , grave 4969 , next to Richard E . Byrd .