TextSearch

The first ship to leave its home port was the icebreaker USCGC NORTHWIND, casting off from the Boston Navy Yard on November 25, 1946. On the 28th she arrived at Norfolk, VA and joined the flagship USS MOUNT OLYMPUS, seaplane tender USS PINE ISLAND and destroyer USS BROWNSON for final preparations. Finally, on December 2, all was ready. Shortly before noon, Admiral Byrd went aboard the USS MOUNT OLYMPUS for a final lunch with Dick Cruzen. Afterwards, Byrd stepped ashore and announced that he would wait to sail on the carrier USS PHILIPPINE SEA some thirty days later. Byrd appointed Paul Siple to represent him as the War Department's chief representative on the expedition and with that, the USS PINE ISLAND cast off, to be followed shortly thereafter by the other three ships. The tiny fleet moved down the Roads, past Old Point Comfort, Cape Henry and finally into the open sea where they abruptly turned south for their 10,000-mile voyage to Antarctica. December 2nd also found the ships of the Pacific Fleet pulling away from various California ports: the seaplane tender USS CURRITUCK and destroyer USS HENDERSON from San Diego, the oiler USS CACAPON from San Pedro and the cargo ship USS YANCEY from Port Hueneme. The cargo ship USS MERRICK was still busy loading gear and would pull out of Port Hueneme on December 5. The Atlantic Fleet sailed around Cuba through the Windward Passage and across the Caribbean to Panama. On December 7, the four ships passed through the canal, docking at Balboa on the Pacific side. Waiting for them was the submarine USS SENNET and oiler USS CANISTEO, since they had previously been assigned to the Central American station. By December 10 all the ships had arrived and as they left Panama behind, the ships fanned our over many hundreds of miles as they made their voyage south. CHAPTER SEVEN Operations in Antarctica Central Group Activities The Central Group rendezvoused at Scott Island on December 30, 1946, in order to follow the USCGC NORTHWIND through the pack ice into the open waters of the Ross Sea. The modern icebreaker is one of the most distinctive and remarkable vessels ever designed. And from this distinctive group of ships came the hardest working vessels of their kind: the Wind-class sisters built during and just after World War II. A total of seven were built by the Western Pipe and Steel Company of San Pedro, California. However, four of them were sailing with a Soviet flag in 1946-7 as part of the lend-lease program with the Soviets, and the last ship was not returned until 1952. (When the American crew arrived at Bremerhaven to take over the ship, subsequently renamed STATEN ISLAND, it was in horrific condition. The ship's desk drawers were crammed with rotting tins of fish and the flight deck area was smeared with chicken blood and feathers. It would take two cruises to the Arctic before the stench would disappear). Of the three remaining vessels, only the USCGC NORTHWIND was immediately available, as the USS BURTON ISLAND was still in service and the EASTWIND was scheduled for service in the Arctic. By default, the USCGC NORTHWIND would mean success or failure as the thrust began. When it became apparent that the ice presented a serious danger to the USS SENNET, the submarine was towed back to Scott Island. The remainder of the group reached the Bay of Whales on January 15, 1947, with the USCGC NORTHWIND breaking out a harbor in the bay ice for them. Over the following two days, landing parties went ashore and selected a site for Little America IV, somewhat north of Little America III, the West Base of the UNITED STATES ANTARCTIC SERVICE EXPEDITION 1939-41. Construction of the base and accompanying aircraft facilities commenced immediately thereafter. Quite an assortment of vehicles were used in this undertaking, including tractors, jeeps, weasels, bulldozers and other tracked equipment. On January 21, young sailor Vance Woodall, from the USS YANCEY, was working on the ice in the unloading area when a tractor nearby picked up a load of snow roller sleds to move in to the barrier cache area. The D6 tractors were proving too heavy to ride on top of the snow that lay on the surface of the bay ice. In order to gain sufficient towing purchase, the drivers had to let the steel treads plow into the snow until reaching the hard ice. As a result, one tread would often grip the ice before the other, throwing the tractor violently from side to side until both treads took equally. The official accident report states that Woodall unfortunately caught both his right arm and head in the slats of the roller just as the tractor suddenly lurched ahead. Woodall's spinal column was severed "high in the neck" and the navy veteran of only seven months died instantly. By February 6 Little America consisted of a multitude of tents, a sole Quonset hut, three compacted snow runways and a short airstrip made of steel matting. At one point, the number of persons stationed at the base approached 300, but eventually this number had to be greatly reduced so that the remaining individuals could be readily evacuated by the USS BURTON ISLAND. Meanwhile, shortly after noon on Thursday, January 2, 1947, the carrier USS PHILIPPINE SEA , with Admiral Byrd on its bridge, slowly pulled away from the pier at the Norfolk Navy Base as bands played and the local command saluted farewell. The USS PHILIPPINE SEA had been finishing up a shakedown exercise off Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, when orders were received that she would be participating in Operation Highjump. The brand new ship hurried north with an exuberant crew cheering the news . . . this was certainly more exciting than routine shore leave in Hong Kong or Panama! But what a task they had before them. Since she would be going through the canal, changes had to be made in the hull and flight deck structures. A massive shipment of parts for twenty sleds came in from the Supply Office of the Boston Navy Yard and quickly assembled for use by the Byrd party. A quantity of "Byrd cloth" was shipped in "for the construction of various items of cold weather clothing and equipment". An HO3S1 helicopter was flown aboard along with approximately one hundred tons of miscellaneous equipment for use by the other ships participating in Highjump. Next came the six R4D transport planes. They were obviously too big to be flown in at sea so it took a little imagination to get them aboard. Since there was no landing field adjacent to the dock, a mile-long swath had to be cut right through the middle of the naval base, from the field to the docks. What a site it was as drivers had to "pilot" the planes through the narrow pathway, with sailors sitting on the wings to prevent a sudden burst of wind from picking the plane up and hurling it against the sides of buildings, fences and machinery, often within inches of the wingtips. Last aboard would be Byrd, just hours before shoving off. The USS PHILIPPINE SEA reached the Canal Zone on January 7, 1947, and the next day started the slow journey through the locks. Byrd and his men departed Balboa for the Antarctic on January 10. The ship steamed south at twenty knots toward Scott Island. By January 22 the vessel had reached 58°48'S, and "it was assumed icebergs could be encountered during the day". One of the helicopters was readied for takeoff and as it lifted from the deck, the pilot neglected to gain further altitude before veering off to the side of the carrier. As the copter swept over the port side, the sudden down-wash of wind, together with the loss of the flight deck surface as a cushion, sucked the aircraft right into the water. Fortunately the pilot bailed out and was rescued by a lifeboat. On January 25, they rendezvoused with the USCGC NORTHWIND, USS CACAPON, USS SENNET and USS BROWNSON near Scott Island. Four days later, on January 29, the first two R4D's successfully took off from the flight deck of the USS PHILIPPINE SEA for the risky flight to Little America IV; Admiral Byrd was aboard the first plane. By January 30, all six R4D's had arrived safely at Little America IV. The carrier's objective had now been completed. Carrying the only outbound mail from OPERATION HIGHJUMP ships during their Antarctic deployment, the USS PHILIPPINE SEA turned and headed for Balboa, Canal Zone. She arrived there on February 18 and ten days later was back at Quonset Point, Rhode Island. Back at Little America, every opportunity was taken to keep the aircraft flying. Several photographic missions were flown, including a two-aircraft flight to the South Pole on February 15-16. A final flight attempt was made on the 22nd, but was turned back due to poor weather, thus terminating Little America-based flight operations for the expedition. On the ground, investigations were conducted in the immediate vicinity of Little America. A tractor party departed Little America for the Rockefeller Mountains on February 12, but had to return prematurely to the base a week later due to the impending evacuation. Finally completing shakedown trials, the USS BURTON ISLAND departed San Diego, California at 1530 hours on January 17, 1947. By February 6 she had reached the northern edge of the Ross Sea pack. Two days later she contacted the ships of the Central Group at 72°S and delivered mail for these vessels. On February 13 she headed for McMurdo Sound, arriving on the 16th, where she acted as a weather station until the 20th. Following this duty, she steamed for Little America to commence evacuation of the base. The USS BURTON ISLAND reached Little America on February 22 and evacuation operations commenced immediately. The remaining base personnel boarded the icebreaker shortly thereafter, and she departed the Bay of Whales on February 23, 1947. The ships of the Central Group took various routes on the homeward journey. The USS MERRICK received extensive rudder damage from the ice floes and had to be towed by the USCGC NORTHWIND back to Port Chalmers, New Zealand, for repairs. All the ships had taken a significant amount of abuse from the ice. The bows and sides of the flagship and cargo vessels USS MERRICK and USS YANCEY became severely dented, as rivets were sprung and propellers damaged. Nevertheless, they all made it back. The USS MERRICK was in drydock for a month but eventually sailed north on March 22, 1947, arriving in San Diego on April 12th. Meanwhile, the USCGC NORTHWIND, USS MOUNT OLYMPUS and USS BURTON ISAND departed Wellington, New Zealand, on March 14, 1947. The USCGC NORTHWIND arrived in Seattle, Washington, on April 6, 1947. The USS BURTON ISLAND arrived at San Pedro, California, on March 31, 1947 and the USS MOUNT OLYMPUS slipped through the Canal on April 7th and arrived in Washington, D.C. on April 14. The Yancey had a more interesting return voyage. She departed Port Chalmers on March 5 and arrived at Pago Pago, Samoa, on the 11th. She left Samoa on the 27th and steered for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, with the Navy YTL-153 in tow. Under steam at about 7.5 knots, she arrived at Pearl on the 14th of April. The long voyage for the crew and ship finally ended on May 2, 1947, when they settled into Port Hueneme, California. The submarine USS SENNET served as a stand-by rescue vessel for the R4D flights from the USS PHILIPPINE SEA to Little America through the 30th of January. On February 4 she set course for Wellington, New Zealand. She left New Zealand on the 15th of February and arrived at her mooring at Submarine Base Balboa, Canal Zone, on March 13, 1947. WESTERN GROUP ACTIVITIES The Western Group rendezvoused at the Marquesas Islands on December 12, 1946, and sailing on parallel paths, they reached the edge of the pack ice northeast of the Balleny Islands on Christmas Eve day. The USS HENDERSON and USS CACAPON fanned out to serve as weather stations while flight operations from the USS CURRITUCK began on December 24. Perhaps Dufek and his men struggled with the Antarctic elements off the Thurston Peninsula, but Captain Charles A. Bond and his Western Group were blessed by comparison. Their primary weather problem was related to fog. Additionally, considering that none of the sailors aboard the three ships and ever seen Antarctic service before, things couldn't have gone much better. Captain John Clark of the USS CURRITUCK wrote, "The acute personnel situation then current in the Navy by reason of the demobilization fully affected this vessel". Of major concern was the Engineering Department, where the inexperienced men "were encountering numerous difficulties with all phases of the plant. The ship was to continue to be handicapped by critical personnel shortages throughout the entire operation". The handling of the PBM's were a concern, too. "A continuous and searching analysis was made of all phases of plane handling". Clark was acutely aware of the special weather conditions encountered in the South Polar region and the need to "reduce all plane handling times to a minimum except crane operating time and that of actual fueling from the ship's side, which were, or course, uncontrollable". With much practice, the plane handling time was actually cut by two-thirds. A few flights were attempted but fog continued to plague them until New Year's Day, 1947. The fog lifted and the first mapping flight of about seven hours was flown along the Oates Coast with complete success. Free from fighting the elements his colleague Dufek was encountering, Bond was able to concentrate his attention on mastering the weather. "The ship was continuously looking for good weather and for ice bays in the pack ice for wind protection, being guided in the former by the aerologist's recommendations". The pilots were encouraged and enthused by Bond's leadership and the resulting accuracy of the aerology and radar tracking teams, both on the USS CURRITUCK and aboard the aircraft. Whereas the pilots at Little America IV fought dense cloud formations rising to thirteen or fourteen thousand feet, the Western Group, flying along Wilkes Land, found that even if the overcast was dense, "ordinarily you would break out in the clear soon. On the average the cloud layer wasn't any more than 4 or 5,000 feet thick with not too much icing . . . it would be absolutely clear on top". Icebergs were encountered, but as Clark recalled, "Bergs were shown by radar with fidelity and the ship maneuvered in and out among them easily". Bond was pleased as significant air operations resulted in unquestioned successes. After the seven-hour mission on New Years Day, flights were made on the 2nd, 4th, 5th and 6th over the continent from their staging area in the Balleny Islands. "Operations were eminently successful and a substantial portion of the area assignment had been completed by this time". Their first assignment completed, Cruzen radioed from the Central Group instructing Bond to cease operations and sail the USS CURRITUCK eastward to the vicinity of Scott Island in order to reconnoiter for the USCGC NORTHWIND and its bedeviled flock in the Ross Sea. The USS CURRITUCK reached Scott Island on the 10th and both patrol planes flew reconnaissance missions on the 11th and 12th, but no leads could be seen for their trapped colleagues in the ice below. Dismissed by Cruzen after their unsuccessful air operations, the USS CURRITUCK headed west again past the Adélie Coast and on to Wilkes Land along the Sabrina, Knox and Queen Mary Coasts. PBM Landing at "Bunger's Oasis" Unfortunately, no flights were possible between January 13 and the 21st because of the huge northerly swell. On January 22 the swells at last moderated and the weather remained acceptable for additional flights. Over the next week, long and successful photomapping missions progressed to the west. Suddenly, on either January 30 or February 1 (the record is unclear), PBM pilot Lieutenant Commander David E. Bunger lifted from the bay and headed south for the continent some hundred miles distant. At this time the USS CURRITUCK was off the Shackleton Ice Shelf on the Queen Mary Coast of Wilkes Land. Reaching the coastline, Bunger flew west with cameras humming. Suddenly the men in the cockpit saw a dark spot come up over the barren white horizon and as they drew closer, they couldn't believe their eyes. Byrd later described it as a "land of blue and green lakes and brown hills in an otherwise limitless expanse of ice". Bunger and his men carefully inspected the region and then raced back to the ship to tell the others of their discovery. Several days later Bunger and his flight crew returned for another look, finding one of the lakes big enough to land on. Bunger carefully landed the "flying boat" and slowly came to a stop. The water was actually quite warm for Antarctica, about 30°, as the men dipped their hands in to the elbow. The lake was filled with red, blue and green algae which gave the lakes their distinctive color. The fly boys "seemed to have dropped out of the twentieth century into a landscape of thousands of years ago when land was just starting to emerge from one of the great ice ages", Byrd later wrote. Byrd called the discovery "by far the most important, so far as the public interest was concerned of the expedition". As early as 1947, men now wondered if this was the first sign of global warming. As Paul Siple disgustingly reported, discussion between the scientists as to the nature of "Bungers Oasis" had not even begun "before the eleven press representatives aboard the USS MOUNT OLYMPUS had fired off dispatches to the outside world describing the oasis as a 'Shangri-La' and implying that it was warmed by a mysterious source of heat and might be supporting vegetation". Siple gave high marks to the crew of the PBM for landing and making an attempt to examine the lake, however Bunger "had no technical tools to examine his find". He even had to guess the temperature of the water since no thermometer was aboard. But they did have an empty bottle aboard which they filled with water from the lake. Unfortunately, "the water in the bottle turned out to be brackish, a clue to the fact that the 'lake' was actually an arm of the open sea". By the end of January, inclement weather had forced the airmen to skip over the existing gap between 150°E and 145°E longitude, which later expeditions would fill in. Mapping missions continued day after day covering a 1500-mile long area between 141°E and 115°E longitude. Wilkes Land proved to be a "featureless ice sheet that ranged from 6,000 to 9.500 feet above sea level. No mountains were lofty enough to thrust their heads into the frigid winds above this white blanket, although valleys and ridges in the ice surface up to 100 miles inland gave a hint of rough terrain underneath". The weather turned typically Antarctic as the first week of February arrived. Seas became rough and snow storms frequent as flight operations were limited to only three days during the month. During that time, the USS CURRITUCK sailed hundreds of miles around the coastline, from 115°E to 40°E longitude, all around Wilkes Land, the American Highland fronting the Indian Ocean and on to Queen Maud Land. When the planes were able to fly, outstanding results would be the norm. These results would be of significant importance in the selection of base sites some ten years later during the IGY. On February 12, when the USS CURRITUCK was off the Princess Ragnhild Coast of Queen Maud Land, pilots W. R. Kreitzer and F. L. Reinbolt lifted off in their PBM for a routine photo mission to map 300 miles of coastline. What had previously been drawn in as coastline now proved to be towering shelf ice rising high above the sea. As they turned south, they suddenly discovered a range of ice-crystal mountains, luminously blue against the dark sky, rising more than two miles into the air. Flying near the mountain peaks, Kreitzer and Reinbolt followed the range for nearly one hundred miles before turning back. One of them later told Byrd, "It was like a

… truncated (20,223 more characters in archive)

Operation Highjump: The Great Antarctic Expedition