by Alec Brew
The Americans had arrived on 25 April, and with Heimdal occupying the only wharf had been forced to anchor offshore. Byrd had been forced to bring one of his Fokker Monoplanes, The Josephine Ford, ashore on a makeshift pontoon, made by lashing four boats together. As soon as Norge,arrived on 7 May, Byrd was quick to ask Nobile when he would be heading for the Pole, and was told it would be in about three days. The Americans made frantic last-minute preparations, and at 1.30 am on 9 May the Norwegians were awoken by the sound of aero-engines. They rushed outside in time to see the Josephine Ford roaring off on her flight to the North Pole.
All that day the Norwegians were busy making their final preparations, all the time wondering what was happening to Byrd and his crew. At 5 pm an Italian mechanic rushed into the dining hall to say he could hear approaching engines. Everyone rushed outside and there was the Fokker winging in from the north, safe and sound, on their return from the first ever flight to the North Pole.
On 9 May Amundsen was ready to go on his second attempt to reach the North Pole by air. This time, drawing on the experience of being stranded on the ice pack with no communications, he was well equipped with radio. Norge was equipped with a long wave transmitter and receiver powered by a propeller-driven generator, which had a range of 2000 miles in the interference-free air of the Arctic. On the flight to Pulham the airship had established two-way communications with London while still off the south coast of France. Norge was also equipped with powerful direction-finding equipment, which included two aerial loops, wound around the complete outer envelope.
On 11 May Norge set off on her voyage across the top of the world, with sixteen men on board. Amundsen and Ellsworth were the joint leaders of the aerial expedition, but Nobile was the captain of the airship. Second in command was Riiser-Larsen, and First Lieutenant Emil Horgen of the Norwegian Navy was assigned to the side rudder, with the main rudder in the care of a chief gunner of the Norwegian Navy, Oscar Wisting. Captain Birger Gottwaldt was the radio expert with Frithjof Storm-Johnsen the radio telegraphist. Fredrik Ramm was a journalist who filed regular reports by radio, and Finn Malmgren was their meteorologist. Oskar Omdahl and five Italiam mechanics made up the rest of the crew.
At 9.55 am the airship was let go, and set course for the north. Byrd took off just afterwards and accompanied the airship for about an hour. The fifteen-hour flight to the Pole was uneventful, only the monotony of the jagged ice field lay below them, with two glimpses of polar bears the only cause for excitement. It has to be remembered that at the time it was not known whether the Arctic consisted entirely of sea, or contained land masses or islands of whatever size.
At 1.25 pm Greenwich Mean Time they circled the Pole and dropped the Norwegian, Italian and American flags. They then set course for Alaska, across a part of the globe that had never been seen by human eyes. At 8.30 am they ran into a thick belt of fog that did not clear until 6 pm. The fog caused ice to form on all the metal parts of the airship, and when it broke off it often damaged the envelope after being hurled into it by the propellers. Constant repairs had to be made.
At 6.45 am on 13 May the coast of Alaska was sighted, twenty-nine hours after leaving the Pole. Soon they were over Wainwright, which Amundsen recognised having been there in 1922 – 3. They then ran into a gale and had to battle against it over the Bering Strait. Finally, Norge reached the village of Teller, 90 miles from Nome, after seventy hours in the air. A member of the crew parachuted to the ground to supervise the landing, and anchor and landing ropes were dropped. The landing was successfully accomplished and the airship was deflated. The first flight across the North Pole had been accomplished, and the use of a semi-rigid airship had been justified.
Amundsen had become the first man to reach both Poles, and decided that his career in exploration was over. He retired to a quiet life, his finances having been restored by the success of Norge.
After the expedition Umberto Nobile began planning another airship flight across the Arctic, but this time with more scientific aims in mind. He planned several flights over the ice pack, and invented a device for lowering men onto the surface from a hovering airship, so that scientific measurements could be made. Mussolini approved this plan in October 1927, and Nobile was given permission to acquire the sister airship of Norge, Italia. The Italian Air Ministry supplied the crew and the Italian Geographical Society planned the scientific programme. The whole expedition, which included a steamship as a floating base, which was renamed City of Milan, was financed by that city.
Three scientists accompanied Nobile, led by Finn Malmgren, who had been on Norge. Three flights were made in all from King’s Bay, Svalbard, the first being on 11 May 1928, with thirteen men on board. The weather deteriorated and Italia turned back to the north coast of the island. Four days later Nobile set off once more, this time in an easterly direction, past the north coast of Franz Josef Land and Severnaya Zemlya. Banks of low-lying cloud forced Nobile to return to Svalbard once more.
The last flight of Italia began at 4.51 am on 23 May 1928. The airship flew north against the wind on a course towards Cape Bridgman in north-east Greenland. They soon crossed the edge of the ice pack, and flew on until Greenland was sighted at 2.45 pm. The wind had reduced the speed of Italia to only 37 mph.
At 5.29 pm near Cape Bridgman Nobile set course for the North Pole. With a following wind, and sunny weather Italia made good time and the North Pole was reached at 2.20 am, on 24 May. Nobile and the six others in the crew, who had also been on Norge, became the first people to fly over the North Pole for a second time. Nobile had intended to use his invention to lower some people onto the ice to make scientific observations, but the wind speed was too great, so they contented themselves with dropping the Pope’s Cross and the Italian flag from a height of 500 feet.
13 . Italia leaving on King’s Bay, Svalbard,on 23 May 1928 for the North Pole. The airship failed to make the return journey, crashing on the ice.
They turned south running on longitudinal 25 degrees east at a height of 3000 feet. Cloud was encountered until 10 pm, and then they descended to 700 feet, where they were able to work out their ground speed, which was only 26 mph. They had been running on only two of the three engines for the whole of the flight, but now the third was started. Even with all three engines running the ground speed at 3.25 am was still only 43 mph.
They were running in gale force winds with thick banks of fog, interspersed with snow storms. The crew were becoming anxious, desperate for landfall, and then at 9.25 am the elevator jammed, probably caused by ice. The airship dived, and to prevent it striking the ice Nobile stopped all engines. Italia slowly rose to 3000 feet while repairs to the elevator were being made. At 9.55 am repairs were adjudged complete and two engines were started. The airship cautiously descended to 1000 feet.
At 10.30 am, when Italia was 45 miles north-east of Ross Island and 180 miles from King’s Bay, it developed a strong list to the stern.The airship had been light and therefore they were holding the nose down to maintain level flight. Nobile had just dropped a glass ball of red liquid from a starboard porthole. He was timing its fall to the ice, to check their exact height, when he heard Cecioni, one of the Italian crewmen, exclaiming that they were heavy. This was probably because of the loss of gas caused by the ice being flung into the envelope by the propellers.
When Nobile ducked his head back inside the gondola he found they were down about 8 degrees by the tail, and descending quickly. He quickly ordered the two engines that were running to be brought to full power, and to start the other engine. He hoped to increase their forward speed and therefore the dynamic lift of the airship, to arrest their descent. He stared at the variometer, but it showed they were still descending, possibly even more quickly. With the ice pack getting uncomfortably near he ordered the engines to be stopped, to lessen the possibility of fire, and ordered the ballast chain dropped.
There was remarkable calm in the gondola, as the crew obeyed orders silently. The port engine was still running, and Nobile shou
ted from a porthole to the mechanic, Caratti, to shut it down. As he did so he looked down, to the stern, and saw the rear gondola was only a few metres above the ice. He ducked back inside again and grabbed the wheel, hoping to steer Italia onto the ice to lessen the impact. With a resounding crash the rear gondola hit the ice pack, killing the mechanic there. The control car then hit, and as it was dragged across the ice ridges it was torn away from the keel. The lightened airship immediately rose back into the air, with one wall of the control car still attached. There were six men still on board, as the unpowered airship drifted up, and with the wind back towards the Pole.
The gondola had broken open under the impact and the other nine men were spilled on the ice together with provisions and equipment. When the men had recovered from the shock of being suddenly deposited on the Arctic ice pack as Italia floated away into the sky, they took stock of their position. Luckily, the emergency radio had fallen with them, and appeared to be undamaged. They began sending distress signals to City of Milan but the ship did not appear to be listening.
They continued to send messages every hour as they made themselves secure in the remains of the gondola. They were on a drifting ice floe, which travelled 28 miles south-east over the next two days. On 28 May Charles XII Land came into view and Malmgren and two others, Mariano and Zappi, were detailed to walk across the ice in the hope of finding help. Those remaining continued to send SOS messages and finally, on 6 June, an operator in Archangel replied.
A huge relief operation was set in motion, co-ordinated by the Norwegian Government, and Roald Amundsen was naturally asked to take a leading part. Amundsen and Nobile had fallen out, however, and the Norwegian had said things about his Italian colleague that caused Mussolini to specifically request that he should not be in any way involved with the search and rescue attempt. Amundsen returned home, but was desperate to help, and not to be seen to be standing idly by while his former companion was lost on the ice. Vividly recalling his own three-week ordeal on the Arctic ice pack, he was desperate to help.
By the intervention of a Norwegian business man in Paris, he secured the use of a French Latham 47 flying boat from the Aviation Maritime, together with its crew of Captaine de Corvette Rene Guildad; co-pilot, Lieutenant Cavelier de Cuverville; a radio officer, Emile Valette; and mechanic, Gilbert Brazy. The Latham 47 was a biplane flying boat with two Renault 12 JB engines in a tandem arrangement. The search for Italia had become an international event, and national prestige was at stake, which is why the French were so willing to send one of their most modern flying boats, even though twenty other aircraft were already involved.
14. Lundberg’s aircraft after crashing on the ice, during his second landing at the crash-site, adding himself to the five men stranded on the ice.
15. The Latham 47 flying boat, borrowed by Roald Amundsen to search for Italia, and in which he went missing.
The Latham left Caudebec on Saturday 16 June and arrived at Bergen, Norway, that same evening. After a 24 hour rest they flew on to Tromsø. Here, they were joined by Amundsen and his fellow pilot Lief Dietrichson. The aircraft was carefully prepared at Tromsø. Ten hours later, at 4 pm on Monday 18 June it took off on its last flight. Shortly afterwards a fisherman saw the aircraft flying into a fog bank, while apparently trying to climb above it. The last heard of Amundsen and the Latham was a radio message received three hours later. The flying boat was never seen again, but ten weeks later, on 13 October, one of the aircraft’s petrol tanks and a float were picked up off the north-west coast of Norway, followed by more wreckage a few days later.
The tank and the float had been unscrewed from the aircraft’s structure. It appeared that the Latham had been forced down somewhere in a disabled state, and that the crew had attempted to save themselves by creating a boat from the parts. A search was not initiated for the Latham for some time after its departure from Tromsø because many suspected that Amundsen might well have changed direction after take-off to make directly for Nobile’s position, which would explain his non-arrival at King’s Bay.
On 15 June the ice-breaker Krassin had sailed from Leningrad to trawl the west coast of Svalbard. Another ship the Malyguin searched the east coast. Riiser-Larsen searched in a Norwegian seaplane and three Swedish aircraft and an Italian seaplane also joined in the search. On 20 June the men on the ice floe were discovered by the Italian aircraft and food for twenty days was dropped to them.
16. The Russian ice-breaker Krassin, having just arrived at the crash-site.
A Swedish pilot named Lundberg flew out to land on the ice floe with orders to bring back Nobile himself. Despite Nobile’s protestations that he should be the last man saved, he relented and was flown back to Svalbard. When Lundberg flew back to save more of the men his aircraft was wrecked while landing, returning to six the number of men stranded on the ice.
Meanwhile Krassin was cutting a path through the ice to the men. At one point, on 6 July, a Junkers monoplane was lowered from the ship onto the ice and began an air search. The Russian pilot spotted the Italians Mariano and Zappi near to King Charles XII Land and was able to land and rescue them. Krassin smashed its way through the ice to the remainder of the men and they were taken on board after an ordeal on the ice that had lasted thirty-two days.
No sign of Italia or the six men on board was ever found. Roald Amundsen had forced landed on the Arctic ice pack and he and his men had saved themselves by their own efforts, but he had perished trying to save others who were in the same predicament. Nevertheless, a legend built up among some of his countrymen that the ‘White Eagle’ of Norwegian polar exploration was out on the ice somewhere waiting rescue, and would one day return from the frozen wastes, as he always had before.
CHAPTER 6
Down in the Atlantic
Captain Frank Courtney was one of the most famous British pilots in the years following the First World War, the popular press dubbing him ‘The Man with the Magic Hands’. In 1928 he made an attempt to become the first man to fly the Atlantic from east to west over the Azores route in a Dornier Wal flying boat. Both he and the aircraft succeeded in reaching America, but not together! Because of an engine fire, he and his crew parted company with the Dornier in mid-ocean, and the crew and aircraft completed the journey quite separately.
Frank Courtney looked like a bank clerk, tall and slim with pince-nez glasses, and in 1913 that is just what he was, in a Paris bank. Smitten by the thought of flying he wrote to Claude Grahame-White at his fledgling aircraft company at Hendon, and was able to talk his way into an unpaid apprenticeship.
With the help of a loan from the family solicitor, he was also able to pay for flying lessons at the Grahame-White School. One of his fellow pupils through the summer of 1914 was JD North, the chief engineer of the company. Courtney was able to obtain his certificate (No. 874) three weeks after the War started; JD North never did.
Courtney had tried to join the Royal Flying Corps the day war broke out, but was rejected because of his glasses, and returned to Hendon. As soon as the need for experienced men became apparent, he was encouraged to join the RFC as an Air Mechanic Second Class (2nd AM), and was posted to Farnborough. When it was discovered that he had a pilot’s certificate (and by claiming double the three hours flying time he had accumulated), he was put on the roster of standby pilots, for when there was a shortage. Then, by volunteering to take the most inhospitable shifts, at weekends, he was made flight instructor. He was now given flying pay and was allowed to wear wings, the only 2nd AM pilot in the RFC!
A failed attempt to loop a greatly disliked Martinsyde S1 Scout, resulted in uncontrolled gyrations all over the sky, because of the effect of the rotary engine. Several further attempts had the same result, but his colleagues and superiors who had watched this performance came to the quite erroneous conclusion that he was an expert aerobatic pilot. This resulted in him being posted on a monoplane course – monoplanes being seen as tricky to fly.
Shortly afterwards he was promoted to co
rporal, and transferred to France, ferrying an Avro 504 in the process. As there were no corporal pilots on active service he was promoted to sergeant right away; he flew Morane Parasol monoplanes with No. 3 Squadron. After surviving ‘The Fokker Scourge’ and becoming an experienced battle-tested pilot, Courtney was shot down and wounded. Following his period of recuperation he was promoted to second lieutenant and posted to Farnborough as a military test pilot.
In September 1916 he returned to France to No. 20 Squadron, flying FE2ds. He later transferred to No. 45 Squadron, and then No. 70 Squadron on Sopwith 1½ Strutters. Back in No. 45 Squadron as a flight commander, he managed to survive ‘Bloody April’ 1917, and was then transferred back to England to take up a Special Instructor’s post at London Colney. Subsequently, he was transferred back to military test flying. During this period he had his first contact with Boulton & Paul at Norwich, being involved with a programme to fit 150 hp Gnome Monosoupape engines to Sopwith Camels destined for the American forces. He also test flew the first Boulton & Paul design, the P3 Bobolink fighter.
After the War, Courtney became a freelance test pilot and Boulton & Paul, where JD North was now chief engineer, became one of his best customers. He test flew their P.7 Bourges twin-engined fighter-bomber, and achieved lasting fame by looping it, and demonstrating its aerobatic potential at Hendon and elsewhere. He flew many prototypes for numerous companies including Airco, Martinsyde, Armstrong Whitworth, Hawker Aircraft, and Koolhoven in Holland as well as Boulton & Paul. He also operated as a reserve pilot for some of the fledgling airlines of the day, and was a familiar competitor at many of the air races in the immediate post-war years.
In 1923 alone he made the first flights of the Hawker Duiker army co-operation monoplane; the Armstrong Whitworth Awana transport; Armstrong Whitworth Wolf corps-reconnaissance biplane; the Armstrong Whitworth metal-Siskin fighter; the Handasyde Monoplane; the Fokker FK31 monoplane fighter; and the Boulton & Paul Bugle bomber; as well as many other testing assignments. He flew numerous airline sectors, mostly to the Continent, to Paris, Amsterdam and Berlin; flew the Siskin on demonstration tours of Spain and Sweden; and still had time to win the King’s Cup flying the Siskin II, G-EBEU, at an average speed of 149 mph!
