Antarctica Escape from Disaster

by Peter Lerangis

  In an apartment in Brooklyn, shortly after giving birth, Mary Lerangis urges her first-born son to become a writer.

  In Prospect Park, Nicholas Lerangis entertains a son so obsessed with books that, by sixteen months, he had yet to learn to walk.

  Lerangis, stylish even at four years old.

  Lerangis (in back) with his younger sister and brother. He promised them that if they learned to play well enough, the little man on the piano would start to dance. . . . They are still practicing.

  To this day, Lerangis refuses to admit that this early work was created during sixth-grade math class.

  Lerangis as a freshman at Freeport High School in 1970. Here, he shows off his writing style and his mustache, both of which were to develop quite a bit in the future.

  Lerangis (standing, second from left) at the Charles River with his a cappella singing group, the Harvard Krokodiloes. The group still performs to this day.

  Lerangis promptly retired his ruffled shirt after this performance at Harvard University’s Sanders Theater in 1976.

  Lerangis with his soon-to-be wife, Tina deVaron, at their rehearsal dinner in Boston in 1983.

  Lerangis with his sons, Nick and Joseph, in 1991. He remarks that, although this was a comfortable pose at the time, any attempt to recreate it today would be painful.

  In 2003, Lerangis was invited by the White House to accompany First Lady Laura Bush to Moscow to represent the United States at the first Russian Book Festival. From left to right: R. L. Stine, Lerangis, Marc Brown, Cherie Blair QC, and First Lady Laura Bush.

  The Lerangis/deVaron family in 2005 at the Gates exhibition in Central Park— just a hop, skip, and a jump from their home on the Upper West Side. (Image courtesy of Ellen Dubin Photography.)

  A welcome reception during an author visit in Solana Beach, California, in 2009.

  Lerangis connects with his audience after a school visit in Chappaqua, New York, in 2012.

  Glossary

  abovedecks — ANY HIGHER DECK

  adze— an axlike tool with a curved blade amidships — in the center of the ship

  aurora australis (also called the southern lights) — a mysterious formation of arcing lights in the Southern Hemisphere apparent most strongly in the Antarctic

  avast— a nautical command that means Stop!

  backwash — the backward movement of water as it is propelled behind an object ballast — a heavy material (sometimes rocks) put at the bottom of a ship or boat to create stability

  barnacle — a small crustacean with a pebblelike shell that attaches itself to rocks, boats, and ships

  barque— a three- to five-masted sailing ship with all masts square-rigged except the aftermast, which is fore-and-aft rigged barquentine— a three- to five-masted ship with a square-rigged foremast but fore-and-aft rigged mainmast and mizzenmast

  batten (n) — a narrow wooden strip of wood batten (v) — to fasten or secure with a batten

  beam — the widest part of a ship

  belowdecks— any lower deck

  bilges — the lowest part of a boat or ship’s inner hull

  binnacle — a housing for a ship’s compass boom — the horizontal spar used to support the bottom edge of a sail

  bow — the front of a ship

  bowsprit — the spar extending from the bow of a ship

  braces — a rope used to control horizontal movement of a square-rigged sail

  brackish — salty

  brash ice — ground-up ice floes and lumps of snow, with a puddinglike texture

  breaker — a wave that breaks into foam bulkhead — an upright partition that separates compartments of a ship

  bulwarks — the side of a ship above the upper deck

  calve — to break off a section of ice from a larger mass, as in an iceberg from an ice shelf

  capsize — to overturn or to become overturned

  cofferdam — a watertight structure to cover a hole in a ship’s hull during repairs

  come about — to change a ship’s tack crevasse — a deep crevice in ice or snow crosstrees — the intersection of mast and horizontal spar in a square-rigged ship crosswind — a wind that blows across, as opposed to with or against, a ship

  Davy Jones’s locker — the sea bottom

  dead low — the absolute lowest point of the tide

  deckhouse — a structure on the upper deck of a ship, which often contains officers’ quarters

  dinghy — a small boat, often carried on a larger boat or ship

  doldrums — an area near the equator characterized by hot weather and a lack of wind

  encroach — to advance more than the usual limits

  exposure — a condition resulting from prolonged contact with severe weather; can result in death

  feather (v) — to turn an oar, at the end of a stroke, so that its blade is horizontal as it pulls back above the water’s surface, reducing wind resistance

  flense — to strip blubber from a whale

  flier, take a — to attempt a reckless act fo’c’sle— abbreviation of forecastle, the area of a ship under the foresail of a ship; often where the sailors are housed

  foremast — the mast at the bow end of a ship

  furl (v) — to wrap a sail around something greenheart — dark greenish wood, known for its durability, from a South American tree

  grommet — a strong eyelet or loop, as on a sail, through which a rope is passed

  growler — a small iceberg

  gunwale — the highest edge of the ship’s hull

  guy line — a rope or wire connected between objects or people and used as a guide

  gyre (n) — a circular movement; a giant circular current

  halyard — a rope used to raise sails hardtack — a hard, plain biscuit made of flour and water

  heave to (past tense, hove to) — to turn a ship’s bow into the wind and let the ship stay adrift in preparation for a storm

  heel (v) — to lean to one side due to wind or waves

  hoosh— stew

  hull — the frame, or body, of a ship hummock — a ridge of ice

  hypothermia — a condition characterized by lower-than-normal body temperature iceberg — a large mass of floating ice broken off (or calved) from shelf ice or from a glacier

  ice floe — a flat, floating fragment of sea ice ice shelf (also shelf ice) — an ice sheet that begins on land and extends into the water, resting on the sea bottom

  jibe — to move sails from one side to the other while sailing into the wind, in order to change the ship’s direction

  jury-rigged — put together in a makeshift fashion

  keel — the central timber at the bottom of the ship, running from bow to stern

  lash — to bind with a rope

  lay (n) — a share of profit paid instead of wages

  lay to — to bring a ship to a stop in open water, facing the wind

  lead (n) — a path of water through pack ice lee — the side sheltered from the wind maelstrom — a turbulent, powerful whirlpool

  mainmast — the second mast from the bow after foremast (middle mast on the Mystery) mainsail — the bottom sail on the mainmast mast — the vertical pole that supports sails Melville, Herman (1819–1891) —American novelist who wrote Moby-Dick

  mizzenmast (or mizzen) — the sail on the aft end of a ship (the third sail on the Mystery)

  Nansen, Fridtjof (1861–1930) — famous Norwegian Arctic explorer

  oarlock — a metal U-shaped device that keeps an oar in place

  old ice — ice floes that have remained unmelted from previous seasons, usually dense and hummocky

  pemmican — food made from dried meat and filler such as flour, molasses, or dried fruit

  port — the left side of a ship (as you face bow)

  pressure — the force exerted by two ice floes pushing against each other

  pressure ridge — ice that has been pushed upward between colliding ice floes

  Primus stove — a smal
l, portable metal stove consisting of one burner and a wire platform over it

  prow — see bow

  pudding ice — see brash ice

  put in — to enter a port, cove, or harbor

  put to — to head for shore

  reel (n) — a spirited Scottish Highlands dance

  rigging — an arrangement of sails, spars, and ropes

  riptide — a strong crosscurrent caused by the action of water against a shore or edge of an ice floe

  rudder — a plate mounted at the ship’s stern for directing its course, turned by means of a tiller

  runner — either of two long, thin, parallel tracks of wood attached to the bottom of a vehicle, on which it moves through snow scuttle — to sink a ship by means of a hole in the hull

  sheet — a rope attached to the bottom of a sail, used to change the angle of the sail relative to the wind

  ship water (v) — to take in water over the ship’s hull

  sledge — a sled used for transporting loads over the ice

  sloop — a boat with one foreand aft-rigged mast and one staysail

  southern lights — see aurora australis

  spar — a pole that supports sails and rigging spindrift — a sea spray blown by the wind square-rigged— an arrangement of square or rectangular-shaped sails

  starboard — the right side of a ship (as you face bow)

  stave in (past tense, stove in) — to smash or crush inward

  staysail — a triangular sail supported by a stay, or diagonal halyard, as opposed to a mast

  stem — the rear of a ship

  stream ice — pack ice that contains leads tack — to change the direction of a ship, usually by turning the bow into the wind

  taffrail— the rail at the stern of the ship

  tailwind— a wind roughly in the same direction as the ship’s motion (a wind blowing from behind)

  tarpaulin — a waterproof canvas covering tiller — a lever with which to turn a rudder and steer a boat

  trace(s) — a strap(s) connecting a harnessed dog to a sledge

  trim — to arrange sails for the optimal speed and direction

  unstep— to remove (a mast)

  waterline — the line made by the surface of the water against a ship’s hull

  water sky — a dark streak on the horizon that indicates open ocean

  whirlpool — a circular current of water (see maelstrom)

  winch — a machine containing a drum around which is curled a rope or wire for pulling or lifting

  yaw (v) — to move erratically off course yeti — the legendary snow beast of Nepal; came to be known as the abominable snowman, Sasquatch, or Bigfoot

  Bibliography

  Alexander, Caroline. Shackleton’s Legendary Antarctic Expedition. Alfred A. Knopf, 1999. Includes excellent reproductions of Antarctic photos taken by master polar photographer Frank Hurley.

  Armstrong, Jennifer. Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: Shackleton’s Amazing Voyage. Crown Publishers, 1998.

  Bickel, Leonard. Mawson’s Will. Avon

  Books, 1977.Thrilling survival story;

  Douglas Mawson walked 320 miles

  across Antarctica after a companion

  and all his dogs and equipment fell into

  a crevasse.

  Cherry-Garrard, Apsley. The Worst Journey

  in the World. Carroll & Graf, 1989.

  Robert Falcon Scott’s fatal voyage to

  the South Pole.

  Huntford, Roland. Scott & Amundsen G. P.

  Putnam’s Sons, 1980. The race

  between Scott and Amundsen for the

  South Pole, with photos and maps.

  Lansing, Alfred. Endurance: Shackleton’s

  Incredible Voyage, Carroll & Graf, 1986. The most exciting account of the Shackleton expedition.

  Maloney, Elbert S. Chapman Piloting. Hearst

  Marine Books (various ed.). Good book for basic sailing information.

  Shackleton, Ernest. South. Carroll & Graf,

  1998. A memoir of the voyage of the

  Endurance by its legendary leader. Full

  of interesting details.

  Worsley, F. A. Shackleton’s Boat Journey.

  W. W. Norton & Company, 1977.

  Written by the captain of the

  Endurance, an account of what many

  call the greatest boat journey in the

  world, by Shackleton, Worsley, and

  four other men, across the Drake

  Passage on a modified 22-foot

  lifeboat.

  Websites:

  www.terraquest.com/antarctica/index.html.

  Excellent introduction to Antarctica;

  good photos.

  www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/shackleton.

  Excellent web documentary of

  Shackleton’s fabled transantarctic

  voyage, contemporary adventures, and

  lots of good general information about

  Antarctica. Video clips.

  Working seaports and seaport museums in the U.S.A.:

  Mystic Seaport, P.O. Box 6000, 75

  Greenmanville Avenue, Mystic, CT

  06355-0990 (Visitor Information

  860-572-5315, toll free 1-888-SEA

  PORT), http://www.mysticseaport.org/

  South Street Seaport Museum, 207 Front

  Street, New York, NY 10038 (212-748

  8600), http://www.southstseaport.com/

  Acknowledgments

  I began researching this book while waiting long hours to be selected as a juror, so my first thanks go to the New York City criminal court system. Anne Fadiman, my good friend and an avid Antarctica buff, provided great enthusiasm and much research material from her amazing personal library. The real Peter Mansfield, whom I’ve had the good fortune of knowing for twenty-five years, helped enormously with nautical terminology. I thank the real Larry Walden for his patient tutelage during several summer afternoons sailing on Casco Bay, and his thorough evaluation of this book for sailing authenticity. And my mother, Mary Lerangis, who sent me to Greek school when I was a kid and shouldn’t have had to correct all my Greek language mistakes, nevertheless did so with great joy. Efharistò, s’aghapò.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  copyright © 2000 by Peter Lerangis

  cover design by Angela Goddard

  978-1-4532-4519-4

  This edition published in 2012 by Open Road Integrated Media

  180 Varick Street

  New York, NY 10014

  www.openroadmedia.com

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