From Pole to Pole

by Garth James Cameron

  Two expeditions to the Antarctic had used captive balloons for ice reconnaissance. On February 4, 1902, Scott, leader of a British expedition, had used a balloon inflated with hydrogen to obtain a view of the Ross Ice Shelf. The indentation where the flight had taken place was named Balloon Bight. On March 29, 1902, Drygalski, leader of a German expedition, flew in the same type of balloon to identify areas for study and possible routes out of the ice where his ship was beset. Both of the balloons were standard spherical types, as used for free flights and not adapted in any way for the role of tethered observation platforms. Amundsen probably considered captive balloons, and would have known that they had been used by British and German expeditions. However, balloons had a number of major defects. They were inflated with hydrogen, which is the lightest gas but is inflammable, and even explosive when contaminated with air. It was not practical to transport balloons long distances when inflated. They were transported in a deflated state. When needed the balloons were inflated. The process was slow and the balloon vulnerable to bad weather, particularly to high winds. The gas was either generated on the spot, which required a bulky generator and tons of acid, zinc, and sulfuric acid, or provided by a large number of heavy high pressure gas bottles. The most important limitation was that the tethered balloon became unstable in high winds. Observation became difficult, and a tethered spherical balloon could not be flown in winds over 15 kt. The balloons used by both the German and British expeditions were the standard spherical type used for sport and scientific flying. The spherical shape was ideal for free flights as the shape gave the maximum ratio of volume to surface area. In flight the balloon moved with the wind and there was no airflow past it. Flight in high winds was not a problem although inflating, launching, and landing could be dangerous. When the balloon was tethered, the wind became a problem as it then flowed around the balloon. The military spherical balloons used for observation while tethered to the ground used modified rigging which improved their stability in a wind, but they were still unusable in a moderate wind. They swayed dramatically, which made observation impossible and the flight dangerous. An example of how dangerous this could be is the experience of E. T. Willows, the British airship pioneer and manufacturer of airships and kite balloons. On August 23, 1926, he and his passengers were killed while flying in a tethered spherical balloon when a high wind caused the balloon to escape from its net. The Parseval-Sigsfeld streamlined kite balloon developed in Germany in the 1890s was a great improvement as it could cope with much stronger winds, but they were expensive, more complicated to rig, required a winch to control their ascents and descents, and needed more gas and therefore more chemicals or gas bottles. Balloons could not be kept inflated for long periods of time or in gales, and so would have to be inflated each time they were needed, making them more trouble than they were worth.

  In 1909, Amundsen decided that man-lifting kites might fulfil his requirement for a light and compact device for reconnaissance. Samuel Franklin Cody (1867–1913) in England and Jacques-Theodore Saconney (1874–1935) in France developed systems of kites which lifted a payload into the air. This could be a camera, meteorological instruments, or one or two observers. These systems were designed for military use, but had obvious civil applications for explorers. When not in use, the kites could be dismantled until each kite was a compact bundle of sticks and folded fabric. Stable in a high wind, they could also be flown in light winds or no wind when towed by a ship that provided enough relative wind speed to lift the kites and the observers. The Cody system used a type of winged box kite. The front and rear of each kite was strengthened by diagonals that projected beyond the box. To each of these diagonals a wing-like projection was added. It was long on the front upper diagonals and short on the other six projections. The upper ‘wings’ were dihedral and the lower ones, anhedral. The structure was designed to enable the crew to make the covering taut, and therefore more efficient. A pilot kite raised a light line into the air. Then a number of larger, lifter kites were attached to raise a cable into the air. Extra lifters were slid up the cable until a cableway was established in the air. The number of lifter kites used varied from two to six depending on the wind strength and the load to be carried A carrier kite was then attached with a basket for one or two observers. The observers were carried in a seat or basket and were constructed so as to minimize the chance of someone falling out. The kites made for the Royal Navy sometimes used a breeches buoy which resembled an over-sized pair of trousers. A compact fabric seat could be used, but was not for the faint hearted. The carrier kite was attached to a small trolley which slid up and down the cable, and was controlled by system of lines operated by the pilot. The carrier kite had a means of raising and lowering the front and rear of the kite to increase or decrease lift. The crew could also control a brake acting on the cableway to stop the movement of the trolley at any altitude. In strong wind it was possible for the crew to be stranded aloft until either the wind dropped or the ground crew managed to winch in the whole assembly. A well trained ground crew and pilot made the system reasonably safe. If the pilot kite suffered damage in flight the whole train of kites would start to sway from side to side and descend in a most alarming manner. The usual result was a shaken but uninjured crew. A similar system was built for Amundsen by the Norwegian army officer and aeronautical engineer Einar Olaf Sem-Jacobsen (1878–1936). Sem-Jacobsen was the most important early pioneer of flight, especially military flight, in Norway. In 1909 he co-founded the Norwegian Society for the Promotion of Aviation and qualified for an FAI (Fédération Aéronautique Internationale) balloonist’s certificate in 1910. On July 21, 1912, he became the first Norwegian to pass the test for an FAI aeroplane pilot’s certificate. He was the head of the Norwegian Army Aircraft Factory from 1916 to 1922. He travelled widely in search of knowledge of all types of flying machines, from balloons and airships to aeroplanes and man-lifting kites. Photographs of the Sem-Jacobsen kites show that they closely resembled the Cody kites. The kites were constructed at the Horten naval base. The pilot kite had an area of 5 m2; each lifter had an area of 13 m2 and the carrier an area of 20 m2. The carrier could lift up to 300 kg. The ground crew operated a winch and paid out or reeled in the cable as required. The system constructed for Amundsen differed from the Cody system in that the chair or canvas sack for the observer hung below the lifter kite by about 10 m. This implied that the system was controlled from the ground rather than controlled by the flight crew and ground crew as in the Cody system. Trials were carried out by Captain Sem-Jacobsen, Lieutenants Presterud, Opheim, Thommesen, and sail maker Ronne. The plan was to fly the kites from a ship so that an airborne observer could spot routes through the pack ice and conditions for men, dogs, and sledges. Later experience showed that the observer would have been able to see leads (ice free channels) in the ice of use to the ship but not ice conditions for surface travel.

  The Cody system had routinely raised the observers from 1,000 to 2,000 ft., and a similar performance could be expected from the system trialled by Amundsen. The flight trials took place on the small island of Vealos in Kristiania fijord. On July 26, 1909, Amundsen’s second in command, Ole Engelstad (1876–1909), was electrocuted by a lightning strike on the cable restraining the kites. They were being flown unmanned, and Engelstad was attempting to winch them down during a storm. The kite experiments continued over the winter of 1909–1910, but Amundsen’s enthusiasm for them declined. It is said that the kites were aboard the Fram during the 1910–1913 Antarctic expedition but they were not used.

  One unexpected result of the trials was that Amundsen meet Martin Ronne at the Horten shipyard and recognised that he had skills that were needed in preparing for and carrying out Arctic and Antarctic expeditions. Ronne (1861–1932) was a seaman who had had served on both civilian and naval ships. At the age of 40 he took up the trade of sail maker, and was working at this trade at Horten when Amundsen was there because of the kite trials. He sewed some of the sails (fabric panels stretched over the
kite’s framework) and a canvas seat for the pilot/passenger. Because Ronne was light he took part in the test flying of the kites. His ability to produce any fabric item (from clothing to the tent left at the South Pole) made him a key member of Amundsen’s expeditions from then on. He went to Antarctica with the Fram during its 1910–1912 South Pole expedition, and was aboard the Maude during its voyage through the North East Passage in 1918–1920. In 1925 he was at Kings Bay to support the Amundsen-Ellsworth North Pole flight and the next year he was back at Kings Bay during the Amundsen-Ellsworth-Nobile airship expedition of that year. Ronne was one of those skilled tradesmen whose essential skills made it possible for men like Amundsen to function. Without the Martin Ronnes of this world, the Amundsens could not have achieved what they did.

  Amundsen’s first flight in an aeroplane was with Danish-American aviator Silas Christofferson in April 1913. The machine was a Curtiss style open floatplane with a central float and tip floats. Amundsen is wearing a life-belt. Christofferson died in an aircraft accident on October 31, 1916.

  Amundsen in April 1913 about to fly in a floatplane from San Francisco Bay. The aeroplane is either a Curtiss or a copy of a Curtiss. Pilot Christofferson built two flying boats for Amundsen but they were either never delivered or sold soon after delivery.

  Sem-Jacobsen and Amundsen stayed in touch and Amundsen relied on him for advice and training during his continuing efforts to make use of this new technology.

  Amundsen wrote that he was the first serious explorer to make use of aviation and history records that, if not the first, his was one of the earliest efforts to adopt aviation for purposes of exploration above the Arctic Circle (66° 33° north latitude). Amundsen kept aircraft in mind and in 1913, when he was on a lecture tour of America to raise funds, he had his first flight in an aeroplane. This flight was at San Francisco and the pilot was Danish-American aviator Christofferson. This was in a floatplane which was, or resembled, an early Curtiss design with a central float and tip floats. Pilot and passenger sat side by side with dual controls. They sat in the open in front of the engine. Amundsen was in his usual mode of giving lectures about his last expedition (Antarctica and the South Pole in 1910–1912) to pay off the debts of this last expedition and raise money for the next one. He was planning to use the Fram again. This time he would enter the Polar Sea by way of the Bering Strait, be frozen into the pack ice, and drift with the ice for several years. He hoped to do what Nansen had not quite done in 1893–96 and drift across the North Pole. He was so impressed by the floatplane that he ordered two small flying boats at a price of $7,000 each. He also visited Germany that year. Germany was very air-minded, and the flying he saw impressed him and kept his interest alive. He encountered his usual money troubles and either sold the flying boats or cancelled the order before taking delivery. He certainly never flew in either aircraft.

  Amundsen was not the only Norwegian to recognise the aeroplane as having potential for exploration in the Arctic. Flight for May 17, 1913 noted that Lieutenant Gjertsen proposed to explore the North Pole with the aid of a Deperdussin monoplane, and was attending the Ecole D’ Aviation Deperdussin. This was Hjalmar Fredrik Gjertsen (1885–1958), who had been Amundsen’s second mate in the Fram on the Norwegian Antarctic Expedition of 1910–1912. Gjertsen learnt to fly in France, had the government pay the course fees, and trained as a naval aviator in Norway. He served as Captain of the minelayers Glommen and Froya in 1915–1918, although he does not appear to have served as an aviator after his training.

  Aeroplanes were developing rapidly. By the outbreak of World War I in July 1914, the endurance record was over 24 hours; the altitude record more than 26,000 ft. and the speed record over 110 kt. Aeroplanes had flown across the Mediterranean from France to North Africa; in stages from Madrid to Moscow; and across the United States in stages. Floatplanes and flying boats were in widespread use. Aeroplanes were being built and tested for flights across the North Atlantic. In Russia Igor Sikorski had successfully flown the Grand, a four-engined aeroplane, and then a bigger four-engined type, the Ilya Mouromets. On July 30, 1914, the Norwegian pilot Tryggve Gran (who had been to Antarctica with the Scott South Pole expedition of 1910–12) had flown his Bleriot XI-2 aeroplane from Cruden Bay, Scotland to Jæren, near Stavanger, in Southern Norway in 4 hrs. 10 min.

  Farman aeroplanes saw widespread use and were in service in Norway from 1912 to the late 1920s. This drawing of a Farman MF7 “Longhorn” was published in Flight on July 6, 1912. Amundsen learned to fly, and took his test for an aviator’s certificate, in this type of aeroplane. He bought a Farman and intended to take it on his North Pole expedition. World War I broke out in 1914 and caused the cancellation of the expedition. Amundsen donated the aeroplane to the Norwegian government for use by the armed forces.

  During his preparations for his expedition to the Polar Sea he decided that he would learn to fly, and purchased an aeroplane to take with him. He recognised that contemporary aeroplanes were not capable of long flights in the Arctic. He intended to carry a machine on board the Fram, replace its wheels with skis, and use it for short flights from the ship. The machines of the day were strictly fine weather machines. Their use would be restricted to fine summer weather, with good visibility and light or no wind. Aeroplanes were usually built as light wooden frames, braced with wire or cables, and covered in doped fabric. They were not durable and needed regular maintenance even when hangared and flown in temperate climates. Careful pilots checked the airframe and adjusted the rigging at frequent intervals. Amundsen would not have kept his aeroplane on the deck of his ship and exposed to the elements, so his aeroplane would have spent most of its time dismantled in the hold. When it was required it would have been assembled and flown. An aeroplane like a Farman “Longhorn” would have had a radius of action of about 60 nm. This could be increased radically by fitting an enlarged fuel tank. Navigation would be a major problem for the pilot. Magnetic compasses were unreliable in high latitudes close to the North Magnetic Pole. The only reasonably safe way to navigate such an aircraft would be to pick a day with settled weather and exceptionally good visibility. A departure from a well mapped land mass was one way to do it. Another would be for the Fram to keep a fire burning, causing a plume of smoke visible from far away. Attention to detail would be important. If there was a temperature inversion the smoke plume would flatten out and not be visible from a distance.

  Amundsen (L) and Einar Sem-Jacobsen (R) ca 1913-1914.

  Amundsen obtained permission to receive instruction from Captain Sem-Jacobsen in Army aeroplanes. It was a great privilege for a civilian like Amundsen, and only his status as a national hero made it possible. The flight instruction was given in Farman “Longhorn” aeroplanes. This machine was a biplane with the tail supported on outriggers to allow the engine and ‘pusher’ propeller to be positioned behind the pilot and passenger who sat in a small nacelle. The name “Longhorn” was applied to the machine because it had a second elevator mounted on outriggers in front of the nacelle. It had two wheels (which were replaced by skis in the Norwegian winter) attached to each of the two landing skids. Farmans of this type saw widespread service both as combat aeroplanes early in World War I and then as trainers. The British aviation weekly Flight reported on August 9, 1913 that Amundsen was receiving flying instruction in Norway in anticipation of receiving two waterplanes, presumably the two Christofferson flying boats that were destined not to be delivered. He may have started to learn to fly in 1913 but he was certainly doing so in early 1914. Amundsen flew with Sem-Jacobsen every chance he got, and spent about 20 hours in the air. The controls look quaintly amusing to the twenty-first century eye, although they worked in the conventional sense. The ailerons and elevators were operated by a handlebar which had loops at both ends. Tilting the bar to port or starboard caused the machine to roll to port or starboard. The handlebar was attached to a vertical tube. Pushing the handlebar forward or aft caused the Farman to pitch down or up. There were two rudder pedals. Push
ing the port pedal caused a yaw in that direction and pushing the starboard pedal caused a yaw to starboard. Responses to control inputs were sluggish, partly due to the low airspeed and partly due to the lack of refinement of contemporary aircraft. A British pilot who trained on a Farman with the same control set up wrote this about the experience:

  Einar Sem-Jacobsen and Amundsen in a Farman. The aircraft was not fitted with dual controls and Amundsen was wedged between the instructor and the fuel tank. He had to reach over the instructor to grasp the “handle bars” which operated the ailerons and elevators. Amundsen probably could not reach the floor mounted rudder pedals.

  Amundsen (second from the left), about to receive flight instruction on a Norwegian Army Farman “Longhorn” in late 1913 or early 1914. The figure in uniform on the left may be his instructor Einar Sem-Jacobsen.

  “[It was] a queer sort of bus like an assemblage of birdcages . . . Flying with their antiquated controls was a mixture of playing the harmonium, working the village pump, and sculling a boat.”

  The Farman Amundsen trained on had only one set of controls. He sat behind Sem-Jacobsen and would reach over his shoulders to grasp the wheel which controlled the elevators and ailerons of the biplane. He could not reach the rudder pedals.

  In the midst of his training he travelled to France with Sem-Jacobsen and purchased a Farman of the type that he was learning to fly in. Sem-Jacobsen then set out to fly it from Paris to Kristiania. This was probably the longest cross-country flight carried out by a Norwegian at this time. In 1914 cross-country flying was an adventure. In Western Europe visibility was often poor, even in good weather, because of the haze caused by factory chimneys. Aircraft compasses were of limited reliability and tended to rotate very unhelpfully, even when the aircraft was flying wings level on a constant heading. It was normal practice to follow line features like railway lines, canals or coastlines. Cruising speed was about 42 kt. and endurance 3 hrs. 15 min. giving a still air range of about 135 nm with no reserve. The low cruising speed meant that winds had a major effect on the ground speed. Winds of 20 kt. were common and a head wind of that strength would almost halve the aircraft’s range. The aircraft’s rate of climb was modest and made the aircraft vulnerable to the type of down drafts encountered in unstable conditions. An aircraft flying in the lee of a ridge in windy conditions could find itself descending in spite of trying to climb at full power. Flight in turbulent air was a challenge, with coarse use of the controls needed to keep the aeroplane under control, and the pilot understandably anxious about the structural integrity of the machine. Turbulence could also cause the aeroplane to descend because of the extra drag caused by the frequent control inputs. With an aeroplane flying at only a few knots above the stall speed, the nose had to be lowered to compensate for the extra drag caused by the control inputs.