Roald Amundsen and the 1925 North Pole Expedition

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Amundsen and Ellsworth quickly began to make preparations for their flight. The Dorniers, simply named N24 and N25 after Amundsen and Lincoln Ellsworth in 1924. Ellsworth first met the Norwegian explorer in 1918. Five years later, he offered to finance a joint polar expedition.

their registry numbers, were being crated and shipped to Tromso, Norway. The two men assembled their support staff and aircrews. N24 was to be piloted by Norwegian naval Lieutenant Lief Dietrichson, with Ellsworth and mechanic Oskar Omdal aboard. Riiser-Larsen would fly N25, with Amundsen and a German mechanic, Ludwig (named Karl in some sources) Feucht, as crewmen.

Waiting at Tromsö, about 300 miles to the southeast, was the Norwegian naval transport Fram and the motor ship Hobby, which would transport survival gear, including a light sled and a canvas boat as well as spare parts. The Dorniers, crated in sections, were carefully lifted and lashed to the deck of Hobby. ‘Hobby had already given up trying to be a boat,’ Amundsen wrote later. ‘She looked like a mass of gigantic cases which was wandering along over the sea.’

When the ships departed in early April, high winds and ice squalls battered them on the four-day voyage from Tromso to King’s Bay. The vessels became separated, and Amundsen feared that the heavily burdened Hobby would founder in the crashing waves. Seasickness took its toll, even though many of the crew were experienced sailors. Fram steamed into frozen King’s Bay on April 12, 1925, anchoring at the rim of the ice sheet covering the bay. A short time later, to the cheers of all, Hobby hove into view. A Norwegian ship preceded them and broke a passage through the ice for Fram and Hobby to eventually tie up at quayside. Booms began to lower gear and airplane parts to the icy surface of the bay.

Amundsen, Ellsworth and the pilots believed that the flying boats were capable of taking off fully loaded from the ice-covered bay. Snow and ice would actually offer less resistance than a takeoff from open water. Once the planes were airborne, they would proceed to the North Pole, verify their location, then return to Spitsbergen. Although the planes carried extra fuel, they would not both be able to make the round trip. There was little doubt that on the return trip the Dorniers would have to set down on the ice, where the tanks of one plane would be emptied into the other, and the emptied flying boat would then have to be left behind.

The aviators chose their gear carefully because of weight limitations. A lightweight sled would provide some movement of equipment if they were forced down onto the ice. A canvas boat would allow the crews to cross patches of open water in the ice pack. There was the usual assortment of guns, tents and compact stoves. Food consisted of salted beef, chocolate, biscuits, dried milk and malted-milk tablets. A camera was brought along to verify the expedition’s findings and record events.

As the planes were assembled, the polar summer crept ever closer. Although the bay’s ice sheet remained relatively solid, the weight of the Dorniers caused the surface to sag and buckle, forcing water up around the hulls, which could cause additional drag on takeoff. The Rolls-Royce engines functioned perfectly, but Amundsen resisted any attempt to take the planes skyward on a practice flight. He reasoned that a single takeoff from the ice was perilous enough, and he did not want to jeopardize his frail planes with a practice effort. Instead, trial runs consisted only of taxiing.

Several weeks passed with storms or gusty winds prohibiting the flight. Finally, on May 21, the expedition’s meteorologist proclaimed the weather would clear for takeoff. The engines were warmed up and last-minute adjustments were made. Since the Dorniers had open cockpits, the fliers wore heavy flying clothes, thick underwear of wool and leather and capacious canvas boots padded with senna grass.

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Tags: Adventurers & Trail Blazers, Aircraft, Aviation History, Expeditions, Historical Discoveries, Historical Figures

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