British Commonwealth Transantarctic Expedition

V. Fuchs himself wrote that the idea to cross the entire Antarctic continent came to him on an expedition in 1949 to the Land of Alexander I during a severe snow storm ^[1] . In 1950, Fuchs contacted the rector of St. Paul's College at Cambridge University, Sir J. Wardy (he was the chief of the scientific staff on the Shackleton expedition, and in 1929, along with Fuchs, participated in a geological expedition to Greenland). According to the initial draft, the continent should have crossed at the narrowest point, from the coast of the Weddell Sea to the McMurdo Strait on tracked vehicles, with the support of aviation, which will supply the expedition with the necessary supplies and conduct air reconnaissance. Fuchs did not count on the reliability of the equipment and planned to use dog teams as a backup means of transportation.

In 1955, the expedition began to be carried out. The Board of Trustees was led by Air Marshal Sir J. Slassor, Rear Admiral C. Parry became the head of the Executive Committee. On February 17, 1955, the British government granted the expedition 100 thousand pounds . Soon, the expedition acquired the status of a common commonwealth of nations : financial support was provided by Australia , the Union of South Africa and New Zealand . The patronage of the expedition was taken by Queen Elizabeth II .

Expedition vessel - transport of the New Zealand Navy Endeavor (Captain T. Kirkwood). To deliver the team to the Weddell Sea, the Canadian Teron fishery (skipper - H. Maro) was chartered. The New Zealand Air Force provided a reconnaissance aircraft en: Auster AOP.6 and four personnel. The New Zealand Post Office also provided radio equipment and established ongoing communications.

Government donations amounted to 187 thousand pounds in cash, the total estimate exceeded 700 thousand pounds. Large donations were provided by the Royal Geographical Society , the Greves and Everest Foundations. The national subscription was opened by Prime Minister Anthony Eden . Donations were also provided by 4,000 schools across Britain. In addition, the expedition was given the legal status of a limited liability company , which made it possible to cover expenses by using rights, in particular, issuing advertising brochures, speaking on the radio, etc. This income amounted to about 20% of the expedition’s budget ^[2] .

Fuchs squad. Shackleton Base

1. Vivian Edmund Fuchs - expedition chief, geologist.
2. David Stretton - geologist, deputy expedition chief in charge of equipment.
3. David Pratt - deputy expedition expedition. During World War II he served in the Royal Technical Forces, a specialist in tracked vehicles.
4. John Lewis (New Zealand) - Senior Pilot. In the years 1949-1950. worked in Antarctica on an Argentine expedition.
5. Gordon Heslope (New Zealand) - co-pilot.
6. Peter Weston (New Zealand) - aircraft mechanic.
7. Taffy Williams (New Zealand) - radio operator.
8. Ken Blacock is the leader of the reconnaissance party. Member of two expeditions to Antarctica led by Fuchs and D. Stretton.
9. Ralph Lanton - radio operator of the ground party. He wintered five times in Antarctica, a member of the Fuchs expedition of 1948-1950.
10. Tony Stewart is a meteorologist. Professor of Naval College in Pengborn , specialist in balloons.
11. Peter Jeffries is a meteorologist. The youngest member of the expedition (24 years old). He served in the Weather Service in the Atlantic Ocean.
12. Hannes Lagrange ( South Africa ) - meteorologist.
13. Roy Homer is an engineer. In 1953-1954 participated in the British North Greenland expedition. Had experience replacing the engine in the field at −45 ° C.
14. Rainer Goldsmith is a doctor. He carried out a program of physiological studies.
15. George Lowe (New Zealand) - photographer and cameraman. A participant in climbing Chooyu and Everest .

Hillary squad. Scott Base

1. Sir Edmund Hillary is the head of the auxiliary party.
2. Trevor Hedzerton is a geophysicist, leader of the New Zealand Group of the International Geophysical Year.
3. Bernie Gunn is a meteorologist and climber.
4. W. Smith is an observer; the commander of the Endeavor ship.

In total, 23 people participated in the wintering at the Scott base.

Training. First Wintering

The southern summer of 1955-1956 Fuchs's party on the ship Theron set off for the Weddell Sea, where it was confronted with unusually severe ice conditions. (In 1911, due to the blocking of the expedition vessel, Wilhelm Filchner’s transantarctic expedition broke in ice, and Ernest Shackleton in 1915 ). They managed to get to the shores of Fasel Bay only thanks to ice reconnaissance from an airplane. 8 people remained on the shore to equip the base and about 250 tons of equipment. At the head of the wintering party was C. Blakecock. Fuchs was forced to return to Europe to organize further work.

Wintering was hard. The equipment was on the ice of the bay, while the base should have been equipped in a mountain range 3 miles from the ship's berth. Eight team members were clearly not enough for loading and construction work. People lived in tents or in large cargo containers, insulated with glass wool . The climate in the bay turned out to be much colder than expected, there were frequent storms. It was impossible to keep the dogs in the open air and the team began to build snow-covered tunnels where the temperature was −16 ° C, and it turned out that it was too hot for the dogs: the snow was melting from the warmth of the dog’s body. The construction of the expeditionary house was interrupted by an almost weekly blizzard, which made any work impossible. Constantly had to dig up tents, and all the equipment was carried by snowdrifts. The storm blew pack ice from the bay with a significant part of the equipment, including tracked snowmobiles and fuel supplies.

Nevertheless, trained polar explorers were able to survive in tents in the polar night at −30 ° C and strong winds, and by July they had set up the Shackleton base. From September 1, 1956, cartographic and geological work was carried out on the southern route (dog teams were used, since the surviving snowmobile had an engine defect).

Transantarctic Campaign

In December 1956, Fuchs arrived at the Shackleton on the Danish icebreaker Magga Dan , bringing in additional supplies and vehicles. The season of January - April 1956 was used for further cartographic work, as well as the laying of warehouses at a distance of 300 miles (480 km) to the south, a meteorological station was arranged on the highway. The second wintering with the participation of the boss was successful.

On November 24, 1957 , the transcontinental campaign began. It was attended by 12 people. The main vehicles were specially equipped tracked tractors and en: Sno-Cat conveyors. The path was very difficult, since hundreds of miles of snowy shrouds met expeditioners. In parallel to Fuchs’s squad, members of the Hillary team from the Scott base paved the route: they had to lay warehouses within a radius of 700 miles (1100 km) from the McMurdo Strait. The main transport of the Hillary team was en: Ferguson TE20 wheeled tractors. International Geophysical Year team members explored previously unexplored areas of the Ross Sea coast and mountainous regions.

In January 1958, an incident occurred: the expedition was not supposed to reach the South Pole at all (Fuchs planned to explore the unexplored areas of the periphery of the Polar Plateau, especially since the American base Amundsen-Scott had been operating at the South Pole since 1956). E. Hillary, having finished laying the "700 miles" warehouse, arbitrarily moved to the South Pole, and on January 4 reached the American base, becoming the third person in history to reach the southern tip of the globe by land. From the American base, he delighted Fuchs, offering to end the expedition at the Pole, which was completely unacceptable for the leader, as he disrupted the scientific program. Hillary’s actions caused a storm of enthusiasm in his homeland, New Zealand, but was condemned by the entire world scientific community.

On January 19, 1958, Fuchs reached the South Pole, having met a warm welcome at the Amundsen-Scott base. Hillary by that time left the pole on an American plane. Further, the Fuchs route ran along the route laid by Hillary. There were some incidents here too - tractors were constantly breaking down (dogs were taken out of the South Pole by plane), and one of the mechanics was poisoned by carbon monoxide due to a malfunction in the exhaust system. The Fuchs squad arrived at the Scott base on March 2, 1958, breaking 2158 miles (3473 km.) In 99 days. The Endeavor ship received a telegram from Queen Elizabeth II, who elevated Fuchs to the knighthood.

The success of the expedition was also ensured by the full support of the US Army, as well as aerial reconnaissance: in December 1958, four crew members flew 1,430 miles (2,300 km) on de Havilland Canada DHC-3 Otter over the entire trek in 11 hours. The flight was based at the US station Ellsworth, founded near the Shackleton base in 1957.

The expedition was one of the main sensations of 1958: for the first time in world history, people crossed the ice continent. Correspondents of the world's leading publications were located at the Amundsen-Scott and Scott bases, and Hillary had a special correspondent. Because of the rush, the book about the expedition was a poorly processed travel diary: it was published in September 1958 and did not contain a word about the main results of the expedition - scientific. Of the 19 chapters, 15 were written by Fuchs, 4 by Hillary.

The largest result of the expedition was seismometric measurements of the thickness of the Antarctic glacier, conducted by the Fuchs group every 30 miles of the way. Reliable systematic data on the thickness of the ice sheet at a distance of over 3,000 km were first obtained. For the first time, it was found that the average thickness of the glacier exceeds 2000 m.

Numerous geological and glaciological observations, topographic surveys and gravimetric surveys have also been carried out. The expedition examined a number of Antarctic oases in the mountains of the Sea of ​​Ross (a mummified seal was found in one of them), and auxiliary units examined all the glaciers of the Transantarctic mountains, including the Birdmore Glacier . The Hillary Squad completed 2,600 miles of tractors and dog sledding.

The Fuchs-Hillary expedition actually began a systematic exploration of Antarctica by modern scientific means and methods, continued by Soviet and American high-latitude stations and expeditions. The expedition in practice proved the effectiveness of the use of mechanical transport in the study of the continental spaces of Antarctica. The author of the afterword to the Russian edition of the book of Fuchs and Hillary - G. A. Avsyuk , argued that

The epithet “of the last great journey in the world” has some justification, especially in the use of the word “great” ^[3] .

• Antarctic - A News Bulletin, vol. 1. No. 8., p 184-189, (New Zealand Antarctic Society, December 1957)
• Fuchs W., Hillary E. Across Antarctica. Per. from English V. Zhitomirsky. Ed. 2nd. M .: Terra, 1997. 304 p. ISBN 5-300-01270-X