The Worst Journey in the World (80 page)

Then something happened.

While Scott was writing the sentences you have just read, he reached the
summit of the plateau and started, ever so slightly, to go downhill. The
list of corrected altitudes given by Simpson in his meteorological
report are of great interest: Cape Evans 0, Shambles Camp 170, Upper
Glacier Depôt 7151, Three Degree Depôt 9392, One and a Half Degree Depôt
9862, South Pole 9072 feet above sea-level.
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What happened is not quite clear, but there is no doubt that the surface
became very bad, that the party began to feel the cold, and that before
long Evans especially began to crock. The immediate trouble was bad
surfaces. I will try and show why these surfaces should have been met in
what was, you must remember, now a land which no man had travelled
before.

Scott laid his One and a Half Degree Depôt (i.e. 1½° or 90 miles from
the Pole) on January 10. That day they started to go down, but for
several days before that the plateau had been pretty flat. Time after
time in the diaries you find crystals—crystals—crystals: crystals
falling through the air, crystals bearding the sastrugi, crystals lying
loose upon the snow. Sandy crystals, upon which the sun shines and which
made pulling a terrible effort: when the sky clouds over they get along
much better. The clouds form and disperse without visible reason. And
generally the wind is in their faces.

Wright tells me that there is certain evidence in the records which may
explain these crystals. Halos are caused by crystals and nearly all those
logged from the bottom of the Beardmore to the Pole and back were on this
stretch of country, where the land was falling. Bowers mentions that the
crystals did not appear in all directions, which goes to show that the
air was not always rising, but sometimes was falling and therefore not
depositing its moisture. There is no doubt that the surfaces met were
very variable, and it may be that the snow lay in waves. Bowers mentions
big undulations for thirty miles before the Pole, and other inequalities
may have been there which were not visible. There is sometimes evidence
that these crystals were formed on the windward side of these waves, and
carried over by a strong wind and deposited on the lee side.

It is common knowledge that as you rise in the atmosphere so the pressure
decreases: in fact, it is usual to measure your height by reading the
barometer. Now the air on this last stretch to the Pole was rising, for
the wind was from the south, and, as we have seen, the plateau here was
sloping down towards the Pole. The air, driven uphill by this southerly
wind, was forced to rise. As it rose it expanded, because the pressure
was less. Air which has expanded without any heat being given to it from
outside, that is in a heat-proof vessel, is said to expand by adiabatic
expansion. Such air tends first to become saturated, and then to
precipitate its moisture. These conditions were approximately fulfilled
on the plateau, where the air expanded as it rose, but could get little
or no heat from outside. The air therefore precipitated its moisture in
the form of crystals.

Owing to the rapid changes in surfaces (on one occasion they depôted
their ski because they were in a sea of sastrugi, and had to walk back
for them because the snow became level and soft again) Scott guessed that
the coastal mountains could not be far away, and we now know that the
actual distance was only 130 miles. About the same time Scott mentions
that he had been afraid that they were weakening in their pulling, but he
was reassured by getting a patch of good surface and finding the sledge
coming as easily as of old. On the night of January 12, eight days after
leaving the Last Return Party, he writes: "At camping to-night every one
was chilled and we guessed a cold snap, but to our surprise the actual
temperature was higher than last night, when we could dawdle in the sun.
It is most unaccountable why we should suddenly feel the cold in this
manner: partly the exhaustion of the march, but partly some damp quality
in the air, I think. Little Bowers is wonderful; in spite of my protest
he
would
take sights after we had camped to-night, after marching in
the soft snow all day when we have been comparatively restful on
ski."
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On January 14, Wilson wrote: "A very cold grey thick day with
a persistent breeze from the S.S.E. which we all felt considerably, but
temperature was only -18° at lunch and -15° in the evening. Now just over
40 miles from the Pole." Scott wrote the same day: "Again we noticed the
cold; at lunch to-day all our feet were cold but this was mainly due to
the bald state of our finnesko. I put some grease under the bare skin and
found it make all the difference. Oates seems to be feeling the cold and
fatigue more than the rest of us, but we are all very fit." And on
January 15, lunch: "We were all pretty done at camping."
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And Wilson:
"We made a depôt [The Last Depôt] of provisions at lunch time and went on
for our last lap with nine days' provision. We went much more easily in
the afternoon, and on till 7.30 P.M. The surface was a funny mixture of
smooth snow and sudden patches of sastrugi, and we occasionally appear to
be on a very gradual down gradient and on a slope down from the west to
east." In the light of what happened afterwards I believe that the party
was not as fit at this time as might have been expected ten days before,
and that this was partly the reason why they felt the cold and found the
pulling so hard. The immediate test was the bad surface, and this was the
result of the crystals which covered the ground.

Simpson has worked out
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that there is an almost constant pressure
gradient driving the air on the plateau northwards parallel to the 146°
E. meridian, and parallel also to the probable edge of the plateau. The
mean velocity for the months of this December and January was about 11
miles an hour. During this plateau journey Scott logged wind force 5 and
over on 23 occasions, and this wind was in their faces from the Beardmore
to the Pole, and at their backs as they returned. A low temperature when
it is calm is paradise compared to a higher temperature with a wind, and
it is this constant pitiless wind, combined with the altitude and low
temperatures, which has made travelling on the Antarctic plateau so
difficult.

While the mean velocity of wind during the two midsummer months seems to
be fairly constant, there is a very rapid fall of temperature in
January. The mean actual temperature found on the plateau this year in
December was -8.6°, the minimum observed being -19.3°. Simpson remarks
that "it must be accounted as one of the wonders of the Antarctic that it
contains a vast area of the earth's surface where the mean temperature
during the warmest month is more than 8° below the Fahrenheit zero, and
when throughout the month the highest temperature was only +5.5° F."
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But the mean temperature on the plateau dropped 10° in January to -18.7°,
the minimum observed being -29.7°. These temperatures have to be combined
with the wind force described above to imagine the conditions of the
march. In the light of Scott's previous plateau journey and
Shackleton's Polar Journey this wind was always expected by our
advance parties. But there can be no doubt that the temperature falls as
solar radiation decreases more rapidly than was generally supposed. Scott
probably expected neither such a rapid fall of temperature, nor the very
bad surfaces, though he knew that the plateau would mean a trying time,
and indeed it was supposed that it would be much the hardest part of the
journey.

On the night of January 15, Scott wrote "it ought to be a certain thing
now, and the only appalling possibility the sight of the Norwegian flag
forestalling ours."
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They were 27 miles from the Pole.

The story of the next three days is taken from Wilson's diary:

"
January 16.
We got away at 8 A.M. and made 7.5 miles by 1.15, lunched,
and then in 5.3 miles came on a black flag and the Norwegians' sledge,
ski, and dog tracks running about N.E. and S.W. both ways. The flag was
of black bunting tied with string to a fore-and-after which had evidently
been taken off a finished-up sledge. The age of the tracks was hard to
guess but probably a couple of weeks—or three or more. The flag was
fairly well frayed at the edges. We camped here and examined the tracks
and discussed things. The surface was fairly good in the forenoon -23°
temperature, and all the afternoon we were coming downhill with again a
rise to the W., and a fall and a scoop to the east where the Norwegians
came up, evidently by another glacier."

"
January 17.
We camped on the Pole itself at 6.30 P.M. this evening. In
the morning we were up at 5 A.M. and got away on Amundsen's tracks going
S.S.W. for three hours, passing two small snow cairns, and then, finding
the tracks too much snowed up to follow, we made our own bee-line for the
Pole: camped for lunch at 12.30 and off again from 3 to 6.30 P.M. It blew
from force 4 to 6 all day in our teeth with temperature -22°, the coldest
march I ever remember. It was difficult to keep one's hands from freezing
in double woollen and fur mitts. Oates, Evans, and Bowers all have pretty
severe frost-bitten noses and cheeks, and we had to camp early for lunch
on account of Evans' hands. It was a very bitter day. Sun was out now and
again, and observations taken at lunch, and before and after supper, and
at night, at 7 P.M. and at 2 A.M. by our time. The weather was not clear,
the air was full of crystals driving towards us as we came south, and
making the horizon grey and thick and hazy. We could see no sign of cairn
or flag, and from Amundsen's direction of tracks this morning he has
probably hit a point about 3 miles off. We hope for clear weather
to-morrow, but in any case are all agreed that he can claim prior right
to the Pole itself. He has beaten us in so far as he made a race of it.
We have done what we came for all the same and as our programme was made
out. From his tracks we think there were only 2 men, on ski, with plenty
of dogs on rather low diet. They seem to have had an oval tent. We sleep
one night at the Pole and have had a double hoosh with some last bits of
chocolate, and X's cigarettes have been much appreciated by Scott and
Oates and Evans. A tiring day: now turning into a somewhat starchy frozen
bag. To-morrow we start for home and shall do our utmost to get back in
time to send the news to the ship."

"
January 18.
Sights were taken in the night, and at about 5 A.M. we
turned out and marched from this night camp about 3¾ miles back in a
S.E.ly direction to a spot which we judged from last night's sights to be
the Pole. Here we lunched camp: built a cairn: took photos: flew the
Queen Mother's Union Jack and all our own flags. We call this the Pole,
though as a matter of fact we went ½ mile farther on in a S. easterly
direction after taking further sights to the actual final spot, and here
we left the Union Jack flying. During the forenoon we passed the
Norwegians' last southerly camp: they called it Polheim and left here a
small tent with Norwegian and Fram flags flying, and a considerable
amount of gear in the tent: half reindeer sleeping-bags, sleeping-socks,
reinskin trousers 2 pair, a sextant, and artif[icial] horizon, a
hypsometer with all the thermoms broken, etc. I took away the spirit-lamp
of it, which I have wanted for sterilizing and making disinfectant
lotions of snow. There were also letters there: one from Amundsen to King
Haakon, with a request that Scott should send it to him. There was also a
list of the five men who made up their party, but no news as to what they
had done. I made some sketches here, but it was blowing very cold, -22°.
Birdie took some photos. We found no sledge there though they said there
was one: it may have been buried in drift. The tent was a funny little
thing for 2 men, pegged out with white line and tent-pegs of yellow wood.
I took some strips of blue-grey silk off the tent seams: it was perished.
The Norskies had got to the Pole on December 16, and were here from 15th
to 17th. At our lunch South Pole Camp we saw a sledge-runner with a black
flag about ½ mile away blowing from it. Scott sent me on ski to fetch it,
and I found a note tied to it showing that this was the Norskies' actual
final Pole position. I was given the flag and the note with Amundsen's
signature, and I got a piece of the sledge-runner as well. The small
chart of our wanderings shows best how all these things lie. After lunch
we made 6.2 miles from the Pole Camp to the north again, and here we are
camped for the night."
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The following remarks on the South Pole area were written by Bowers in
the Meteorological Log, apparently on January 17 and 18: "Within 120
miles of the South Pole the sastrugi crossed seem to indicate belts of
certain prevalent winds. These were definitely S.E.ly. up to about Lat.
78° 30' S., where the summit was passed and we started to go definitely
downhill toward the Pole. An indefinite area was then crossed S.E.ly,
S.ly and S.W.ly sastrugi. Later, in about 79° 30' S., those from the
S.S.W. predominated. At this point also the surface of the ice-cap became
affected by undulations running more or less at right angles to our
course. These resolved themselves into immense waves some miles in
extent,
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with a uniform surface both in hollow and crust. The whole
surface was carpeted with a deposit of ice-crystals which, while we were
there, fell sometimes in the form of minute spicules and sometimes in
plates. These caused an almost continuous display of parhelia.

"The flags left a month previously by the Norwegian expedition were
practically undamaged and so could not have been exposed to very heavy
wind during that time. Their sledging and ski tracks, where marked, were
raised slightly, also the dogs' footprints. In the neighbourhood of their
South Pole Camp the drifts were S.W.ly, but there was one S.S.E. drift to
leeward of tent. They had pitched their tent to allow for S.W.ly wind.
For walking on foot the ground was all pretty soft, and on digging down
the crystalline structure of the snow was found to alter very little, and
there were no layers of crust such as are found on the Barrier. The snow
seems so lightly put together as not to cohere, and makes very little
water for its bulk when melted. The constant and varied motion of cirrus,
and the forming and motion of radiant points, shows that in the upper
atmosphere at this time of the year there is little or no
tranquillity."
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