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Could the members of the 1897 Andrée balloon expedition have survived?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2018

Björn Lantz
Björn Lantz*
Affiliation:
Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden
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Abstract

After making a final landing with their hydrogen balloon on the Arctic pack ice on 14 July 1897 at 82°56′N 29°52′E, expedition members Salomon August Andrée, Nils Strindberg and Knut Frænkel began a slow march with very heavily laden sledges over the ice to try to reach a depot at Cape Flora. Two fundamental errors regarding where to go and what to bring sealed their fate. This note will explore the theory that, given the information they had at the time, the explorers should not have made these mistakes. In fact, the expedition members could have survived if they had instead travelled directly to their other depot at Seven Islands with more lightly laden sledges.

Keywords

Arctic explorationAndrée balloon expeditionAndrée diariesArctic ice drift
Type
Research Note
Information
Polar Record , Volume 54 , Issue 3 , May 2018 , pp. 234 - 236
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2018 

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References

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