CHAPTER XXII 

FIRST AIRSHIP VOYAGE OVER THE POLAR SEA 

     Because of the unfavorable weather, it was not till September 2, 1907, that we could get a chance to take the America out for her trial trip. That was too late in the season to start for the Pole, as winter was approaching ; and yet we were determined to start should the conditions be fair and the ship work right. There were only three of us in the crew. Our force of men led the big ship out of the balloon house, and at the word of command they let her go high up in the air. Still she was not free. A tow-line was attached to the Express, a small steamer which had brought to our headquarters Prof. Elias and a party of German officers sent out to study our craft. The Express towed us out around Smeerenburg point, and there, though the weather was anything but good, I gave the order to cut the tow-line. This was soon done, and the airship was at last thrown upon her own resources. 

     The engine was started, and the America leaped forward. With a thrill of joy we of the crew felt her moving through the air. Look­ing down from our lofty perch, we could see the equilibrator swimming along in the water, its head in the air, much like a great sea-serpent. We soon ran away from the steamer, and could hear the men upon her cheering us as we lost sight of her. Soon the wind freshened from the northwest, accompanied by snow. We were in danger of being driven upon the mountainous coast, which would mean the destruction of the ship and probably the loss of our lives as the steel car went tumbling down the cliffs into the sea. 

     Everything depended upon the engine. Vani­man kept it running, and increased its effective output as the danger of shipwreck became most pressing. Inch by inch we fought our way past the mountains, one after another, clearing the last by only a few rods. The open Arctic Ocean was before us; and well satisfied with the working of engine and ship up to this time, it was with great satisfaction I gave the order to Riesen­berg at the wheel to "head her north!" We should have a try at it, at least. 

     But we had not run far before the snow-squall increased in violence. Just then we learned our compass had been deranged by an accident. The air was so thick with flying snow we could not see the mountains, and were lost in a snowstorm threatening to drive us to de­struction upon a lee coast. Three times we came up so near the mountains, looming sud­denly ahead out of the thick air, that we thought all was over, but each time the motor and pro­peller brought us round to temporary safety, with the helm thrown hard over. 

     At last, after some two hours of this, during which we must have covered 35 miles, we realized there was but one thing to do, and that was to try to land the ship where she could be saved. In a momentary break in the thickness of the weather we' saw before us a glacier—a mass of ice filling a valley between two mountains—and decided to make an effort to bring the America down upon its smooth surface. 

     But before we could descend upon the glacier we must drag our equilibrator, and also the retarder (which we had now let down into the sea) up the face of the great ice-wall—a vertical cliff of ragged, rugged ice rising nearly 100 feet sheer from the sea. Was it possible for our ser­pents to climb this frightful barrier? We should soon see, for now the wind was driving us straight toward the frightful precipice. As the America swept over the glacier the two ser­pents crawled up the wall without getting foul and apparently without injury. Arriving at the top, they wound between and around giant rocks of the moraine. As we moved inland the serpents fell into deep crevasses in the ice, and then crept out again.  

     Finally, by pulling the valve-cord and letting out gas we brought the airship down near to the surface of the glacier. At the right moment the ripping knife was run into the sides of the huge envelope overhead, the gas rushed out, with a sigh the America gave up her life-breath, and settled down upon the ice. The descent was made so gently that our clockwork register­ing instruments ran right along as if nothing had happened. As we stepped out of the car the cloth of the balloon lay in a great heap alongside, and we saw that the America lay across two crevasses. And there, still attached to the ship, were the two serpents, virtually un­injured after their rough experience. 

     In a few hours the Express and the Frithjof overtook us. Their crews came up to help us, roped together Alpine-fashion as they made their way across the treacherous crevasses. A force of workmen were brought from camp, and in three days we had all the valuable part of the air­ship back at our headquarters, after a most re­markable adventure. 

     At the moment we felt bitter because we had not been able to continue our voyage northward toward the Pole ; but afterward, noting that the wind continued to blow from the northwest and north for several days, we realized that even if we had got farther from land we could never have made a long voyage. We had no chance at all; and we were pretty lucky to get out of it as well as we did. 

     We had, however, had a trial of the ship. She had traveled about thirty-five miles through the air, including her evolutions along the coast. We knew now what the America could do and could not do. Also, we had tested our equili­brating and retarding devices. The first of these is the old principle of the guide rope, used for many years in ordinary spherical ballooning. An airship's lifting force is constantly changing, due to expansion or contraction of gas as the temperature goes up or down, or the pressure of the air fluctuates. 

     The usual way of meeting these changes of lifting force is by throwing out ballast to pre­vent too great descent and by letting out gas to prevent going too high. The guide rope is ballast which can be used both ways without los­ing it. That is to say, a part of its weight being carried in the air, upon the lifting force of the balloon, and a part on the surface of the earth, we have this effect: If the balloon goes up a few yards it must lift that length of guide-rope from the earth, adding so much to the load car­ried, and thus checking the ascent. 

     Conversely, if the balloon goes down a few yards it deposits that much more of the guide rope upon the earth, and thus lightens the load carried and checks the descent. The guide rope is, within the limits of its effectiveness, an auto­matic control of upward and downward move­ments of the aerostat. 

     Our equilibrator was simply a development and perfection of the old guide rope principle. We needed in the guide rope a total weight of about 1,200 pounds, and not wishing to take all of this weight in dead material like hemp or steel, and very much wishing to carry all possible food and other vital supplies, we worked the problem out this way. We made a strong cylinder of leather about eight inches in diameter and 120 feet long; divided it into thirty compartments; stuffed the interior with reserve food, so that the total weight was seventy-five per cent provi­sions and twenty-five per cent. leather and other materials; and to protect the leather from wear and tear on the ice, covered the entire reservoir with thousands of thin steel scales about as big as a silver half dollar, all riveted on, each lapping the other very much as the scales of a fish are placed by nature. The retarder was built much in the same way, of leather stuffed with food, but for a different purpose. It would be practicable to use an ice anchor and firmly anchor the airship to the ice floes, there to ride during head winds instead of drifting backward on the course. But there was danger, with fast anchorage, that the strain on the ship might lead to breakage or accident. 

     So we compromised. Instead of the fast an­chorage we adopted the old principle of the drag anchor, used for centuries by sailing vessels in strong head winds, and made a leather serpent covered with thousands of short, sharp steel points to scratch upon the surface of the ice or snow as it was dragged along over the ice-fields, and by making a certain resistance check the drift of the airship in head winds, thus greatly reducing the' distance lost, without incurring the dangers incident to firm anchorage. The equili­brator or guide rope, with its smooth steel scales, was designed to make the smallest possible re­sistance; the retarder, on the other hand, with its steel scratchers, to make the greatest resistance its weight could effect as it was dragged along in contrary winds. 

     Both of these devices we severely tested this day and found strong and serviceable. Thus our short trial trip in the snowstorm, and the descent upon the glacier, was of the greatest value in teaching lessons for the future. The season being at an end, and winter setting in, the America was returned to Paris, there to be over­hauled and improved for the next campaign. We had no idea of giving up the fight.