Roald Amundsen. Biography, discoveries, travels

“All days and nights we were under the pressure of a terrible press. The noise of the ice blocks beating and breaking against the sides of our ship often became so strong that it was almost impossible to talk. And then ... we were saved by the ingenuity of Dr. Cook. He carefully preserved the skins of the penguins we killed, and now we made mats from them, which we hung over the sides, where they significantly reduced and softened the shocks of the ice ”(R. Amundsen. My life. Chapter II).

There was, perhaps, no more "enchanted" sea route in history than the Northwest Passage. Hundreds of sailors from John Cabot at the end of the 15th century. tried to find a way to Asia bypassing North America, but to no avail. These attempts often ended tragically. Suffice it to recall the voyage of Henry Hudson (Hudson) in 1611 and the expedition of John Franklin in 1845. Robert McClure, one of those who were looking for Franklin, in 1851 discovered the missing western link of the waterway from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, but to overcome the entire For a long time, no one succeeded in the Northwest Passage.

Norwegian Roald Amundsen read a book about the death of John Franklin's expedition as a child and already then decided to become a polar explorer. He walked towards his goal confidently, knowing what he wanted and how to achieve it. This became the secret of his amazing accomplishments. To begin with, he entered as a sailor on a sailboat in order to go through all the steps on the way to the captain's diploma.

In 1897 Belgium organized an expedition to Antarctica. Since there were no polar explorers in Belgium itself, the expedition included scientists from other countries. Amundsen was the first navigator in it. The expedition spent some time at Tierra del Fuego, and then headed for the Antarctic Peninsula. But there the ship got stuck in the ice, it had to spend the winter, for which the travelers were completely unprepared. Fuel quickly ran out, with cold and darkness horror and despair crept into the souls of people. And also this terrible crack - ice, like a boa constrictor, squeezed the ship. Two went mad, all suffered from scurvy. The head of the expedition and the captain were also sick and did not get up from their beds. The story of the Franklin expedition could well repeat itself.

Everyone was saved by Amundsen and the ship's doctor, American Frederick Cook. First, remembering that a healthy mind resides in a healthy body, they got a few seals and began to feed the sick with seal meat. And it helped: the sick got better, their spirit got stronger. According to Amundsen, Dr. Cook, a brave and never discouraged man, became the main savior of the expedition. It was he who proposed to drill dozens of holes in the ice - in a straight line from the bow of the ship - and put dynamite into these holes. The winter explosion did not give anything, but in the summer the ice cracked just along this line and the ship came out on clean water. After more than a year in ice captivity, the expedition returned to Europe.

A year later, Amundsen received a skipper's diploma. Now he could prepare for an independent expedition. He was going to overcome the Northwest Passage, and at the same time determine the position of the magnetic pole. To do this, Amundsen bought a small single-masted yacht "Joa". If the 39-meter "Fram" with its 400-ton displacement was considered too small for long-distance navigation, then what can we say about Amundsen's ship with a length of 21 meters and a displacement of 48 tons? But Amundsen reasoned as follows: the main problems for everyone who tried to conquer the Northwest Passage were heavy ice that clogged the straits and shallow depths. A large ship has little chance of breaking through, unlike a yacht with a shallow draft. However, there was another reason for this choice: Amundsen did not have a significant amount of money.

The Norwegian installed a 13-horsepower kerosene engine on the yacht; in addition, she was equipped with sails. Having made a trial voyage in the Barents Sea in 1901, Amundsen was pleased with his ship. In June 1903, Gyoa went west. The team consisted of only seven people, including Amundsen himself. It's funny, but by the time he sailed, he could not pay off his creditors, so the team made their way on board the ship at night, secretly, and just as secretly, "Yoa" left the port.

After the Norwegians crossed the Atlantic and entered the Baffin Sea, they stopped at Godhavn on Disko Island. Here, 20 dogs were loaded on board, the delivery of which Amundsen arranged with a Danish trading company. Further, the path lay north, to the camp of the Scottish whalers Dalrymple Rock, where supplies of fuel and food were replenished. The Gyoa rounded Devon Island and entered Lancaster Sound. Having overcome it, she reached the small island of Beachy. Amundsen made magnetic observations to determine the direction in which the magnetic pole was. Instruments showed - on the western coast of the Butia peninsula.

On the way to the peninsula - around Somerset Island through the Peel Strait - serious trials awaited the Norwegians. First, "Yoa", passing an extremely difficult section, stumbled upon an underwater rock. And then suddenly a storm hit. It seemed that another blow against the rocks would follow, this time a deadly one, but a huge wave picked up the boat and carried it over the reef. After that collision, "Yoa" almost lost her helm. And one evening, when the yacht stopped at a small island and everyone was going to sleep, there was a heart-rending cry: “Fire!”. The engine room was on fire.

With great difficulty it was possible to fill the entire room with water. The happiness of the team that there was no explosion. Already at the very peninsula of Butia, the ship fell into a terrible storm that lasted four days. Amundsen managed to maneuver in such a way that the Gjoa remained afloat and was not washed ashore. Meanwhile, it was already September, and the polar night was fast approaching. They found a place for wintering on the south coast of King William Island, in a quiet bay surrounded by hills on all sides. Amundsen wrote that one could only dream of such a bay. But not far from here, the final scenes of the tragedy with John Franklin in the title role played out. By the way, the Norwegians managed to find and bury the remains of several members of the British expedition.

Everything needed, including scientific equipment, was unloaded ashore. Having built a warm house, observatories and installed instruments, the Norwegians also made rooms for dogs. Now we had to provide ourselves with food for the winter. They began to hunt deer and soon shot a hundred. Amundsen noted that the members of Franklin's last expedition died mainly from starvation - and this was in places with an amazing abundance of animals and fish!

During the hunt, the travelers met the Eskimos. A good relationship quickly developed between them. The Eskimos as a whole tribe migrated to the winter quarters of the Norwegians and settled nearby. In total, up to 200 people came. Amundsen foresaw this development and took with him a lot of goods for barter. Thanks to this, he managed to collect a wonderful collection of Eskimo household items. Magnetic measurements and other scientific investigations delayed Amundsen at the site for another year. And yet, in August 1904, he went on a boat to explore the narrow Simpson Sound, which separates King William Island from the mainland.

And in August of the following year, the Gyoa moved through this strait. Not a single ship had sailed in these waters before. For three weeks the ship literally crawled forward, the sailors constantly threw the lot and looked for a passage among the endless rocks and shallows. Once the keel of a ship was separated from the bottom by only one inch of water! And yet they broke through. When the sailors crossed the narrow winding straits between the mainland and the islands of the Canadian archipelago and entered the Beaufort Sea, they saw sails far ahead. It was the American whaling ship Charles Hansson, which came from San Francisco through the Bering Strait. It turns out that the end of the path is very close, and with it the victory! The Norwegians did not suspect that they would need another whole year to overcome the last stage. The ice got thicker, then harder, and finally, on September 2, the Gyoa got stuck north of King Point, off the Canadian coast. The speed with which Amundsen covered the distance from King William Island to Cape King Point is striking: in 20 days, the Gyoa covered almost 2 thousand km, and at least a third of this path through narrow shallow straits.

In his memoirs, Amundsen wrote that long before the expedition, he tried to acquire all the available literature on the Northwest Passage. Thanks to this, he was able to prepare well for the journey. At first glance at a map of the Canadian Archipelago, it seems that the most natural route from ocean to ocean is the northern one, through the straits of Lancaster, Barrow, Wycount Melville and McClure. However, it is precisely on this path that traps await sailors. In one of the books devoted to the search for John Franklin, Amundsen found a suggestion, even a prophecy, that the real passage would be found by those who chose a more southerly route. And so it happened.

But back to the "Yoa", captured in ice captivity. The most annoying thing was that the Northwest Passage had already been passed. And Amundsen decided to tell the world about his accomplishment. To do this, it was only necessary to get to some telegraph station. But the nearest one was 750 km away, behind a mountain range 2750 m high. We set off on a journey at the end of October on sleds pulled by dogs. In a bitter cold, they reached the Yukon River, and on December 5 they reached Fort Egbert, the terminus of the military telegraph line. Amundsen wrote about a thousand words, which were immediately sent. But it was in those days that the wires on the line burst from the frost! It took a week to fix the problem, after which Amundsen received confirmation that the telegrams had reached the addressees. In response, he received hundreds of congratulations.

In February 1906, the traveler left Fort Egbert and on a dog sled moved along the trading stations back to Gjoa. In July the ice receded, and the Norwegians reached Point Barrow without incident, passed through the Bering Strait, and arrived in San Francisco in October. Shortly before this, in April 1906, the city was seriously damaged by the famous earthquake, the most destructive in the history of the United States. Amundsen donated his yacht to the city as a memento of the conquest of the Northwest Passage.

Huge stress and wear and tear did not pass for the traveler in vain: in the first weeks after the end of the voyage, everyone took him for a 60- or 70-year-old man, although in fact he was only 33 years old.

NUMBERS AND FACTS

Main character

Roald Amundsen, the great Norwegian polar explorer

Other actors

Frederick Cook, American polar explorer, physician

Time of action

Expedition route

From Europe across the Atlantic to the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, then westward by narrow straits between the mainland and the islands

Target

Crossing the Northwest Passage, scientific research

Meaning

For the first time in history, it was possible to bypass North America from the north

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Amundsen Roald

Roald Amundsen Biography - Young Years

Roald Engelbert Gravning Amundsen was born on July 16, 1872 in Norway, in the city of Borge, Østfold province. His father was a hereditary navigator. According to Amundsen, the idea of becoming a polar explorer first came to him at the age of 15, when he got acquainted with the biography of Canadian Arctic explorer John Franklin. After graduating from high school in 1890, Rual entered the medical faculty of the University of Christiania, but after completing two courses, he interrupted his studies and got a job as a sailor on a fishing sailing vessel. Two years later, Roal passed the exam for a long-distance navigator. In 1897-1899, Amundsen participated in the Belgian Antarctic expedition as navigator of the Belgica ship. After returning from the expedition, he passed the exam again, becoming a sea captain.
In 1900, Roald makes one important acquisition - he buys the fishing yacht "Yoa". The yacht was built in Roosendalen by shipbuilder Kurt Skaale and was originally used for herring fishing. Amundsen deliberately acquired a small vessel in preparation for a future expedition: he did not rely on a crowded team, which would require significant supplies of provisions, but on a small detachment that could get its own food by hunting and fishing.
In 1903, the expedition started from Greenland. The crew of the yacht "Yoa" continued to wander the seas and straits of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago for three years. In 1906 the expedition reached Alaska. During the voyage, more than a hundred islands were mapped, and many valuable discoveries were made. Roald Amundsen became the first person to cross the Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. However, this was only the beginning of an amazing biography of the Norwegian navigator.
Antarctica, where Amundsen visited in his youth, attracted him with its unknown. The mainland, bound by ice, concealed in its expanses the South Pole of the Earth, where no human foot had yet set foot. 1910 was a turning point in the biography of Roald Amundsen. He led an expedition whose ultimate goal was to conquer the South Pole. For the expedition, the Fram motor-sailing schooner, created by the shipbuilder Colin Archer, was chosen - the most durable wooden ship in the world, which had previously taken part in the Arctic expedition of Fridtjof Nansen and the voyage of Otto Sverdrup to the Canadian Arctic archipelago. Equipment and preparatory work continued until the end of June 1910. It is noteworthy that among the participants of the expedition was the Russian sailor and oceanographer Alexander Stepanovich Kuchin. On July 7, 1910, the crew of the Fram set sail. On January 14, 1911, the ship reached Antarctica, entering the Bay of Whales.
The expedition of Roald Amundsen was in the most intense competition with the English expedition "Terra Nova", led by Robert Falcon Scott. In October 1911, Amundsen's team began to advance by dog sled inland. On December 14, 1911, at 3 pm, Amundsen and his comrades reached the South Pole, ahead of Scott's team by 33 days.

Biography of Roald Amundsen - mature years

Having conquered the South Pole of the Earth, Amundsen caught fire with a new idea. Now he is rushing to the Arctic: his plans include a transpolar drift, sailing across the Arctic Ocean to the North Pole. For these purposes, according to the drawings of Fram, Amundsen builds the schooner Maud, named after the Queen of Norway, Maud of Wales (Amundsen also christened the mountains he discovered in Antarctica in her honor). In 1918-1920, the Maud was sailed by the Northeast Passage (in 1920, an expedition that started from Norway reached the Bering Strait), and from 1922 to 1925, drifting continued in the East Siberian Sea. The North Pole, however, was not reached by Amundsen's expedition. In 1926, Captain Amundsen led the first non-stop transarctic flight on the airship "Norway" along the route Svalbard - North Pole - Alaska. On his return to Oslo, Amundsen was given a ceremonial reception; in his own words, it was the happiest moment of his life.
Roald Amundsen hatched plans to study the cultures of the peoples of North America and North Asia, and new expeditions were in his plans. But 1928 was the final year in his biography. The Italian expedition of Umberto Nobile, one of the participants in the flight "Norway" in 1926, crashed in the Arctic Ocean. The crew of the airship "Italia", on which Nobile traveled, was on a drifting ice floe. Significant forces were sent to save the Nobile expedition, Roald Amundsen also took part in the search. On June 18, 1928, he took off from Norway in a French Latham plane, but suffered an air crash and died in the Barents Sea.
The biography of Roald Amundsen is a vivid example of a heroic life. From early youth, setting himself ambitious goals that seemed impossible to others, he adamantly moved forward - and won, becoming a pioneer in the harsh ice of the Arctic seas or the snowy expanses of Antarctica. Fridtjof Nansen famously said about his outstanding fellow countryman: “He will forever take a special place in the history of geographical research ... Some kind of explosive power lived in him. In the foggy sky of the Norwegian people, he ascended as a shining star. immediately went out, and we cannot take our eyes off the empty place in the sky.
A sea, a mountain and a glacier in Antarctica, as well as a crater on the Moon are named after Amundsen. Raul Amundsen outlined his experience as a polar explorer in the books he wrote, My Life, The South Pole, On the Maud Ship. “Willpower is the first and most important quality of a skilled explorer,” the South Pole discoverer claimed. “Forethought and caution are equally important: foresight is to notice difficulties in time, and caution is to prepare for their meeting in the most thorough way ... Victory awaits the one who is all right, and this is called luck.”

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Amundsen, Roald is a Norwegian polar traveler and explorer. Born in Borg on July 16, 1872, since June 1928 he has been missing. He was the greatest discoverer of modern times. Within almost 30 years, Amundsen achieved all the goals that polar explorers have been striving for for over 300 years.

In 1897-99. Amundsen participated as a navigator in the Antarctic expedition of A. Gerlache on the Belgica ship. The expedition explored Graham's Land.

In order to prepare his own expedition to determine the exact location of the North Magnetic Pole, he improved his knowledge at a German observatory.

After a trial voyage in the Arctic Ocean, Amundsen set off in mid-June 1903 on the Joa ship with a displacement of 47 tons with six Norwegian companions and passed in the direction of the Canadian-Arctic islands through the Lancaster and Peel straits to the southeast coast of King Island -William. There he spent two polar winters and made valuable geomagnetic observations. In 1904 he surveyed the North Magnetic Pole on the west coast of the Boothia Felix Peninsula and undertook daring boat and sleigh rides through the ice-covered sea straits between King William and Victoria Lands. At the same time, over 100 islands were put on the map by him and his companions. On August 13, 1905, the Gyoa finally continued its journey and through the straits between the islands of King William, Victoria and the Canadian mainland reached the Beaufort Sea, and then, after a second wintering in ice near the mouth of the Mackenzie on August 31, 1906, reached the Bering Strait. Thus, for the first time, it was possible to pass the Northwest Passage on one ship, but not those straits that were explored by the expeditions looking for Franklin.

Another great achievement of Amundsen was the discovery of the South Pole, which he managed to accomplish on the first try. In 1909, Amundsen was preparing for a long drift in the ice of the Polar Basin and exploration of the North Pole region on the Fram ship, formerly owned by Nansen, but, having learned about the discovery of the North Pole by the American Robert Peary, he changed his plan and set the goal of reaching the South Pole. On January 13, 1911, he landed from the Fram at the Bay of Whales in the eastern part of the Ross Ice Barrier, from where he set out the following summer, October 20, accompanied by four people on a sleigh pulled by dogs. After a successful trip across the ice plateau, a tedious ascent through mountain glaciers at an altitude of about 3 thousand meters (Devil's Glacier, Axel-Heiberg glacier) and further successful progress on the ice of the inner plateau of Antarctica, on December 15, 1911, Amundsen was the first to reach the South Pole, four weeks earlier than the less successful expedition of R. F. Scott, who made his way to the pole west of the path of Amundsen. On the way back, which began on December 17, Amundsen discovered the Queen Maud Mountains up to 4500 m high and on January 25, 1912, after a 99-day absence, he again returned to the landing site.

Upon returning from Antarctica, Amundsen tried to repeat the drift through the Arctic Ocean, but much further north, possibly through the North Pole, having previously passed through the northeast passage - along the northern coasts of Eurasia (but his next northern expeditions were delayed by the First World War). For this expedition, a new ship, Maud, was built. In the summer of 1918, the expedition left Norway, but could not pass around the Taimyr Peninsula and wintered near Cape Chelyuskin. In the navigation of 1919, Amundsen managed to go east to about. Aion, where the ship "Maud" stood up for the second winter. In 1920 the expedition entered the Bering Strait. In the future, the expedition carried out work in the Arctic Ocean, while Amundsen himself for a number of years was engaged in fundraising and preparing flights to the North Pole.

The second attempt was made on the "Maud" in 1922 from Cape Hop (Alaska), but Amundsen himself did not take part in the voyage of his ship. After a two-year ice drift, the Maud only reached the New Siberian Islands, the starting point of the Fram, in 1893. Since the further direction of the drift was already known thanks to the Fram, the Maud freed itself from the ice and returned to Alaska.

Meanwhile, Amundsen was trying to make a way to the North Pole by plane, but during the first test flight in May 1923 from Wainwright (Alaska), his car went bad. On May 21, 1925, he, along with five companions, incl. Ellsworth took off on two planes from Svalbard. And again he did not reach the goal. At 87 0 43 / s. sh. and 10 0 20 / s. D., 250 km from the Pole, he had to make an emergency landing. Here the members of the expedition spent more than 3 weeks, preparing the airfield for takeoff; in June they managed to return to Svalbard on the same plane.

In the following years, Amundsen finally succeeded, together with Ellsworth and Nobile, on the semi-rigid airship "Norge" ("Norway"), to cross all the polar regions from Svalbard to Alaska, and also to fly over the North Pole. On May 11, the airship started from Svalbard, on May 12 it was at the North Pole, and on May 14, 1926 it reached Alaska, where it sank. However, just before that, on May 9, he flew over the Pole for the first time and thus outstripped Amundsen, just as the latter had once outstripped Scott at the South Pole. In June 1928

Amundsen died while trying to find and help the Italian expedition of Umberto Nobile on the airship "Italia", which crashed in the ice of the Polar Basin; On June 18, 1928, Amundsen flew north from Tromsø in the seaplane Latham and disappeared without a trace with the entire crew. Subsequently, the find of the float and the tank showed that the aircraft had died in the Barents Sea.

In persistent, purposeful work, prompted by great ambition, not retreating in case of failures, Amundsen rendered the greatest service to science. He wrote a number of works about his travels. In Russian per. "Collected Works", vols. 1-5, L, 1936-1939; "My Life", M., 1959, and a number of other publications.

Amundsen at the South Pole.

Bibliography

Biographical dictionary of figures of natural science and technology. T. 1. - Moscow: State. scientific publishing house "Great Soviet Encyclopedia", 1958. - 548 p.
300 travelers and explorers. Biographical Dictionary. - Moscow: Thought, 1966. - 271 p.

(July 16, 1872 – June 18, 1928)
Norwegian traveler, polar explorer

Passed for the first time by the northwestern passage from Greenland to Alaska on the schooner "Ioa" (1903-06). In 1910-12 made an Antarctic expedition on the ship "Fram"; in December 1911 he was the first to reach the South Pole. In 1918-20. passed along the northern coast of Eurasia on the ship "Maud". In 1926, he led the first flight over the North Pole on the airship "Norway". Roald Amundsen died in the Barents Sea while searching for the Italian expedition of Umberto Nobile.

Named after him Amundsen Sea(Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Antarctica, between 100 and 123 ° W), mountain (nunatak in East Antarctica, in the western part of Wilkes Land, at the eastern side of the Denman outlet glacier at 67 ° 13 "S and 100 ° 44 "E; height 1445 m.), American Amundsen-Scott research station in Antarctica(when it was opened in 1956, the station was located exactly at the South Pole, but at the beginning of 2006, due to the movement of ice, the station was about 100 m from the geographic south pole.), as well as a bay and a basin in the Arctic Ocean, and a lunar crater (located at the South Pole of the Moon, which is why the crater was named after the traveler Amundsen, who was the first to reach the South Pole of the Earth; the crater has a diameter of 105 km, and its bottom is inaccessible to sunlight, at the bottom of the crater is ice.).

"Some kind of explosive power lived in him. Amundsen was not a scientist, and did not want to be one. He was attracted by exploits."

(Fridtjof Nansen)

“What is still unknown to us on our planet puts some kind of oppression on the consciousness of most people. This unknown is something that man has not yet conquered, some permanent proof of our impotence, some unpleasant challenge to dominance over nature.

(Roald Amundsen)

Brief chronology

1890-92 studied at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Christiania

1894-99 sailed as a sailor and navigator on various ships. Starting from 1903, he made a number of expeditions that became widely known

1903-06 first passed on a small fishing vessel "Ioa" through the Northwest Passage from East to West from Greenland to Alaska

1911 on the ship "Fram" went to Antarctica; landed in the Bay of Whales and on December 14 reached the South Pole on dogs, a month ahead of the English expedition of R. Scott

In 1918, in the summer, the expedition left Norway on the ship Maud and in 1920 reached the Bering Strait

1926 Roalle led the 1st transarctic flight on the airship "Norway" along the route: Svalbard - North Pole - Alaska

In 1928, during an attempt to find the Italian expedition of U. Nobile, who crashed in the Arctic Ocean on the airship "Italy", and to help her, Amundsen, who took off on June 18 on the seaplane "Latham", died in the Barents Sea.

Life story

Roald was born in 1872 in the southeast of Norway ( Borge, near Sarpsborg) in a family of sailors and shipbuilders.

When he was 14, his father died and the family moved to Christiania(since 1924 - Oslo). Roal went to study at the medical faculty of the university, but when he was 21, his mother dies, and Roal leaves the university. He later wrote: "With inexpressible relief, I left the university in order to devote myself wholeheartedly to the only dream of my life."

At the age of 15, Roald decided to become a polar traveler, reading John Franklin's book. This Englishman in 1819-22. tried to find the Northwest Passage - the path from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean around the northern coasts of North America. The members of his expedition had to starve, eat lichens, their own leather shoes. “It is amazing,” Amundsen recalled, “what ... most of all attracted my attention was the description of these hardships experienced by Franklin and his companions. A strange desire ignited in me to endure the same suffering someday.”

So, from the age of 21, Amundsen devotes himself entirely to the study of maritime affairs. At 22, Roald stepped on board a ship for the first time. At 22 he was a cabin boy, at 24 he was already a navigator. In 1897 young man embarks on his first expedition to the South Pole under the command of the Belgian polar researcher Adrien de Gerlache, in whose team he was accepted under the patronage of Fridtjof Nansen.

The venture almost ended in disaster: research ship "Belgica" froze into the pack ice, and the crew was forced to stay for the winter in the conditions of the polar night. Scurvy, anemia and depression exhausted the expedition members to the limit. And only one person seemed to have unshakable physical and psychological endurance: navigator Amundsen. The following spring, it was he who with a firm hand brought Belgica out of the ice and returned to Oslo, enriched with new invaluable experience.

Now Amundsen knew what to expect from the polar night, but this only spurred his ambition. He decided to organize the next expedition himself. Amundsen bought a ship - light fishing ship "Ioa" and started preparing.

"Any person is not so much able," said Amundsen, "and every new skill can be useful to him."

Roalle studied meteorology and oceanology, learned to make magnetic observations. He skied well and drove a dog sled. Typically, later at 42, he learned to fly - became Norway's first civilian pilot.

Amundsen wanted to accomplish what Franklin had failed, what no one had been able to do until now - to pass through the Northwest Passage, supposedly linking the Atlantic with the Pacific Ocean. And 3 years carefully prepared for this journey.

"Nothing justifies itself so much as spending time on the selection of participants for a polar expedition," Amundsen liked to repeat. He did not invite people under thirty years of age to his travels, and each of those who went with him knew and could do a lot.

June 16, 1903 Amundsen, with six companions, left Norway aboard the Ioa for his first Arctic expedition. Without much adventure, the Ioa passed between the Arctic islands of northern Canada to the place where Amundsen set up a winter camp. He had prepared enough provisions, tools, weapons and ammunition, and now, together with his people, he learned to survive in the conditions of the Arctic night.

He made friends with the Eskimos, who had never seen white people before, bought deer-fur jackets and bear mittens from them, learned how to build a needle, prepare pemmican (food from dried and crushed seal meat), and also handle riding huskies, without which a person cannot do without in the icy desert.

Such a life - extremely remote from civilization, putting the European in the most difficult, unusual conditions - seemed to Amundsen lofty and worthy. He called the Eskimos "the courageous children of nature." But some of the customs of his new friends made a repulsive impression on him. "They offered me a lot of women very cheaply," Amundsen wrote. So that such proposals would not demoralize the expedition members, he categorically forbade his comrades to agree to them. “I added,” Amundsen recalls, “that syphilis must have been very common in this tribe.” This warning had an effect on the team.

For more than two years, Amundsen stayed with the Eskimos, and at that time the whole world considered him missing. In August 1905, the Ioa moved on, heading west, through waters and areas not yet marked on old maps. Soon before them opened the wide expanse of the bay formed by the Beaufort Sea (now the bay is named after Amundsen). And on August 26, Ioa met a schooner coming from the west, from San Francisco. The American captain was as surprised as the Norwegian. He boarded the Ioa and asked: "Are you Captain Amundsen? In that case, I congratulate you." Both shook hands firmly. The Northwest Passage was conquered.

The ship had to winter one more time. During this time, Amundsen, together with the Eskimo whalers, covered 800 km on skis and sleds and reached Eagle City, located in the depths of Alaska, where there was a telegraph. From here Amundsen telegraphed home: " Northwest Passage Crossed"Unfortunately for the traveler, the efficient telegraph operator passed this news to the American press before it was known in Norway. As a result, Amundsen's partners, with whom a contract was concluded on the rights to the first publication of the sensational message, refused to pay the agreed fee. So the discoverer, who survived indescribable hardships in the icy desert, faced a complete financial collapse, became a hero without a penny in his pocket.

In November 1906, more than 3 years after sailing, he returned to Oslo, honored in the same way as once Fridtjof Nansen. Norway, which declared independence from Sweden a year ago, saw Roald Amundsen as a national hero. The government granted him 40 thousand crowns. Thanks to this, he was able to at least pay his debts.

From now on discoverer of the Northwest Passage could bathe in the rays of his worldwide fame. His travelogue became a bestseller. He gives lectures in the USA and all over Europe (in Berlin, even Emperor Wilhelm II was among his listeners). But Amundsen cannot rest easy on his laurels. He is not yet 40, and life's purpose draws him further. New target - North Pole.

He wanted to enter Arctic Ocean through the Bering Strait and repeat, only in higher latitudes, the famous drift "Fram". However, Amundsen was in no hurry to openly communicate his intention: the government could refuse him money for the implementation of such a dangerous plan. Amundsen announced that he was planning an expedition to the Arctic that would be purely a scientific endeavor, and succeeded in obtaining government support. King Haakon donated 30,000 crowns from his personal funds, and the government placed at the disposal of Amundsen, with the consent of Nansen, the Fram vessel belonging to him. While the expedition was being prepared, the Americans Frederic Cook and Robert Peary announced that the North Pole has already been conquered ...

From now on, this goal for Amundsen ceased to exist. He had nothing to do where he could become the second and even more so the third. However, it remained South Pole- and he had to go there without delay.

“In order to maintain my prestige as a polar explorer,” Roald Amundsen recalled, “I needed to achieve some other sensational success as soon as possible. I decided to take a risky step ... Our path from Norway to the Bering Strait went by Cape Horn but first we had to go to Madeira island. Here I informed my comrades that since the North Pole was open, I decided to go to the South. Everyone enthusiastically agreed...

All assaults on the South Pole had previously failed. The British advanced further than others Ernest Shackleton and Captain of the Royal Navy Robert Scott. In January 1909, when Amundsen was preparing his expedition to the North Pole, Shackleton did not reach 155 km to the southernmost point of the earth, and Scott announced a new expedition planned for 1910. If Amundsen wanted to win, he didn't have to waste a minute.

But in order to carry out his plan, he has to again mislead his patrons. Fearing that Nansen and the government would not approve of the plan for a hasty and dangerous expedition to the South Pole, Amundsen left them in the belief that he was continuing to prepare for the Arctic operation. Only Leon, Amundsen's brother and confidant, was privy to the new plan.

August 9, 1910 The Fram went to sea. Official destination: Arctic, via Cape Horn and the western coast of America. At Madeira, where the Fram docked for the last time, Amundsen informed the crew for the first time that his destination was not the North Pole, but the South. Anyone who wanted to could land, but no one was willing. To his brother Leon, Amundsen gave letters to King Haakon and Nansen, in which he apologized for the change of course. To his rival Scott, who was at anchor in Australia in full readiness, he telegraphed succinctly: " "Fram" on the way to Antarctica This signaled the start of the most dramatic rivalry in the history of discovery.

On January 13, 1911, at the height of the Antarctic summer, the Fram anchored in the Bay of Whales on the Ross Ice Barrier. At the same time, Scott reached Antarctica and camped at McMurdo Sound, 650 km from Amundsen. While the rivals were rebuilding base camps, Scott sent his research ship "Terra Nova" to Amundsen in the Bay of Whales. The British were friendly on the Fram. Everyone carefully looked at each other, observing external goodwill and correctness, however, both of them preferred to remain silent about their immediate plans. Nevertheless, Robert Scott is full of unsettling forebodings: "I can't help but think of the Norwegians in that distant bay," he writes in his diary.

Before storm the pole, both expeditions prepared for the winter. Scott could boast of more expensive equipment (he even had snowmobiles in his arsenal), but Amundsen tried to take into account every little thing. He ordered at regular intervals along the route to the Pole to arrange warehouses with food supplies. Having tested the dogs, on which the lives of people now depended in many respects, he was delighted with their endurance. They ran up to 60 km a day.

Amundsen ruthlessly trained his people. When one of them, Hjalmar Johansen, began to complain about the sharpness of the boss, he was excluded from the group that was supposed to go to the pole, and left on the ship as punishment. Amundsen wrote in his diary: "The bull must be taken by the horns: his example must certainly serve as a lesson for others." Perhaps this humiliation was not in vain for Johansen: a few years later he committed suicide.

On a spring day October 19, 1911 with the rising of the Antarctic sun, 5 people, led by Amundsen, rushed to assault on the pole. They set off on four sledges pulled by 52 dogs. The team easily found the former warehouses and left food warehouses further at every degree of latitude. At first, the path passed through the snowy hilly plain of the Ross Ice Shelf. But here, too, travelers often found themselves in a labyrinth of glacial cracks.

In the south, in clear weather, an unknown mountainous country with dark cone-shaped peaks, with patches of snow on steep slopes and sparkling glaciers between them, began to emerge before the eyes of the Norwegians. At the 85th parallel, the surface went up steeply - the ice shelf ended. The ascent began on steep snow-covered slopes. At the beginning of the ascent, the travelers arranged the main food warehouse with a supply of 30 days. For the rest of the journey, Amundsen left food at the rate of 60 days. During this period, he planned reach the South Pole and return back to the main warehouse.

In search of passages through the labyrinth of mountain peaks and ridges, travelers had to repeatedly climb and descend back, in order to then rise again. Finally they found themselves on a large glacier, which, like a frozen river of ice, cascaded down between the mountains from above. This the glacier was named after Axel Heiberg- the patron of the expedition, who donated a large sum. The glacier was riddled with cracks. At the campsites, while the dogs were resting, the travelers, having connected with each other with ropes, scouted the way on skis.

At an altitude of about 3,000 meters above sea level, 24 dogs were killed. This was not an act of vandalism, which Amundsen was often reproached for, it was an unfortunate necessity, planned in advance. The meat of these dogs was supposed to serve as food for their relatives and people. This place was called "Slaughterhouse". 16 dog carcasses and one sled were left here.

"24 of our worthy companions and faithful assistants were doomed to death! It was cruel, but it had to be so. We all unanimously decided not to be embarrassed by anything to achieve our goal."

The higher the travelers climbed, the worse the weather became. Sometimes they climbed in the snowy haze and fog, distinguishing the path only under their feet. The mountain peaks that appeared before their eyes in rare clear hours, they called the names of the Norwegians: friends, relatives, patrons. The tallest The mountain was named after Fridtjof Nansen. And one of the glaciers descending from it was named after Nansen's daughter - Liv.

"It was a strange journey. We passed through completely uncharted places, new mountains, glaciers and ridges, but did not see anything." And the path was dangerous. It is not for nothing that certain places have received such gloomy names: "The Gates of Hell", "Damn's Glacier", "Devil's Dance Hall". Finally, the mountains ended, and the travelers came to a high plateau. Further stretched frozen white waves of snow sastrugi.

December 7, 1911 sunny weather set in. Two sextants determined the midday height of the sun. The definitions show that the travelers were at 88° 16" S.. Remained to the pole 193 km. Between astronomical determinations of their place, they maintained the direction of the south by compass, and the distance was determined by the counter of a bicycle wheel with a circumference of a meter. On the same day they passed the southernmost point reached before them: 3 years ago, the party of the Englishman Ernest Shackleton reached latitude 88 ° 23 ", but before the threat of starvation, they were forced to turn back, not having reached the pole only 180 km.

The Norwegians easily skied forward to the pole, and the sledges with food and equipment were still carried by rather strong dogs, four in a team.

December 16, 1911, taking the sun's midnight altitude, Amundsen determined that they were at about 89° 56" S, i.e. 7–10 km from the pole. Then, splitting into two groups, the Norwegians dispersed to all four cardinal points, within a radius of 10 kilometers, in order to more accurately examine the polar region. December 17 they reached the point where, according to their calculations, should have been South Pole. Here they set up a tent, and dividing into two groups, they took turns observing the height of the sun with a sextant every hour around the clock.

The instruments spoke of being directly at the pole point. But to avoid being blamed for not reaching the Pole itself, Hansen and Bjoland went another seven kilometers. At the South Pole they left a small gray-brown tent, above the tent on a pole they strengthened the Norwegian flag, and under it a pennant with the inscription "Fram". In the tent, Amundsen left a letter to the Norwegian king with a brief report on the campaign and a concise message to his rival, Scott.

On December 18, the Norwegians set off on the return journey, following the old tracks, and after 39 days they returned safely to Framheim. Despite the poor visibility, they found the food warehouses easily: arranging them, they prudently stacked houris of snow bricks perpendicular to the path on both sides of the warehouses and marked them with bamboo poles. All Amundsen's journey and his comrades to the South Pole and back took 99 days. (!)

Let's bring names of the discoverers of the South Pole: Oscar Wisting, Helmer Hansen, Sverre Hassel, Olaf Bjaland, Roald Amundsen.

In a month, January 18, 1912, a pole came up to the Norwegian tent at the South Pole part of Robert Scott. On the way back, Scott and four of his comrades died in the icy desert from exhaustion and cold. Subsequently, Amundsen wrote: "I would sacrifice fame, absolutely everything, to bring him back to life. My triumph is overshadowed by the thought of his tragedy, it haunts me!"

By the time Scott reached the South Pole, Amundsen was already completing his return trip. His recording sounds in stark contrast; it seems to be a picnic, a Sunday walk: "On January 17th we reached the food warehouse under the 82nd parallel... The chocolate cake served by Wisting is still fresh in our memory... I can give you the recipe... "

Fridtjof Nansen: “When a real person comes, all difficulties disappear, since each one is individually foreseen and mentally experienced in advance. And let no one come with talk about happiness, about favorable combinations of circumstances. Amundsen’s happiness is the happiness of the strong, the happiness of wise foresight.”

Amundsen built his base on the shelf Ross Glacier. The very possibility of wintering on a glacier was considered very dangerous, since every glacier is in constant motion and its huge pieces break off and float into the ocean. However, the Norwegian, reading the reports of the Antarctic navigators, was convinced that in the area Bay of Kitovaya the configuration of the glacier has not changed much in 70 years. There could be only one explanation for this: the glacier rests on the immovable foundation of some "subglacial" island. So, you can spend the winter on the glacier.

Preparing for the pole campaign, Amundsen laid down several food warehouses in the fall. He wrote: "... The success of our entire battle for the pole depended on this work." Amundsen threw more than 700 kilograms to the 80th degree, 560 to the 81st, and 620 to the 82nd.

Amundsen used Eskimo dogs. And not only as a draft force. He was deprived of "sentimentality", and is it appropriate to talk about it, when in the fight against polar nature, an immeasurably more valuable thing is at stake - human life.

His plan can strike both with cold cruelty and wise foresight.

“Since the Eskimo dog provides about 25 kg of edible meat, it was easy to calculate that each dog we took to the South meant a reduction of 25 kg of food both on sleds and in warehouses. In the calculation made before the final departure to the pole, I precisely set the day when each dog should be shot, that is, the moment when it ceased to serve as a means of transportation for us and began to serve as food ... "
The choice of wintering grounds, the provision of warehouses, the use of skis, lighter, more reliable equipment than Scott's - all played a role in the eventual success of the Norwegians.

Amundsen himself called his polar travels "work". But years later, one of the articles dedicated to his memory will be entitled quite unexpectedly: "The Art of Polar Exploration."

By the time the Norwegians returned to the coastal base, "Fram" had already arrived in the Bay of Whales and took away the entire wintering party. On March 7, 1912, from the city of Hobart on the island of Tasmania, Amundsen informed the world of his victory and the successful return of the expedition.

For almost two decades after the expedition of Amundsen and Scott, no one was in the South Pole region.

So, Amundsen won again, and his fame spread all over the world. But the tragedy of the vanquished left a greater mark on the souls of people than the triumph of the victor. The death of a rival forever overshadowed the life of Amundsen. He was 40 years old and had achieved everything he wanted to. What else could he do? But he still raved about the polar regions. Life without ice did not exist for him. In 1918, while the world war was still raging, Amundsen set out on a new ship "Maud" into an expensive expedition to the Arctic Ocean. He was going to explore the northern coast of Siberia to the Bering Strait. The enterprise, which lasted 3 years and more than once threatened people with death, did little to enrich science and did not arouse public interest. The world was busy with other concerns and other sensations: the era of aeronautics was beginning.

In order to keep up with the times, Amundsen had to transfer from the dog sled to the helm of the aircraft. Back in 1914, he was the first in Norway to receive a flying license. Then, with the financial support of the American millionaire Lincoln Ellsworth buys two large seaplanes: now Roald Amundsen wants be the first to reach the North Pole!

The enterprise ended in 1925 full fiasco. One of the planes had to make an emergency landing among the drifting ice, where it was left. The second aircraft soon also found a malfunction, and only after 3 weeks the team managed to fix it. On the last drops of fuel, Amundsen reached the saving Svalbard.

But surrender was not for him. Not a plane - so airship! Amundsen's patron Ellsworth bought an airship from the Italian aeronaut Umberto Nobile, whom he hired as chief mechanic and captain. The airship was renamed "Norway" and delivered to Svalbard. And again, failure: even during preparation for the flight, he took the palm from Amundsen American Richard Byrd: on a twin-engine Fokker, he flew, starting from Svalbard, over the North Pole and dropped the Stars and Stripes there as evidence.

“Norway” now inevitably turned out to be the second. But because of its almost hundred-meter length, it was more impressive and impressive to the public than Bird's small plane. When the airship took off from Svalbard on May 11, 1926, all of Norway followed the flight. It was an epic flight over the Arctic over the Pole to Alaska, where the airship landed at a place called Teller. After a 72-hour sleepless flight, in fog, at times almost touching the ground, Umberto Nobile managed to accurately land the giant machine he had designed. It has become a huge success in the field of aeronautics. For Amundsen, however, the triumph was bitter. In the eyes of the whole world, the name of Nobile eclipsed the name of the Norwegian, who, being the organizer and head of the expedition, in fact, flew only as a passenger.

The peak of Amundsen's life was behind him. He did not see any other area where he would like to be the first. Returning to your home in Bunnefjorde, near Oslo, the great traveler began to live like a gloomy hermit, more and more withdrawing into himself. He never married and had no long-term relationship with any woman. At first, his old nanny ran the household, and after her death, he began to take care of himself. It did not require much effort: he lived in a Spartan way, as if he had still been aboard the Ioa, the Fram, or the Maud.

Amundsen was getting weird. He sold all orders, honorary awards and openly quarreled with many former associates. “I get the impression,” Fridtjof Nansen wrote in 1927 to one of his friends, “that Amundsen has completely lost his mental balance and is not fully responsible for his actions.” Amundsen's main enemy was Umberto Nobile, whom he called "an arrogant, childish, selfish upstart", "a ridiculous officer", "a man of a wild, semi-tropical race." But it was thanks to Humberto Nobile that Amundsen was destined to step out of the shadows for the last time.

U. Nobile, who became a general under Mussolini, in 1928 decided to repeat the flight over the Arctic on a new airship "Italy"- this time as the leader of the expedition. May 23, he started from Svalbard and reached the Pole at the scheduled time. However, on the way back, radio communication with it was interrupted: due to icing of the outer shell, the airship pressed against the ground and crashed in the icy desert.

The international search operation was in full swing within a few hours. Amundsen left his home in Bunnefjord to take part in the rescue of his rival, a man who stole his most valuable possession - fame. He hoped to take revenge, to be the first to find Umberto Nobile. The whole world will appreciate this gesture!

With the support of a certain Norwegian philanthropist, Amundsen, in just one night, managed to hire a twin-engine seaplane with a crew that he himself joined in the port of Bergen. In the morning June 18 With the plane reached Tromsø, and in the afternoon flew in the direction of Svalbard. From that moment on, no one has ever seen him.. A week later, fishermen found the float and gas tank from the crashed plane. And in total 5 days after the death of Roald Amundsen, Umberto Nobile was discovered and seven other surviving companions.

The life of a great adventurer ended where his life purpose led him. He could not find a better grave for himself. To an Italian journalist who asked what fascinated him so much in the polar regions, Amundsen replied: "Oh, if you ever had a chance to see with your own eyes how wonderful it is - I would like to die there."

Norwegian traveler, champion, explorer and great man Roald Amundsen known throughout the world as

the first person to conquer both poles of our planet;
the first person to visit the South Pole;
the first person to circumnavigate the world with its circuit at the North Pole;
one of the pioneers in the use of aviation - seaplanes and airships - in Arctic travel.

Brief biography of Roald Amundsen

Roald Amundsen (full name - Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen) born July 16, 1872 in Borg, Norway. His father - Jens Amundsen, hereditary maritime trader. His mother - Hanna Salquist, the daughter of an official from the customs service.

Study at school

Roal was always at school worst student, but stood out for his stubbornness and a heightened sense of justice. The principal of the school even refused him to pass the final exam for fear of disgracing the institution with an underachieving student.

Amundsen had to sign up for the final exams separately, as an external student, and in July 1890 he received his matriculation certificate with great difficulty.

Further studies

After his father's death in 1886, Roald Amundsen wanted to study on a sailor, but the mother insisted that her son choose medicine after receiving his Abitur.

He had to submit and become a medical student at the university. But in September 1893, when his mother suddenly died, he became the master of his fate and, leaving the university, went to sea.

Maritime specialty and travel to the Arctic

For 5 years, Roald sailed as a sailor on various ships, and then passed the exams and received navigator diploma. And in this capacity, in 1897, he finally went to the Arctic with research purposes on a ship "Belgica", which belonged to the Belgian Arctic expedition.

It was the hardest test. The ship was trapped in the ice, starvation, illness began, people went crazy. Only a few remained healthy, among them was Amundsen - he hunted seals, was not afraid to eat their meat, and thus escaped.

Northwest Passage

In 1903 With the accumulated funds, Amundsen bought a used 47-ton sailing-motor yacht "Yoa" built just in the year of his birth. The schooner had a diesel engine of only 13 horsepower.

Together with 7 members of the team, he went to the open sea. He managed to go along the coast of North America from Greenland to Alaska and discover the so-called northwest passage.

This expedition was no less severe than the first. had to endure wintering in the ice, ocean storms, encounters with dangerous icebergs. But Amundsen continued to conduct scientific observations, and he managed to determine the location of the Earth's magnetic pole.

On a dog sled, he reached the "residential" Alaska. He aged a lot, at 33 he looked 70. Difficulties did not frighten an experienced polar explorer, a seasoned navigator and a passionate traveler.

Conquest of the South Pole

In 1910, he began to prepare a new expedition to the North Pole. Just before going to sea, a message came that the North Pole had submitted to the American Robert Peary.

The proud Amundsen immediately changed his goal: he decided to go to the South Pole.

Travelers overcame 16 thousand miles in a few weeks, and approached the very ice barrier of Ross in Antarctica. There they had to land on the shore and move on by dog sleds. The path was blocked by icy rocks and abysses; the skis barely slipped.

But despite all the difficulties, Roald Amundsen December 14, 1911 reached the South Pole. Together with his comrades-in-arms, he passed through the ice 1500 kilometers and was the first to hoist the flag of Norway at the South Pole.

polar aviation

Roald Amundsen flew to the North Pole on seaplanes, landed on the island of Svalbard, landed in the ice. In 1926 on a huge airship "Norway"(106 meters long and with three engines) together with the Italian expedition Umberto Nobile and American millionaire Lincoln-Ellsworth Amundsen fulfilled his dream:

flew over the North Pole and landed in Alaska.

But all the glory went to Umberto Nobile. The head of the fascist state, Benito Mussolini, glorified one Nobile, promoted him to the generals, Amundsen was not even remembered.

Tragic death

In 1928 Nobile decided to repeat his record. On the airship "Italy", the same design as the previous airship, he made another flight to the North Pole. In Italy, they were looking forward to his return, a triumphal meeting was being prepared for the national hero. The North Pole will be Italian...

But on the way back, due to icing, the airship "Italia" lost control. Part of the crew, together with Nobile, succeeded land on the ice. The other part flew away with the airship. Radio contact with the crashed was interrupted.

Amundsen agreed to become a member of one of the rescue expeditions of the Nobile team. June 18, 1928 together with the French crew, he took off in a seaplane Latham-47 towards the island of Svalbard.

This was Amundsen's last flight. Soon, radio communication with the aircraft, which was over the Barents Sea, was interrupted. The exact circumstances of the death of the aircraft and the expedition remained unknown.

In 1928, Amundsen was awarded (posthumously) the highest honor in the United States - Congressional Gold Medal.