Abstract
THE meteorologist of my expedition has unfortunately given a somewhat incorrect idea about the snow conditions at Cape Adare. He reports, namely, that there is a very small snow fall at the sea-level. This is, in my opinion, not the case. But his mistake is excusable and easily explicable; of course, being a young Tasmanian and not previously having seen ice and snow, a devotee to his instrument, took down in his note book the evidence of a usual snow gauge. Snow seldom or never fell in the Antarctic except during heavy gales, and it must be clear to anybody familiar with snow that a snow gauge of the ordinary type is worse than useless during heavy gales. Although Cape Adare itself and the peninsula on which we lived were almost free of snow in the open, we had more than ten feet of snow to the leeward of our hut at Camp Ridley, and undoubtedly there would have been still more had the huts been higher. This indicates, of course, that much snow fell, but it was blown away as well from the promontory at Cape Adare as from the unfortunate snow gauge. In my opinion a very heavy snow fall takes place within the Antarctic circle. And I believe that the strong gales within the Antarctic circle generally are local and that these snow bared dark pronmontories are the very homes of the Antarctic gales, while those places where no dark land is to be seen probably are unmolested by great atmospheric disturbances and are therefore covered in heavy snow. From time to time in the pack ice I have passed through distances where the ice was covered in several yards of loose snow. This I noticed as well on my first voyage in 1894 as during my last expedition. I will therefore use the opportiffiity to warn the coming expeditions from not providing against the difficulties which a very heavy snow fall incurs for sledge parties within the Antarctic circle.
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BORCHGREVINK, C. Snow Conditions in the Antarctic. Nature 64, 257 (1901). https://doi.org/10.1038/064257b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/064257b0
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