48 



of 3,500 feet, and began one of the principal tasks of the expedition: 

 photographing these little-known Arctic lands by means of aerial 

 mapping cameras. In the brief space of three hours an area was 

 mapped equivalent in work to that of four summers by a ground 

 surveying party. In 10 hours, by similar means, a survey of the 

 entire glacier front of west Greenland could be accomplished. 



At midnight, July 27-28, we rounded Cape Fligely, Crown Prince 

 Rudolf Island, the northern extremity of Franz Josef Land. Even 

 here a narrow shore lead was visible, supporting the statement that 

 the sea was very open in the northeastern North Atlantic sector the 

 summer of 1931. At this point of the flight, the Graj Zeppelin 

 approached the nearest that she ever has to the North Pole. The 

 wind was light and the weather settled, so that in eight hours we could 

 easily have arrived at the pole itself. Such an excursion, aside from 

 its spectacular features, would have yielded valuable observations on 

 the state and character of the great ice cover of the Arctic Ocean. 

 This enormous field, which fills the Arctic Basin, is arranged in the 

 general form of concentric belts, viz, an outer fringe of fast ice; an 

 intermediate ring of pack ice; and lastly, a huge central region of 

 polar cap ice. An aerial photographic record of this cover, from the 

 outer fringe to the pole itself, would furnish a radial cross-section of 

 great scientific interest and value. Ecjuipped as the Graf Zeppelin 

 was with modern mapping cameras, placed her in a position of 

 marked advantage over previous expeditions. For that reason alone 

 it is to be regretted that the pole was not included in the itinerary. 



Looking eastward as well as northward from a height of 3,000 feet 

 near Crown Prince Rudolf Island, few polynyas of size sufficient to 

 arrest the eye were present. The pack, on the other hand, did not 

 appear to be tightly pressed together, but seemed to have suffered 

 general disintegration from the warmth of the summer's sun. De- 

 terioration was visible, in fact, over practically all of the sea ice we 

 cruised. Practically all of the ice, from the smallest glagon to the 

 largest floe, presented an upper surface intricately figured and 

 mottled, where the darker colored water lay outlined against the 

 white background of the ice. 



The cruise, embracing as it did only the frontier region of the 

 Arctic, and occurring as it did in midsummer, provided a place and 

 time best to observe the processes of sea ice disintegration. The 

 ever-changing plan view of the pack, as we proceeded from place to 

 place, was the most striking aspect of the ice observations. The 

 relative amounts of ice and water, as shown by conditions below, 

 considered in conjunction with the kind of water, salt or fresh, told 

 an interesting story of melting and dissipation. The great increase 

 in solar radiation during summer, especially in this border zone, is 

 the initial step in the processes of melting down the snow and fresh 



