tenth to three-tenths coverage, and a vessel could have made the 

 passage through the strait by hugging the Labrador coast. A 

 ship was beset on this date, however, in a rather compact field 

 which extended from Cape Norman and Cape Bauld on the New- 

 foundland coast to within 4 miles of the north side of the strait. 

 By the 20th the main pack had receded beyond latitude 52°40' N., 

 but a detached field still persisted in the Strait of Belle Isle. This 

 ice extended from the north shore to within 3 miles of the south 

 shore between the longitudes of 56°10' W., and 56°40' W., and a 

 few strings extended through the strait past 57° 10' W. Several 

 ships were held up in Forteau Bay waiting for the ice to clear, 

 which apparently happened in the next few days. By the end of 

 June no field ice was left south of 53° N., and the passage into 

 Hamilton Inlet and Lake Melville had opened. The first major 

 vessels of the season reached Goose Bay on the 29th. 



Fog blanketed most of the Grand Banks area throughout June, 

 and to such an extent that it was possible to get only one flight 

 under good visibility conditions to the Tail of the Banks near 

 42°30' N., 50° 00' W. Combining the sightings of bergs on the 

 9th and 10th and eliminating the probable duplications there were 

 60 bergs south of the 48th parallel at that time. About half of 

 this number were in bays or grounded along the east and south 

 coasts of the Avalon Peninsula. On the 20th 21 bergs were 

 sighted within 25 miles of the Avalon coast with 14 of this num- 

 ber in bays or within 3 miles of the beach. At this time there 

 were about 40 others south of 50° N., that were far enough off 

 shore to indicate a probable drift south past 48° N. Approxi- 

 mately 140 bergs were reported sighted south of 48° N., during 

 the month, but there are many duplications in this number. A 

 minimum of 100 bergs are estimated to have drifted to that area 

 in June. 



From the 48th parallel north to the pack the numbers of bergs 

 and growlers increased. Many of these grounded along New- 

 foundland's irregular coast or were trapped in the bays, mostly 

 from Trinity Bay through Notre Dame Bay. The berg reports 

 of the 9th and 20th (please refer to the table of ice reports) are 

 representative of the conditions existing during June. On the 

 9th 1,074 bergs were sighted from 53° N., south past Cape Race. 

 Of these 1,027 were north of the 48th and 737 north of the 50th 

 parallels respectively. It was practicable to plot the individual 

 positions of about half the bergs only, but the others were spotted 

 by groups in rather definite areas, so that a rough break-down 

 could be made of the distribution in rectangles of 1 degree of 

 latitude by 1 degree of longitude. The actual number of bergs 

 is far greater than those recorded, however, as it was not possible 

 to adequately cover the -entire area. The bergs were of all sizes 



55 



