The Boston was wallowing helplessly in the heavy ocean swells as Smith and Arnold in the Chicago disappeared in the mist toward Horna Fjord. Wade and Ogden wondered if they would ever see their fellow fliers again.
Wade had made a smooth landing but soon realized how extremely fortunate he was. The sea was running at cross-direction from the wind and the ocean had looked fairly smooth at five hundred feet. But after he touched down, he found it so rough that the left pontoon nearly wrapped itself around the lower wing and snapped two of the vertical wires attached to the upper wing. The oil pump failure meant that no repairs could be made at sea without a replacement and there was no spare on board. Even if it were replaced, the left wing would probably crumple if he attempted a takeoff. Wade describes what happened next:
The first thing we did, after Smith and Arnold left, was to fasten the anchor to the bridle and heave it overboard. We hadn’t been bobbing up and down on the waves for many minutes before we discovered what a nasty business it is to be in midocean on a fragile plane with the waves hitting her at right angles. Soon we both grew dizzy. But we realized that unless the vertical wires were repaired, the ship might not ride out the sea until help arrived. So we managed to crawl onto the wing and get them fixed. Then, climbing back into our cockpits, we settled down for a little rest.1
The two hapless airmen had landed just before 11 A.M., and knowing the approximate positions of the Richmond and Billingsley, thought it would be late afternoon before they could be located. The sea began to surge, twisting the plane around with the wind. Although both men were confident that they would be rescued soon, they gradually realized that they were mere specks in the middle of a vast ocean where few ships traveled. If the pontoons were damaged by the waves, the plane would sink and they would never be able to survive; they’d die within a few minutes from hypothermia. Never in their lives had either of them felt so lonesome, so helpless. A light rain developed and the wind increased making the sea become dangerously choppy. It looked as though the wings would buckle under as they dipped into the water from side to side.
We settled ourselves in our cockpits and waited, rationing our water and food in case fog came and complicated our rescue [Wade recalled]. About 2 P.M., I sighted smoke on the horizon. I mounted the wing and began waving a sheet of canvas while Hank shot off the Very pistol. The ship didn’t see us.
A light but steady rain was falling and we were really feeling the cold. I’ll never forget my feeling of isolation and helplessness. It seemed like hours went by and nothing improved. Instead a growing wind foamed the sea and it looked like we might drift to God knows where.
Finally we sighted another ship. We were determined not to go unseen again. We rigged up a flag-type signaling device and Hank balanced on the wing waving furiously. We were in luck. The ship was crossing in front of us. I got our flares and the rifle, hoping the ping of a bullet hitting the bow would attract their attention. At last they spotted us and turned our way. It was a trawler and it reached us at 3:30 P.M. Our 4½ hour ordeal had seemed twice that long.2
The trawler was the Rugby-Ramsey, a British fishing boat whose captain had decided that day to look for a catch in that area. When it was within hailing distance, he shouted, “What can we do for you?”
“Just throw us a towline,” Wade answered, hoping the boat could tow them to the Faeroe Islands. Wade tried to give the captain directions for getting a line to the plane but the wind howled so much that his words were lost. After one futile attempt, in which the ship and plane almost collided, a sailor attached the towline to a float that he had thrown overboard and the trawler went around in a circle so Ogden could fish it out of the water and fasten it to the plane.
Wade and Ogden sat in their cockpits while the trawler tried to keep the towline taught. Yet each time the trawler arose on a wave she would seem to stand still, and at these moments the Boston would swing around and head into the wind; then when the trawler would drop off from the crest of the wave, the Boston would quiver and groan and get a jerk that would almost shake her to pieces. More than once the pontoons were yanked down under the swells. Finding that she wasn’t making any headway, the trawler stood by and awaited the arrival of one of the destroyers.
The Billingsley arrived alongside and a sailor tossed out a line. Ogden cast the trawler’s towline adrift and picked up the destroyer’s line. A few minutes later, the Richmond arrived and the line was passed to the larger ship. The Boston was drawn alongside and Wade and Ogden drained the water, gasoline, and oil out of the tanks to lighten the plane. They quickly removed everything that was loose in the plane, including baggage, tools, and spare parts while sailors tried to make emergency patches on the broken pontoons with fabric and glue. Wade thought they might disassemble the plane by taking off the wings and then hoist the fuselage onto the Richmond’s deck where they could make repairs. But the wind increased in violence and soon it became impossible to stay on the bobbing plane. Wade and Ogden hurriedly climbed from the plane to the ship. Struggling to follow them, one of the sailors fell overboard but two of his shipmates grabbed him before he was violently swept away.
A sling was then dropped down from the ship’s crane; a sailor put it under the plane at its center of gravity and the plane was slowly lifted toward the ship’s deck. Suddenly, as the plane was about three feet in the air, the ship rolled suddenly, dropping the five-ton boom on top of the plane with a thunderous crash. Three compartments of the left pontoon were punctured, the propeller was broken, and holes were punched in the center section and upper left wing.
“There seemed to be three possible solutions to the situation at this point,” according to the official report of the incident: “First, to keep the plane afloat in the lee until after the storm subsided; second, to disassemble the plane and save the fuselage; and third, to attempt towing again. The first decision was to try the first solution and while the pontoon was being repaired, the plane was stripped and work was rushed to repair the boom. This was soon abandoned due to the continued increasing intensity of the storm. The third plan of towing was then resorted to and the plane rode through the night, suffering greatly, however, from the rough sea.”3
As the Richmond turned toward the Faeroes with the crippled Boston in tow, the two fliers walked to the stern of the ship and watched it wallow helplessly in the waves. At midnight, Wade sent a radiogram to Smith via the Raleigh at Horna Fjord telling of the damage and that the Boston was being towed to the Faeroes for repairs and a new engine. He and Ogden then sat on the pitching stern of the ship, drinking hot coffee, to keep an eye on the machine that had taken them this far. They stayed until almost midnight, then thinking it would survive the towing, turned in. They took a last look at the plane wallowing in the destroyer’s wake before going to sleep.
Shortly after 5 A.M. Wade was awakened for a talk with Capt. Lyman Cotton. The Boston’s front spreader bar had collapsed and allowed the pontoons to squeeze together. Cotton told Wade that his charts of the coast were not reliable enough to maintain a safe speed for quick maneuvering while towing the plane in that condition. He said there was a possibility that the ship could be wrecked on the rocks if the plane was not cut loose.
Fearing that this might happen, Wade and Ogden had left all the filler caps of the water, gas, and oil tanks open so they would fill with sea water and help the plane to sink instead of drifting, thus possibly becoming a menace to shipping. Yet it still might drift for hours so the decision to deliberately sink it was left up to Wade. “The hardest words I have ever had to speak to the ship’s captain were: ‘Abandon the airplane.’ ”4
The plane was pulled alongside and sailors went down the ropes with axes to hack holes in the wooden pontoons, then came back aboard, and cut the tow lines. As the Boston slowly began to capsize, the two fliers saluted and said goodby to the faithful machine that had carried them so far around the globe. They headed for Reykjavik aboard the Richmond with heavy hearts. Wade radioed the bad news to Smith and Nelson at Horna Fjord:
PLANE TOTAL LOSS RICHMOND SAILING REYKJAVIK TO ARRIVE EARLY AFTERNOON TUESDAY 0530 WADE
After Wade’s message was received, there was little joy in Horna Fjord. Such an accident could have happened to any of them. The engine failure was probably due to a sheared off drive shaft to the oil pump. Unlike the fuel pump, there was no emergency hand pump to keep oil circulating to the engine. It was a new engine that Wade and Ogden had installed themselves at the Blackburn factory. The luck of the draw had been against them.
“We were all torn between two emotions,” Arnold wrote in his diary, “one of relief that Wade and Ogden were safe, and the other of sorrow that after coming 20,000 miles they should so suddenly lose their plane through absolutely no fault of theirs.”5
Realizing the disappointment that Wade and Ogden shared, General Patrick directed that the prototype Cruiser that was still at Langley Field, Virginia, be put in good condition on floats and sent to Pictou Harbor, Maine, one of the scheduled stops north of Boston, or to Hawkes Bay, Newfoundland, and await the other planes there. Wade and Ogden would then fly with the others to Boston and across the United States to Seattle.6 Maj. John F. Pirie and Capt. Willis Hale and two mechanics were ordered to transport the Cruiser’s set of wheels and fittings in two Martin bombers to Boston to replace the pontoons. Two other unnamed mechanics familiar with the Cruisers were also to proceed to Boston to assist the three crews in the final change from the pontoons to wheels.7
Smith, Arnold, Nelson, and Harding at Horna Fjord made plans immediately to continue the planned itinerary. Lieutenant Crumrine, the advance officer, had rented a fisherman’s cottage for the fliers and stocked it with blankets and food. The Raleigh, anchored twenty-five miles offshore because of the shallow harbor, had sent sailors to stay with them, cook their meals, help refuel and guard the planes, and establish a radio station. On the night of 4 August, they were entertained with Danish songs by the six daughters of a Mr. Danielson, all dressed in native Icelandic costumes. Still, gloom hung over the evening as the Americans thought about the loss of the Boston.
At midmorning, 5 August, the two remaining planes departed for Reykjavik, a 290-mile trip, against a stiff head wind. The harbor at Horna Fjord was very shallow, and it was difficult to find an area long enough for the takeoff.
They followed the coast where very few safe landing harbors could be seen. They passed many glaciers running down toward the sea and saw the hulks of ships wrecked in years past. As they mused about that, the engine of the New Orleans suddenly began to run rough and the oil pressure dropped from sixty psi to twenty-seven. Nelson decided the better course of action was to continue rather than attempt a landing along the rocky Icelandic coast.
They passed the Billingsley at Portland Point and unexpectedly ran into several severe dust storms, a rare phenomenon in the Arctic, until they reached the narrowest point of the peninsula on the southwest end of Iceland. They crossed it and headed directly for Reykjavik. When they arrived at the Reykjavik harbor at 2:15, there were many boats inside a breakwater to escape the wind-whipped seas outside. Buoys had been placed in a sheltered area and Nelson and Smith were able to land close to them and tie up without difficulty.
The four fliers were surprised to see about 25,000 cheering people waiting to greet them onshore. Just as the launch was taking them in, the Richmond arrived and whistled a greeting. Wade and Ogden soon joined the others on the dock. Wade greeted Smith with a bear hug and there were tears in his eyes. The others knew how he and Ogden must have felt after surviving what they had all been through so far and then suddenly to end the flight so ingloriously. A mechanical failure of a vital part attached to the engine had finished the trip for them. Yet they knew that the same fate could have forced Nelson and Harding down had their engine failed.
Smith sent a radio message to General Patrick and reported that Wade and Ogden were there on the Richmond and requested that “the old Douglas” be sent to Boston with the World Flight insignia and the number 3 painted on it, and thus allow them to continue the rest of the trip.8
Lieutenant Crumrine met the fliers and confirmed previous reports that Lt. LeClaire Schulze was on board the Gertrud Rask, a Danish ship, which was taking supplies for them to Angmagssalik, Greenland, the next stop. He reported that ice was blocking the harbor there and the ship was unable to reach the town dock. Smith and the others were not discouraged because records maintained for the previous twenty years gave the average date for Angmagssalik harbor to be ice-free was 15 August, ten days later.
Contingency plans had to be made. Admiral Magruder and Smith decided to have the Raleigh, with two seaplanes aboard, make scouting forays to see if there were any other harbors so that Angmagssalik could be bypassed, or if it was possible to find a harbor where the planes would just refuel from a ship and continue. Wade went aboard, made two flights, and confirmed that the harbors were filled with icebergs; landings would be impossible. Schulze aboard the Gertrud Rask was also asked to scout nearby harbors as best he could on the ship. While they awaited word that the harbor at Angmagssalik was clear, the crews were entertained, along with Admiral Magruder and his staff, at a luncheon by Iceland’s prime minister. They were embarrassed that they had only their flying clothes to wear, a distinct contrast to the naval officers in their full-dress uniforms.
The fliers enjoyed the hospitality of the Icelanders for the next two weeks. The prime minister offered them his residence but they elected to stay in a hotel near the beach where they could watch their planes and be ready to depart on short notice. Within a short time, there were five American battleships in the harbor with a total of 2,500 sailors and some newspaper reporters on board. According to the townspeople, it was the first time that any American warships had ever visited them.
The fliers were surprised to find that Reykjavik was a modern city with well-paved streets, electric lights, excellent hotels, banks, shops, cafés, taxis, and even motion pictures. And the Icelanders could speak English! They were especially pleased to see the beautiful blond-haired, blue-eyed girls. Since Nelson could speak Swedish and Danish, his hosts were delighted that a Scandinavian was represented among the fliers.
On 6 August, the fliers were invited to a buffet and dance aboard the Richmond with many of the townspeople attending. It was the Billingsley’s turn to entertain the next evening with a dinner. Then it was the Reed’s turn to meet them and serve dinner. The next several days were spent seeing the Great Geyser and the hot springs over which Reykjavik is situated.
But there was still work to be done. The planes had remained in the harbor and had not been brought ashore because of high winds until the eighth of August. The hauling operation up the launching ramp brought a great crowd out to see the planes and, as had happened many times before, the police had to be called out to protect them from souvenir hunters and allow the men to work. Engine repairs were made on the New Orleans and a new propeller was installed.
During the two weeks they were in Reykjavik, a forty-foot boat named the Leif Ericsson arrived with four men aboard. They were attempting to duplicate the route of Eric the Red, the famous Norseman, on his Atlantic crossing to the North American continent around the year 1000. The fliers enjoyed hearing about their experiences and went to the dock to see them off to continue their journey to America. They were reported later as having reached Greenland but were never heard from again.
The Gertrud Rask meantime waited ten miles off the harbor at Angmagssalik. The ice was so heavy that even a ship that was constructed for navigation in the ice fields could not force her way through the belt of floe ice. She was pinned fast for days and slowly drifted southward away from the destination. Suddenly when the ship was seventy miles south of Angmagsalik, the ice opened up. The amount of ice floes still in the harbor worried Schulze and he decided to place the plane moorings about fifteen miles north of the settlement where there was less floating ice.
While Schulze worried about whether there would be enough room for the Cruisers to take off safely if they landed at Angmagssalik, Clayton Bissell aboard the Milwaukee had succeeded in establishing a base at Frederiksdal on the southwest tip of Greenland. The Danish steamer Danepy had already transferred the necessary spares and fuel supplies to the Milwaukee at Ivigtut. The Danish warship Island Falk joined the Milwaukee to lend assistance. On 11 August, the light cruiser Raleigh sent two observation planes on several reconnaissance flights to locate suitable emergency landing areas. Wade transferred from the Richmond to the Raleigh and volunteered to lend another pair of eyes to the search for open water. He flew with Cmdr. Bruce G. Leighton. They didn’t see anything except “horrible weather and lots of ice.” When they did find a suitable harbor “it was filled with icebergs, some over a hundred feet high.”9
Smith received some information that disturbed him during this frustrating period of waiting for decent weather and better ice conditions. He heard that a rumor was circulating among the newsmen that the Americans were going to abandon the flight. Fearing that this speculation would get to Washington, he sent a radiogram to General Patrick reassuring him that if Angmagssalik did not open soon, they were going to fly directly to Frederiksdal where an emergency base was being established. He noted that there were two other options but he did not say which he preferred: a refueling at sea or putting wheels on the planes and flying directly to Labrador.10 This rumor which implied that the Americans were afraid to tackle the next leg–-the longest and most dangerous of all—made Smith and the others even more anxious to continue. They visited the radio station frequently to read the hourly weather reports from the Gertrud Rask. Smith increasingly favored the long flight 830-mile flight to Frederiksdal if Angmagssalik continued to be closed for safe landing. They inspected their planes thoroughly and knew the risk they were taking. More fuel would have to be carried so the total weight was reduced considerably by discarding many tools and even their spare clothes. The items removed were placed aboard the Richmond which would meet them eventually in Labrador.
On 11 August, an Italian naval officer named Marescalchi, an advance agent for Lt. Antonio Locatelli, arrived in Horna Fjord. As had been expected from General Patrick’s radiogram, he announced proudly that Locatelli, Lt. Tullio Crozio, and two mechanics, Bruno Fulcinelli and Giovonni Braccine, were proceeding westbound in their German-designed, Italian-made Dornier Wal (Whale) twin-engine seaplane. They had left Pisa on 25 July, landed in Swiss lakes as they traversed the Alps, followed the Rhine River to Rotterdam, then flew to Brough. They stopped at Stromness and the Faeroe Islands and planned to join the Americans at Reykjavik. Maresalchi said that when Locatelli arrived at Reykjavik, he would request cooperation from the Americans and accompany them to North America. This was denied.
Locatelli arrived on 16 August. He was not pleased about the agreement between the two governments that prohibited him from flying with the Americans if he chose to do so. He asked Smith if he could accompany the Cruisers across the rest of the North Atlantic. Smith and Nelson conferred and realized that it would probably be mutually helpful by providing an added rescue capability if Locatelli were with them, in view of what had happened to Wade and Ogden. Smith wired Washington requesting authority for this from General Patrick and it was granted on 18 August 1924.
The Americans were impressed with the Dornier’s streamlined construction, 74-foot wing span, and especially its tough metal hull made of duralumin. It was a Type J Dornier which was large enough to carry nine passengers but as many as fourteen could be crowded in for short distances. It was much heavier than the Cruisers and faster. Its two Rolls Royce engines, mounted in tandem, gave it added safety in case of failure of one. Arnold commented that “It appeared to be the most efficient plane for long-distance flying that we had ever seen, and Lieutenants Locatelli and Crozio and their two assistants were dashing fellows.”11
Everyone involved in the American World Flight was getting anxious for the two Cruisers to depart, especially the bored news correspondents traveling on the Navy ships. The weather experts studying the route reported that fogs were prevalent along the coast of Iceland and rolled into the area without warning. The Danish government advised that the ice conditions were worse in 1924 than they had been in many years. Many icebergs had been sighted between Iceland and Greenland that were larger than normal and drift ice was found more than a hundred miles south of the course between the two land masses.
The weather remained stormy with gale winds and the news from Schulze in the Gertrud Rask continued to be discouraging. On 12 August, Wade was flying as an observer with Commander Leighton again from the Raleigh when they spotted the Danish cutter in an ice-free cove near Angmagssalik and Leighton prepared to land nearby. Unknown to them, the crew of the Gertrud Rask had attached steel cables from her bow to abutments on shore. Wade tells what happened:
We were making an approach across the cutter’s bow to an area of clear water. A few feet above the water I spotted the cables. I shouted to Leighton while pounding on the fuselage with one hand and pointing with the other. Leighton gunned the engine … there were only inches between life and a dunking in freezing water.12
Leighton hopped over the cables, landed, and taxied back to the Rask. A message was waiting for them from the Raleigh: RETURN IMMEDIATELY FOG. Leighton made a quick takeoff and climbed to 12,000 feet to begin looking for the ship. He landed, the plane was hoisted aboard, and by the time it was stowed on deck, the fog was so thick they could not see either the bow or the stern from the center of the ship.
After thirteen days of waiting, all hope was abandoned that the iced harbor at Angmagssalik, the most inaccessible point on the entire crossing, would clear in a reasonable time before the first freeze. Smith conferred with Admiral Magruder and decided they would instead make the nonstop flight from Reykjavik directly to Frederiksdal where Bissell had now readied the emergency base. The new routing would add an additional 335 miles over ocean and ice fields but seemed to be the only feasible course to avoid the closed harbors. It was the most dangerous leg of all because it was far north of the steamship routes across the Atlantic and on the edge of the Arctic fogs. Extremely high winds swept down from the Greenland ice cap.
On 18 August, the four fliers were up before dawn and in their planes waiting for favorable weather reports. Good news arrived at 10 A.M. and the two Cruisers, more heavily loaded with fuel than ever before, taxied to the outer harbor for takeoff, followed by Locatelli and his crew of three in the Dornier. There were heavy swells and very little wind. As they lined up for takeoff, a large wave suddenly swept over the New Orleans and shattered its propeller. At the same time, another large roller smashed into the Chicago and sheared off the front pontoon spreader bar at the nose fittings. Both planes had to be towed back to the dock for repairs. Seeing what had happened, Locatelli turned the Dornier around, tied up at a buoy, and the crew came ashore. Ironically, Schulze reported at that time that the harbor at Angmagssalik was now cleared of ice. If they had been headed there, they could have carried a much smaller load of gas and, being much lighter, could have probably been able to take off without damage.
All the excess supplies and spare parts for the Cruisers had been put aboard the Richmond to be returned to the States and it had steamed off to take up a position near Greenland. Admiral Magruder immediately ordered the ship’s skipper, Capt. Lyman A. Cotton, to return to Reykjavik where it docked on 20 August. Since there were seventeen hours of daylight at this latitude, the crews were able to work most of the night and both planes were ready by early morning. They took off for Frederiksdal at 6:55 A.M. on 21 August, followed by the Italian plane.
The planes leveled off and Locatelli tried to fly formation but the Dornier was so much faster that Locatelli had to circle a few times to allow the Cruisers to catch up. The impetuous Italian soon grew impatient. He wagged his wings in farewell and forged ahead. He was out of sight in the mist in a few minutes.
There were five naval vessels patrolling the line of flight that Smith and Nelson intended to follow. Captain Cotton on the Richmond described this 835-mile leg from Iceland to Greenland as “the longest and most difficult leg of the transatlantic flight … and [it] was truly a flight to test the skill and courage of the hardiest aviator.”13
They passed the Richmond ninety miles from Reykjavik; then flew over the Reid 115 miles farther. At about the 140-mile mark beyond that ship, the planes were checked out by the Billingsley. According to the plan approved by Magruder, this was the last time they would see the Billingsley so they flew low overhead and waved to the sailors in thanks for their help. They were cheered to find that the ship’s crew had painted in huge letters the words GOOD LUCK in white paint on the open deck. It was an encouraging sight. They would remember this moment forever.
After the next 140 miles or so, they came upon the destroyer Barry. Wade and Ogden were aboard and would be taken to Pictou, Nova Scotia, once the Cruisers had passed and assuming no search was required. The ship was displaying two flags from its mast, the signal that dangerous weather lay ahead. In a few minutes after passing the Barry, they ran into heavy fog but continued on course. As so many times before, the planes were forced to fly close to the wave tops in the limited visibility.
The Raleigh was 160 miles farther on from the Barry and they never saw it. Estimating the distance from the Greenland coast at about 150 miles, Smith swung to a course toward the shore barely on top of huge waves, hoping that the fog would be lighter close to the land. Seventy-five miles before the coast was reached, the flight began to encounter large icebergs and winds estimated at about sixty mph. The combination of fog, the many icebergs of all sizes, and the rocky coast made the flying extremely dangerous. Just before rounding Cape Farewell, the two planes lost sight of each other and separated.
Smith admitted he was terrified as they played tag and leap-frog with the towering icebergs because they could not see them until they were upon them:
The presence of all these bergs and so much ice made the fog even more dense than before. We were traveling along at a speed of ninety miles an hour, and could see only between a hundred and a hundred and fifty feet ahead, so use your own imagination as to how soon a plane traveling at that speed could use up the distance that we could see, and then try and figure out how little time was left us to sight a berg ahead, decide which way to turn, and then execute the maneuver. Three times we came so suddenly upon huge icebergs that there was no time left to do any deciding. We simply jerked the wheel back for a quick climb, and were lucky enough to zoom over the top of it into the still denser fog above. Here we were completely lost and unable to see beyond the prop and wing tips. Blindly, we would grope and feel our way downward, hoping against hope that the little space we should eventually descend into just above the surface of the water would be clear of ice for a great enough distance to enable us to glance around, size up the situation, and get set for dodging the next one.14
After the flight, Smith and Nelson were often asked why they didn’t climb above the fog. They both did try but the fog apparently had no limit and with the extra load of fuel and oil they were carrying, they could climb no higher than 8,000 feet. The mountains along the Greenland coast were known to be eight to ten thousand feet high and they could easily have flown into them as Martin had done in Alaska. Smith decided the better part of valor was to stay low, inches above the water, and take their chances: He describes their near-miss with death:
Diving through a small patch of extra heavy fog that was clinging close to the water, we emerged on the other side to find ourselves plunging straight toward a wall of white. The New Orleans was close behind us with that huge berg looming in front. I banked steeply to the right while Erik and Jack swung sharp to the left. Les shouted, “Hold on, God!” and I’m sure I did some rapid praying myself. Both left wings seemed to graze the edge of the berg as we shot past it. And in far less time than it takes to tell it the two planes were lost from each other.15
Smith headed the Chicago in toward shore while Nelson turned out to sea for about thirty miles before swinging back on course. Neither saw the other and neither knew whether or not the other had crashed into that iceberg. Each had to continue dodging bergs, ghostlike shadows and then, suddenly, dark patches that were the sides of mountains; this meant they had reached the mainland of Greenland and could follow the coastline. They each flew a compass course toward Frederiksdal while keeping as close to shore as they dared. They broke out of the fog briefly into bright sunlight, only to plunge back into a layer of fog that topped out at 1,500 feet. Unable to get under it, they flew on top and had only distant mountain peaks to reassure them they were still on course toward their destination.
Finally, we arrived over where, according to our charts, we thought Frederiksdal ought to be, and watched anxiously for an opening in the clouds [Smith continued]. We circled around several times, and then the All-Wise Providence, who had already spared our lives a dozen times on this day’s journey, parted the clouds for us to see there was a shaft of light extending down to the sea. Far below we spied a boat emitting clouds of black smoke. We knew this must be the Danish coastguard cutter, the Island Falk, sending up smoke signals for us, because there was no other ship in these waters. Her guns were firing and her whistle was blowing, but, of course, we could hear nothing above the roar of our Liberty.16
Smith landed the Chicago in very rough water beside the ship at 5:30 in the afternoon. The Island Falk was anchored far out at the mouth of a large fjord and Smith had to taxi several miles to calmer waters upstream between the towering mountains to the tie-up buoys. He and Arnold were exhausted after ten hours and forty minutes in the cold, cramped cockpits. A launch came alongside and a Danish officer asked if they knew where the New Orleans and Locatelli were since no one had heard from either of them. Smith nodded negatively and replied that they had been lost in the fog and had no idea where they might be.
Fearing the worst for Nelson and Harding, Smith and Arnold said little to each other as they refueled and inspected their plane but each reflected mentally on how fortunate they were to escape what could have been a quick death from plunging into a berg or a rock outcropping. “We simply couldn’t see how anyone could be as lucky as we had been,” Smith said.17
Then suddenly, as they were finishing their servicing chores, the beautiful, familiar sound of a Liberty engine echoed across the harbor. Nelson and Harding in the New Orleans were circling above the fog layer looking for a break in the clouds just as the Chicago had done an hour before. They, too, found a hole in the low clouds, saw the Danish vessel, and glided down for a landing. As the plane was leveling off, however, it caught a pontoon on a large wave, slightly damaging it. Considering what they had also been through during their 11 hours, 17 minutes in the air, it was insignificant damage that could be easily repaired. The four men and two planes had survived this, the longest and most dangerous leg of the entire flight.
Nelson and Harding, after turning left and barely escaping the berg when Smith turned right, had flown south to escape the thickening icebergs near the coast. They looked for their leader when they rounded the tip of Greenland and feared he had crashed into a berg or a rock outcropping on the coast when they could not see the Chicago. It was a most welcome and joyful sight to see it sitting calmly at rest in the harbor.
The two exhausted crews went aboard the Island Falk and sent a radio message to the Richmond of their arrival. They willingly went to bed after a welcome dinner. They had been without sleep for about forty-two hours.
Now that the Americans were safe, the attention of all was focused on the whereabouts of Locatelli and his crew. The Dornier had not been sighted and it was quite possible that he and his three crew members could have crashed into one of the icebergs that the others had escaped. Admiral Magruder, with permission from Washington, ordered his ships to concentrate on searching for the Italian flying boat. All the vessels were ordered to patrol in a 12,000-square-mile area of an angry sea covered with floating cakes of ice. They spent the days and nights of 21 to 24 August conducting search patterns. The two cruisers each catapulted their two Vought UO-1 observation planes several times but the fog seriously hampered visibility and made it difficult for the planes to be launched and retrieved safely. By midnight of the twenty-third, some of the vessels were running short of fuel and the destroyers Billingsley and Reid were sent back to European ports for restocking. The Richmond, Raleigh, and Barry also would soon need refueling but for the moment continued the search.
From the time the first message was received that Locatelli was probably lost, the Danish administrator at Julianhåb immediately ordered two search parties of Greenlanders sent out on foot and with dog teams. They concentrated on likely spots along the coast and inland.
Captain Cotton, skipper of the Richmond, cruising about 125 miles east of Cape Farewell, Greenland, was about to recommend to the admiral that they abandon the search when a lookout saw a flicker of light on the horizon. Cotton colorfully describes what happened next:
The Richmond turns and speeds toward the spot, throbbing with her hundred-thousand horsepower. A red star, fired into the air, lights up our decks with lurid light, as officers, men, correspondents, and cameramen rush up on deck, half-clad, hair disheveled, with heavy overcoats and trailing blankets hastily thrown around them. An answering star from the darkness ahead. Can it be that the lost are found? Can it be? Our searchlight feels along the horizon, groping over the hostile sea that is loathe to surrender its prey. The light touches a small object, bobbing like a cork on the water. All eyes are strained toward the plane, through moments of tense silence. How slowly it seems to draw near! The beams of our searchlights catch it again as it rises to the crest of a breaker, and this time we see the red, white, and green rudder of the Italian monoplane. One, two, three, four—-the crew are all visible now. All are alive and safe!18
It was 11:35 P.M. when the Richmond sidled carefully up to the plane and one of the Richmond’s crewmen threw it a line. The line was, Locatelli told the press later, “like the first thread connecting us with life again.” They had almost given up hope as heavy waves and icebergs had battered and rammed the Dornier to near destruction. The ailerons, vertical stabilizer, and elevators were shattered and the engine mounts were bent. It probably would not have stayed afloat through the night; certainly it would never fly again.
Traumatized by their ordeal, Locatelli and his three crew-mates were so seasick and exhausted that they had to be lifted aboard the cruiser in cargo nets. Sailors punctured the plane’s gas tanks and hull and set it on fire so it wouldn’t become a hazard to shipping. The four Italian airmen watched soulfully as it sank out of sight. Locatelli turned toward Admiral Magruder and gratefully handed him an Italian flag as thanks for their rescue. When he looked at the ship’s navigation charts later he was told that the Dornier had drifted into an area that had already been searched. Had the Richmond’s lookout not seen their flares, no one would have ever known what had happened to them.
The airmen were fed and afterward Locatelli told their story to the assembled newspaper correspondents on board. When they ran into dense fog, he said he decided to land on the sea rather than fly at wave-top level and risk ramming into the towering icebergs or a mountain. He intended to take off when the fog cleared. But the heavy seas and floating ice damaged the plane so severely that takeoff would have been impossible. Locatelli was criticized in the press for leaving the Americans behind but Smith disagreed. “I think Locatelli did right in going ahead,” he said. “To have gone slower he would have had to use up more gas.”19
While this episode was unfolding, messages had been flowing back and forth between Washington and the Richmond. General Patrick decided that Wade and Ogden should be given the opportunity to resume the flight. He had ordered the prototype DWC to be flown on pontoons to Nova Scotia, where Wade and Ogden would meet the other fliers and continue with them to Seattle. The plane would be named the Boston II.
Smith and Nelson still had much dangerous flying ahead of them. They were preparing on 21 August for the next leg to Ivigtut, a small village and mining camp that the advance officers had made into a regular supply base one hundred and fifty miles farther up the west coast of Greenland. They were planning to depart when they found that the Chicago’s pontoons had been punctured. The men who had been posted to watch the planes during the night had allowed some cakes of ice to drift into them. While Nelson, Harding, and Arnold pumped the pontoons out, Smith took off his flying suit and dove into the icy water to apply temporary patches of canvas and sheet aluminum on the undersides. It was hard work and the others took turns to relieve Smith since only a few patches could be attached at a time. They rubbed their hands and arms vigorously with oil to overcome the numbness of the cold water.
It wasn’t until the twenty-fourth that good weather was reported at Ivigtut; Smith decided to take advantage of it even though it was raining and foggy at Frederiksdal. The two planes taxied out and dodged large cakes of ice to get airborne. During the first attempt to take off in rough water, the engine on the New Orleans cut out several times and Nelson made a quick landing in heavy swells. This damaged both vertical wing wires and caused the pontoon brace wires to loosen up. He and Harding tightened them while Smith waited to take off in the Chicago.
The two planes finally got off and flew for two hours along the frigid, dismal coast. The wind gradually increased to gale force and the airmen were reminded of the Aleutian williwaws as they were jolted and thrown about in their cockpits. Contrary to what they had been led to expect by the weather reports, they had to fly through freezing rain, snow, fog, and sleet before they sighted the Ivigtut harbor. They found it to be mercifully well-protected from the high winds and waves.
The village was at the head of a fjord surrounded by high, rugged mountains. Glaciers flowed down the mountainsides to the sea and huge ice chunks would “calve” or break off and come crashing down to separate and float out to the Davis Strait. Nelson noted that the area was the scene of the “last and barrenmost” of the emergency repair depots that were established.
Waiting in the harbor at Ivigtut was the Milwaukee and on board was Clayton Bissell who had been their advance officer for the Aleutian segments. They were as surprised and pleased as he was. Bissell was the last person they had seen in the Aleutians and the first person they met who had been with them previously on the flight. With his experience at Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians to guide him, Bissell had supervised the construction of excellent ramps on the beach so the planes could be pulled up out of the water and floating ice for easier maintenance. After their planes were towed up and tied down, the four fliers got in a launch and went aboard the Milwaukee to find that the entire crew had been called to the deck to give them a rousing welcome.
The village of Ivigtut consisted of a few men and women and about 150 Danish miners who extract cryolite from the hills during the summer months. Cryolite is a rare mineral consisting of sodium and aluminum fluoride used principally in the smelting of aluminum. Discovered in Greenland in 1794, it occurs almost nowhere else. The fliers found that the work was hard but the miners were provided with quarters, food, clothing, tobacco, and alcoholic beverages. Unable to spend their earnings in Greenland, they returned to Denmark in the fall with tidy earnings that allowed them to resume the good life until the next spring. The arrival of the Milwaukee and the World Fliers provided unequaled excitement in the form of a dinner for all the miners as guests of the ship’s crew, followed by a motion picture shown on deck in the rain.
The fliers went trout fishing one day and Smith was able to try a rod and line that had been given to him by a well-wisher before he left Seattle. He was delighted to catch forty trout in less than two hours and prepare them for his teammates.
A 560-mile risky flight over water now faced the two planes to get to Icy Tickle, Labrador, the last over-ocean leg of the flight. If they succeeded, they would be the first airmen to have flown westbound across the Pacific and the North Atlantic. The planes were carefully inspected. One of the Chicago’s pontoons that had been punctured during takeoff at Frederiksdal was repaired. Smith decided that since new engines were available at Ivigtut, they should replace the used ones as a safety precaution. The pontoons on the planes were revarnished and despite the fact that all work had to be done in the open, both planes were actually ready in three days because Smith wanted to delay no further if the weather cleared. Short test flights were made to check them out and both crews were ready to go on 28 August. This day happened to be Les Arnold’s birthday. Although the weather was reported better for flying all the way to Labrador, the U.S. Navy ships were just not in position along the route. The weather meantime deteriorated and did not break for the next four days.
In addition to the foul weather, the fliers met a new surprise enemy: billions of tiny, biting gnats that caused Nelson to describe as “the most troublesome brutes you ever saw—worse even than tropical insects. They flew into our eyes, and we had to talk with our lips shut, to keep them from swarming into our mouths. In fact, they were so bad that we finally couldn’t work at all until we got some netting draped over our heads and tied around our necks.”20
Smith had time to think during the many hours of waiting about what might be in store for them after they reached the North American continent. He felt they had already had their full share of welcomes, and it was the consensus that they all wanted to get to Seattle without any more delays for ceremonies, speeches, and parties. He asked Bissell to send a message to General Patrick requesting “that no entertainments, receptions, or escorts be arranged for them previous to the completion of the round world flight by arrival of planes on Pacific coast.”21
It was to be a fruitless appeal. They would be welcomed en route by literally thousands of people, all anxious to see and talk with the World Fliers, to hear about their adventures, and to touch their planes. The seemingly endless period of waiting at Ivigtut ended on 31 August when en route weather reports were favorable from Labrador, the Richmond, and the four destroyers—Coghlan, McFarland, Ausburne, and Lawrence—all standing by in their assigned positions along the route to Labrador. The Brazos, an oiler, was ordered to stand by at the Bay of Islands with fuel while the Milwaukee was to remain and report the flight’s departure from Ivigtut, then proceed to Icy Tickle, Labrador, and replace the Richmond that would be there to meet the planes. The fleet’s operations orders stipulated that searchlights for signals were to be used in thick weather, and flags and whistles otherwise when the planes passed.
Smith had difficulty getting off and it took two hours of taxiing to finally become airborne. Nelson, however, was able to use his wake and took off easily. When only about ten minutes from Ivigtut, they encountered heavy fog. Knowing there were many icebergs ahead, they carefully hugged the water until they broke out into the clear after about thirty minutes of flying.
The Chicago and New Orleans chugged along peacefully in bright sunshine. They were about two hundred miles from Labrador when they ran into head winds. Then “the cold hand of Failure suddenly tried to claw us down,” according to Smith. The Chicago’s motor-driven fuel pump suddenly failed; a few minutes later, the wind-driven pump clattered to a stop. Oil began leaking out of the engine nacelle and ran down the sides of the plane. Smith switched to the 58-gallon reserve fuel tank that had only enough fuel for about two hours of flying. Smith immediately throttled back and yelled to Arnold to start using the hand-operated wobble pump in his cockpit that boosted the fuel from the lower tanks into the gravity-feed reserve, allowing the engine to continue operating.
Arnold pumped furiously with his right arm, then when his arm grew numb after an hour or so, he made a sling with his belt, attached it to the hand pump, placed a handkerchief around his neck to relieve the chafing, and pumped with his other hand to keep up the steady beat. He was sweating profusely and every time he thought he would quit for a minute or so to rest and the engine would sputter. He looked down at the icy water below and continued to pump with renewed determination. He pumped for nearly three hours, knowing that remaining airborne was his sole responsibility.
But there were two more worrisome developments. The Chicago’s engine was losing oil and Nelson signaled from the New Orleans that they could see it streaming down the fuselage. There was no way to determine how much oil was left in the tank and how long the engine could run without it. Smith also found that the earth-inductor compass had ceased to operate. The sun’s position, however, enabled them to continue heading westward where land was certain to appear in time.
After what seemed a lifetime to both men, the faithful Richmond was sighted ahead sitting confidently in the calm bay at Indian Harbor. They knew they had reached North American soil. Smith and Nelson landed their ships in the bay off the tiny settlement of Icy Tickle at 3:20 P.M. while the ship blew its whistle in greeting. They had achieved a historic aviation “first” and soon were to be honored far beyond their wildest dreams.