Edisto (AGB 2) - Naval Cruise Book

Page 60 text:

n f the liberzgf eclooppefs lm! rzm . While the unloading of VICTORY pro- ceeded with the aid of three section twelve- hour working parties from the crew of EDISTO, other activities were taking place off Hut Point. In addition to the cargo for McMurdo we had embarked several civilian scientists and private company engineers at Lyttleton who would take part in what was termed Operation THAW. Their project stemmed from a dis- covery some years ago that water in con- tinuous motion has a tendency to undermine and wear away ice formations. With the aid . . and two who never made it of subersible pumps, rotor blades, and diesel generators the men began with two small holes in the ice and day by day say those holes become larger and larger until they reached a diameter of almost fifty feet- Some of us scoffed at the idea from the first but after remarkable progress was made We all began to feel somewhat like a horse watching a new-fangled Ford machine chug bv. The engineers, characteristically OP' timistic, predicted that within a few yea1'S the device would make icebreakers obsolete- That idea cheered the whole crew and WC wished them well in theiriefforts.

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- . . . there are days in the pack when the wind howls 'through the rigging and the ship is motionless because the ice damps the sea, snow drifts horizontally before the gale, and there is the feeling of being alone in a past white sepulcher. there is no such isolation elsewhere in the world. nothing within hundreds of miles but ice and sea and the lifving sea is shut off by the white plain that vanishes a few yards beyond the side of the ship. man is helpless. he can only wait, wait for the storm to end, for the ice to open, to let him mofve again as a sentinent thing toward his goal. . . - Russell Owen

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31 january arrived with high winds and driving snow, forcing suspension of cargo operations. The Winds increased in ferocity and one by one the VICTORY's dead men pulled out of the ice under the strain. EDISTO came along side to help but it was decided that both ships should ride out the storm by nosing into the ice and keeping as many turns on the shafts as necessary to prevent drifting. ...I