Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey Research Articles

Acclimatization to Cold in the Antarctic

DURING a year spent as medical officer to the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey in the Antarctic at Marguerite Bay, I had the opportunity of making some observations on cold acclimatization in eleven men.

Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey

The Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey has recently acquired a vessel to enable it to carry out its expanding field of work in the Antarctic. The ship, which was named John Biscoe by Mrs. Creech Jones, wife of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, on December 16, has a double-skin wooden hull and a displacement of 1,015 tons; she is driven by Diesel-electric power. She carries a crew of twenty-five, and is to take a relief party in the summer to replace about half the party at present occupying the seven observation stations maintained by the Survey in the Antarctic. The new party will carry out geological, meteorological and zoological investigations, and is under the leadership of Dr. V. E. Fuchs, a geologist who has had experience of exploration in East Greenland and in East Africa. The John Briscoe has been named memory of the discoverer of the southern part of Graham Land. The Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey (see Nature, March 22, p. 388) was set up under the control of the Colonial Office after the War to take over from the Admiralty the meteorological stations established in the Antarctic in 1943.

The Sledge Dogs of the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, 1945–46

In early 1945, having had no previous experience of dogs or dog-driving, I was given charge of twenty-five huskies at the Hope Bay base of the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey. These dogs were purchased in Labrador by Surg.-Cdr. E. W. Bingham, R.N., and Capt. N. B. Marshall in the autumn of 1944, and were transported to the Antarctic via England. Every man develops his own methods and personal preferences for animal management, and there is a welter of conflicting advice and testimony. In such circumstances it is best for the absolute novice to select the system of one acknowledged expert and adhere to it rigidly.

The Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, 1946–47

In July 1945, the Secretary of State for the Colonies appointed me leader of the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey for two years, an appointment which brought a prospect of a free existence in the wide open spaces as compared with routine office life. I soon found this prospect fading over the horizon. For months I was tied to an office, early and late, surrounded by scores of papers, insistent questioners and a ceaseless telephone bell. All this was necessary before the stores were ordered, packed and dispatched and the staff appointed.