The
Norge was a
semi-rigidSemi-rigid airships are airships with a partial framework. These often consist of a rigid, or occasionally, flexible, keel frame along the long axis under the aerodynamic hull envelope. The partial framework can also be located inside the hull...
ItalianItaly , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. Italy shares its northern, Alpine boundary with France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia...
-built
airshipAn airship or dirigible is a lighter-than-air aircraft that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust...
that carried out what many consider the first verified overflight of the
North PoleThe North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is, subject to the caveats explained below, defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets the Earth's surface...
on May 12, 1926. It was also the first aircraft to fly over the polar ice cap between
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
and
AmericaThe Americas, or America, are lands in the Western hemisphere or New World, comprising the continents of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions. America may be ambiguous in English, as it is more commonly used to refer to the United States of America...
. The expedition was the brainchild of polar explorer and expedition leader
Roald AmundsenRoald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912. He was also the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage...
, the airship's designer and pilot
Umberto NobileUmberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
and
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
explorer
Lincoln Ellsworth-Birth:Son of James Ellsworth and Eva Frances Butler, he was born in Chicago, Illinois. He also lived in Hudson, Ohio as a child.-Arctic/North Pole exploration:...
, who along with the Aero Club of
NorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a country in Northern Europe occupying the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, as well as Jan Mayen and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard under the Spitsbergen Treaty...
financed the trip.
Norge was the first N class
semi-rigid airshipSemi-rigid airships are airships with a partial framework. These often consist of a rigid, or occasionally, flexible, keel frame along the long axis under the aerodynamic hull envelope. The partial framework can also be located inside the hull...
designed by
Umberto NobileUmberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
and constructed starting 1923.
The
Norge was a
semi-rigidSemi-rigid airships are airships with a partial framework. These often consist of a rigid, or occasionally, flexible, keel frame along the long axis under the aerodynamic hull envelope. The partial framework can also be located inside the hull...
ItalianItaly , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. Italy shares its northern, Alpine boundary with France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia...
-built
airshipAn airship or dirigible is a lighter-than-air aircraft that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust...
that carried out what many consider the first verified overflight of the
North PoleThe North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is, subject to the caveats explained below, defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets the Earth's surface...
on May 12, 1926. It was also the first aircraft to fly over the polar ice cap between
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
and
AmericaThe Americas, or America, are lands in the Western hemisphere or New World, comprising the continents of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions. America may be ambiguous in English, as it is more commonly used to refer to the United States of America...
. The expedition was the brainchild of polar explorer and expedition leader
Roald AmundsenRoald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912. He was also the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage...
, the airship's designer and pilot
Umberto NobileUmberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
and
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
explorer
Lincoln Ellsworth-Birth:Son of James Ellsworth and Eva Frances Butler, he was born in Chicago, Illinois. He also lived in Hudson, Ohio as a child.-Arctic/North Pole exploration:...
, who along with the Aero Club of
NorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a country in Northern Europe occupying the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, as well as Jan Mayen and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard under the Spitsbergen Treaty...
financed the trip.
Specification and Design
Norge was the first N class
semi-rigid airshipSemi-rigid airships are airships with a partial framework. These often consist of a rigid, or occasionally, flexible, keel frame along the long axis under the aerodynamic hull envelope. The partial framework can also be located inside the hull...
designed by
Umberto NobileUmberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
and constructed starting 1923. As part of the contract to sell it as the Norge it was rebuilt for Arctic conditions. The pressurised envelope was reinforced by metal frames at the nose and tail, with a flexible tubular metal keel connecting the two. This was covered by fabric and used as storage and crew space. Three engine gondolas and the separate control cabin were attached to the bottom of the keel. Norge was the first Italian semirigid to be fitted with the cruciform tail fins first developed by the
Schütte-LanzSchütte-Lanz is the name of a series of rigid airships designed and built by the Luftschiffbau Schütte-Lanz company from 1909 until the last LS22 delivered in 1917. One research and four passenger airships were planned for post-war use, but never built...
company.
- Lifting gas: hydrogen
- First Flight: March 1924 as N-1; April 1926 as Norge
- Length: 106 m
- Diameter: 26 m
- Gas capacity: 19,000 m³
- Performance: 115 km/h
- Payload: 9,500 kg
- Engines: 3 Maybach
Maybach-Motorenbau GmbH is a German luxury car manufacturer. It was founded in 1909 by Wilhelm Maybach with his son Karl Maybach as director. The company was originally a subsidiary of Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH and was itself known as "Luftfahrzeug-Motoreinbau GmbH" until 1918...
total power of 780 Hp/582 kW
Polar Expedition
In 1925
AmundsenAmundsen may refer to:* Roald Amundsen, the Norwegian polar explorer, or his namesakes:** in the Antarctic:*** Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station*** Amundsen Glacier, descending from the Queen Maud Mountains to the Ross Ice Shelf....
telegrammed Nobile asking to meet him at Oslo, where he proposed an airship trip across the Arctic. Because Nobile knew the currently flying airship, the N-1, was too heavy for such a trip, he suggested the airship N. that was under construction. Amundsen insisted on being ready by 1926, so Nobile had to modify N-1 for long range and cold weather. The Norwegians then contracted to buy the N-1, renamed to
Norge, which Nobile would prepare.
On 29th March 1926, the ship was officially turned over to Amundsen and Ellsworth during a ceremony near Rome. The flight to the Artic started off from
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
almost two weeks later, delayed due to bad weather. The first leg ended at
LeningradSaint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city's other names were Petrograd and Leningrad...
after a 17 hour flight marred by bad weather, on 15th April. The ship then proceeded to
Vadsøis a city and municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The city is the administrative centre of the municipality and the county of Finnmark....
in northern Norway, where the airship mast is still standing today. The expedition then crossed the
Barents SeaThe Barents Sea is a part of the Arctic Ocean located north of Norway and Russia. It is a rather deep shelf sea , bordered by the shelf edge towards the Norwegian Sea in the west, the island of Svalbard in the northwest, and the islands of Franz Josef Land and Novaya Zemlya in the northeast and...
to reach King's Bay at
Ny-ÅlesundNy-Ålesund is one of the four permanent settlements on the island of Spitsbergen in the Svalbard archipelago. It is located on the Brøgger-peninsula at Kongsfjorden...
,
SvalbardSvalbard is an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean north of mainland Europe, about midway between mainland Norway and the North Pole. It consists of a group of islands ranging from 74° to 81° north latitude, and from 10° to 35° east longitude. The archipelago is the northernmost part of Norway. Three...
.
There Nobile met
Richard Evelyn ByrdRear Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd, Jr., USN was a pioneering American polar explorer, aviator and a recipient of the Medal of Honor.-Ancestry:He was a descendant of one of the First Families of Virginia...
preparing his
FokkerFokker was a Dutch aircraft manufacturer named after its founder, Anthony Fokker. The company operated under several different names, starting out in 1912 in Schwerin, Germany, moving to the Netherlands in 1919. During its most successful period in the 1920s and 1930s, it dominated the civil...
for his North Pole attempt. Nobile explained the Norge trip was to observe the uncharted sea between the Pole and Alaska where some thought land was; at the time he believed Robert Edwin Peary had already reached the pole. This would be the last stop before crossing the pole. The airship left Ny-Ålesund for the final stretch across the polar ice on May 11 at 9:55.
The 16 man expedition included Amundsen, the expedition leader and navigator;
Umberto NobileUmberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
the airship's designer and pilot; polar explorer and expedition sponsor
Lincoln Ellsworth-Birth:Son of James Ellsworth and Eva Frances Butler, he was born in Chicago, Illinois. He also lived in Hudson, Ohio as a child.-Arctic/North Pole exploration:...
; as well as polar explorer
Oscar WistingOscar Adolf Wisting was a Norwegian polar explorer.Together with Roald Amundsen he was the first person to reach both to the North and South Poles....
who served as helmsman. Other crew members were 1st Lt.
Hjalmar Riiser-LarsenHjalmar Riiser-Larsen was a Norwegian aviation pioneer, polar explorer and businessman. Among his achievements, he is generally regarded as the founder of the Royal Norwegian Air Force....
, navigator; 1st Lt. Emil Horgen, elevatorman; Capt. Birger Gottwaldt, radio expert, Dr
Finn MalmgrenFinn Adolf Erik Johan Malmgren was a Swedish meteorologist and Arctic explorer.Malgrem studied in Göteborg, Sundsvall and Stockholm. In 1912 he started to study at the Uppsala University where he received a bachelor's degree in 1916...
of Uppsala University, meteorologist; Fredrik Ramm, journalist; Frithjof Storm-Johnsen, radioman; Flying Lt. Oscar Omdal flight engineer. Italian members of the crew were Chief-Mechanic Cecioni, Rigger Alesandrini, and Motor-Mechanics Arduino, Caratti, and Pomella. Nobile's dog, Titina, also came aboard as mascot.
On May 12 at 01.25 (GMT) they reached the North Pole, at which point the Norwegian, American and Italian flags were dropped from the airship onto the ice. Relations between Amundsen and Nobile, which had been strained in the freezing, cramped and noisy conditions became even worse when Amundsen saw that the Italian flag dropped was larger than either of the others. Amundsen later recalled with scorn that under Nobile, the airship had become "a circus wagon in the sky".
After crossing the pole, ice encrustations kept growing on the airship to such an extent that pieces breaking off would be blown by the propellers and make holes in the hull.
- "The ice forming on the propellors as we went through the fog, and hurled against the underside of the bag, had pretty well scarred up the fabric covering the keel, though it had not opened up the gas bags or caused any hydrogen loss. We had used up all our cement in repairing the fabric..."
On May 14 the airship reached the Eskimo village of
Teller, AlaskaTeller is a city in Nome Census Area, Alaska, United States. At the 2000 census the population was 268.It is situated on the southern half of the spit called Nook in Inupiaq, which separates Port Clarence and Grantley Harbor, at the outlet of the Imuruk Basin.-Geography:Teller is located at ...
where in view of worsening weather, the decision was made to land rather than continue to
NomeNome is a city in the Nome Census Area of the U.S. state of Alaska, located on the southern Seward Peninsula coast on Norton Sound of the Bering Sea. According to 2005 Census Bureau estimates, the city population was 3,590. Nome was incorporated on April 9, 1901, and was once the most populous...
.
The three previous claims to have arrived at the North Pole – by
Frederick CookDr. Frederick Albert Cook was an American explorer and physician, noted for his claim of having reached the North Pole on April 21, 1908, a year before Robert Peary claimed to, April 6, 1909.-Life:...
in 1908,
Robert PearyRobert Edwin Peary was an American explorer who claimed to have been the first person, on April 6, 1909, to reach the geographic North Pole...
in 1909, and Richard E. Byrd in 1926 (just a few days before the
Norge) – are all disputed as being either of dubious accuracy or outright fraud. Some of those disputing these earlier claims therefore consider the crew of the
Norge to be the first verified explorers to have reached the North Pole.
During the three day flight the Norge's radio was unable to transmit their status, until they landed at Teller, where they found a small radio.
See also
- Airship
An airship or dirigible is a lighter-than-air aircraft that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust...
- Airship Italia
Airship Italia was a semi-rigid airship used by Umberto Nobile in his second series of flights around the North Pole.-Design and specifications:...
- Roald Amundsen
Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He led the first Antarctic expedition to reach the South Pole between 1910 and 1912. He was also the first person to reach both the North and South Poles. He is known as the first to traverse the Northwest Passage...
- Umberto Nobile
Umberto Nobile was an Italian aeronautical engineer and Arctic explorer. Nobile was a developer and promoter of semi-rigid airships during the Golden Age of Aviation between the two World Wars...
- Farthest North
Farthest North describes the most northerly latitude reached by explorers before the conquest of the North Pole rendered the expression obsolete...
- North Pole
The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is, subject to the caveats explained below, defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets the Earth's surface...
- Timeline of hydrogen technologies
Timeline of hydrogen technologies A timeline of the history of hydrogen technology.-1600s:* 1625 - First description of hydrogen by Johann Baptista van Helmont...