Computations on the action of glaciers from data collected this summer are now being made in the Geology Department. The figures upon which they are working are the result of three months work by a combined Harvard-Dartmouth expedition which had as its two-fold purpose the ascent of Mt. Crillon's 12,728 foot peak in the Fairweather range of Alaska and the collecting of accurate information in the little-known field of glacier movements. The party, composed of 11 men under the leadership of Bradford Washburn '33, was divided into two groups; the climbing party of Adams Carter '36, Howard Kellog '37, Waldo Holcombe '33, Edward C. Streeter Jr. '36, Bradford Washburn '33, and Henry S. Woods of Dartmouth; and the base camp party, which was to make geophysical and geological surveys, of R. P. Goldthwait, A. Lincoln Washburn, Russell Dow, Robert Stix, and D. F. Putnam, all of Dartmouth.
Two Previous Attempts
Two previous attempts have been made upon Crillon, both under Washburn's leadership, but bad weather and bad luck had held the party down to a point only 35 minutes in altitude below the summit of the mountain. This year, laying determined plans to achieve his end, Washburn took no chances and started on the 28th of May. But again bad luck appeared when, on getting to the Pacific coast, Washburn found that the expedition supplies had gotten lost in the shipping strike and that all the Alaskan boats were hopelessly tied up. Three weeks were spent in straightening out this tangle and it wasn't until June 23 that the base camp was established at Crillon Lake, 10 miles as the crow flies and 15 miles on the only walkable route to the summit of the mountain.
Operators Directed By Radio
Once at the base camp one party started packing supplies up the route which had been used the summer before and the other party began the measurements of the glaciers. Washburn himself, in order to make sure the surveys were successful, stayed at the base camp and directed operations upon the mountain with the aid of a five-meter transceiver, a miniature radio set about the size of a large camera and weighing only two and a half pounds capable of being carried in a rucksack and set up anywhere in a minute or two. This enabled Washburn, who knew the route up the mountain minutely, to talk to Carter, in charge of the packing party, for an hour or more every night, and yet devote his full attention to the map making and geological work which was being done with the assistance of the Dartmouth men.
Snow Thwarts First Attempt
When the supplies had been carried to a height of 6,300 feet, Washburn and Holcombe, whose places in the climbing party had been taken by Lincoln Washburn and Dow, started up the mountain, leaving the base camp at 8 o'clock on the night of July 14th. The high camp was reached at 9 o'clock the next morning and the day was spent in resting. The morning of the 16th at midnight the whole packing party, plus Washburn and Holcombe, started from the high camp and by 8 o'clock they had reached the base of the 1000 foot cliff which the party scaled last year. At this point a two-day snow storm drove the party back and kept them in the high camp until the morning of the nineteenth. They left, however, before turning back at the foot of the cliff, crampons, rope, and other climbing supplies to be used as soon as the storm broke. It cleared the night of the 18th and by making another midnight start the party was again at the base of the cliff by 4 o'clock that morning.
Summit Reached In Storm
The ascent of the face was made under very bad ice conditions, but with the assistance of 1000 feet of fixed rope the party at last reached the summit in three ropes of two each. Once on the plateau at the top of the cliff Washburn and Carter decided to make a rush for the summit without waiting for the last rope which had fallen behind due to heavy packs of willow wands and miscellaneous supplies. They left with 35 pounds of climbing rope and extra clothing but no food except for two bars of chocolate. By 11 o'clock the final ridge leading to the summit had been reached and after an hour and a half of difficult rock and snow climbing the summit itself was made in the midst of a snow-cap snow storm which prevented anything being seen and forced the climbers to return as soon as they got there.
The storm, which had begun as a mere cap of clouds around the summit, settled rapidly down along the sides of the mountain and prevented the party on the plateau from attempting to follow Washburn's tracks.
Two days later however, another attempt in order to get photographs was made, this time with Holcombe also on the Washburn Carter rope. The summit was reached again, but this time in the most perfect weather conditions and many pictures were taken.
Glaclers Measured Hourly
Beside the long-sought conquest of the mountain the party accomplished much interesting and valuable scientific work Of particular interest in this respect was the measurement of glacial movement, not only over the course of weeks, but also in hours. Unexpected results were obtained, showing that the glacier suddenly slid forward during the evening around supper time, again about midnight, and once more early in the morning. The average movement of the Crillon glacier, the one studied most in detail, was two inches an hour. Dynamite blasting was also done to determine the depth of the ice by means of the returning reverberations, but the computations from field data have not been completed.
Food Dropped From Plane
A notable feature of the trip was the dropping of a large load of supplies on July 24th, put up in boxes, from airplanes flying about 1000 feet above the surface of the snowfields. Of the 1200 pounds of food dropped only two small boxes containing peas were lost and none of the other food was injured in the least Washburn said that the force of the box as it hit the snow, instead of burying it many feet, merely caused it to throw up a wide crater in the bottom of which could be found the box, sunk less than six inches.
2500 Feet of Movies
Airplanes were also used to make many photographs of the mountain itself and to assist in the map-making, sponsored by the Geological Society of America. Over two hundred photographs were taken from the plane which was called in from Juneau four times during the course of the summer. Twenty-five hundred feet of full-sized motion picture film was also taken, both of the ascent of the mountain and the several serial flights
