Page 20 - An-introduction-to-Svalbard

The Eagle leaving Danskøya in 1897.

1897: ANDRÉE

The young Swedish engineer Salomon August Andrée had a plan to reach the North Pole
in a hydrogen balloon. Both Alfred Nobel and the Swedish King Oscar II were among those
who helped finance this costly project. A large balloon house was erected on Danskøya in
the northwest corner of Spitsbergen, and in the summer of 1896 the expedition was ready
to set off. Unfortunately, appropriate southerly winds never arrived and the balloon could not
be launched until a year later. On the 11th of July 1897, the anchoring ropes were cut and
the balloon named the Eagle disappeared to the north. Accompanying Andrée were two more
Swedes: Nils Strindberg and Knut Fraenkel. A carrier pigeon’s short message from the first day
of the expedition was to be their last sign of life. 33 years later, in August 1930, the crew of a
Norwegian seal hunting vessel found remains of humans and a variety of items labelled "Andrée
Expedition" on White Island. Several of these objects are now on display at the Andrée Museum
in Gränna, Andrée’s hometown in Sweden.

1906: WELLMAN

The American journalist Walter Wellman failed in his attempts to reach the North Pole across the
ice from Franz Josef Land in 1898 -1899. He then made three attempts to reach the pole from
Danskøya in 1906, 1908 and 1909. His plan was to use a steerable dirigible to reach his goal.
He had a hangar, house, warehouses and a hydrogen plant built on the island. Sadly his plans
failed – during his last experiment the airship exploded as it was being towed into the hangar.

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