WEBVTT - Thinking Sideways: Operation Highjump 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:04.880 This episode of Thinking Sideways is not brought you by putting. Instead, 0:00:04.960 --> 0:00:08.240 it's brought to you by all those little fuzzy creatures 0:00:08.280 --> 0:00:11.680 that you want to take home and make friends. I know, 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:16.079 I adopted a critter. She's right here, wave kitten. You 0:00:16.120 --> 0:00:18.119 can't hear that, but that's her, fuzzy Paul waving in 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:21.320 the microphone. And she's the best little kitten ever. And 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:23.400 if you want to get yourself a friend, don't go 0:00:23.440 --> 0:00:26.239 to the pet store. Go down to your local shelter 0:00:26.440 --> 0:00:28.800 and adopt a puppy or a kitten or a full 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:31.520 grown adult dog or a cat or whatever else they have. 0:00:31.920 --> 0:00:35.519 And if you've hit your pet quotient, which there really is, 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:38.159 there's a limit, don't get too many. Then you can 0:00:38.200 --> 0:00:43.000 still help out by donating your time or your money. 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:46.599 They always need help, so go down there and make 0:00:46.640 --> 0:01:10.479 it happen. Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of Thinking 0:01:10.520 --> 0:01:15.640 Sideways the podcast. I am Devin, joined as always by 0:01:16.440 --> 0:01:20.640 who already looks bored and Steve, sorry, I was looking 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:23.840 at me kind he looks super bored. Alright, you have 0:01:23.959 --> 0:01:27.880 the face of somebody who's been caught expression of that, like, oops, 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:34.720 I just I'm serious for super serious episode. This is 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:38.680 a serious topic here, Okay, about that that continent at 0:01:38.720 --> 0:01:40.880 the bottom of our world that keeps us right side 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:43.319 up and it weighs a lot. It's true. It's the 0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:47.920 center of it's our ballot, it's our ballast. Another term 0:01:48.840 --> 0:01:50.800 at the center of gravity in the middle of the Earth. 0:01:51.560 --> 0:01:56.320 That's the North Pole. Yeah, right, obviously, Sorry, we've already divulged. 0:01:56.400 --> 0:01:59.480 It's fine. This is going to be good, devolved, not divulged. Yeah, 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:03.360 should be sharing some Yeah, you got it. That's great. 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:14.360 Today's episode was recommended by Colton, So thanks Colton. Yeah, guy, guy, buddy. Uh. 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:16.919 And we are going to talk about Operation high Jump 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:23.880 and the many weird conspiracy mysteries that surround it. By 0:02:24.040 --> 0:02:28.160 mystery kind of, it's kind of a lot of different 0:02:28.200 --> 0:02:30.240 mysteries put together. There's a lot of weird stuff going 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:37.359 on here, It's true. Including me. You were likely that's 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:41.640 nothing weird about you, weird sight. I totally dropped the ball. Now, Okay, 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:45.920 you're likely unfamiliar with Operation high Jump, which was officially 0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:50.840 called the United States Navy Antarctic Developments Program nineteen nineteen 0:02:50.919 --> 0:02:54.639 forty six to nineteen seven, and rightfully so, because why 0:02:54.680 --> 0:02:58.240 would you know about this? Operation High Jump was one 0:02:58.280 --> 0:03:02.080 of twenty eight expedition SANS made to Antarctica, which is 0:03:02.120 --> 0:03:04.200 the South Pole for you people who don't know what 0:03:04.240 --> 0:03:08.399 that graphically confused. Yeah, five of these twenty eight were 0:03:08.520 --> 0:03:12.120 taken on by the United States. Unsurprisingly, Brittain holds the 0:03:12.120 --> 0:03:17.080 record because they just like to colonize everything they do. Yeah, 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:22.000 they visited Antarctica eleven times, and visits are still happening. 0:03:22.000 --> 0:03:25.560 These are just these like grand expeditions. Yeah, these expeditions 0:03:25.560 --> 0:03:28.120 and discovery. Yeah, yeah, there actually were a lot of 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:30.880 the Argentines, for example, have been have been sort of 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:34.920 poking around Antarctica since like the early nineteenth century, very early, 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:39.880 much closer than we are. Yeah, they definitely it's them. Yeah, 0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:42.960 This specific expedition took place, If you were paying attention, 0:03:43.000 --> 0:03:46.360 you may already know, took place from nineteen forty six 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:50.480 to nineteen forty seven and involved four thousand, seven hundred 0:03:50.480 --> 0:03:54.760 men and lots of boats and aircrafts. Officially, there were 0:03:54.840 --> 0:04:01.880 six submissions of this mission expedition up the primary mission 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:07.160 of the expedition being establishing Little America. For yeah, I 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:11.840 don't remember Roman numeral. It was like Ivy IVY Little 0:04:11.840 --> 0:04:15.560 America for America form, which was just the base of 0:04:15.600 --> 0:04:20.000 operations for Operation High Jumps, so literally the jumping off point. Well, yeah, 0:04:20.000 --> 0:04:22.000 it's kind of weird. They were like, well, our primary 0:04:22.000 --> 0:04:25.200 goal is to establish the base of the operations for 0:04:25.240 --> 0:04:28.880 our expedition. Where our primary goal is to establish the 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:32.720 base of operations for our primary expedition goal. I really 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:35.320 feel like I'm watching a Leslie Nielsen movie. Yeah, a 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:37.200 little bit. That's like we were at a part of 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:40.560 town they called Little Italy. Did you ever see that episode? 0:04:40.560 --> 0:04:45.839 Of course? Yeah. Anyway. The submissions, not to be confused 0:04:45.839 --> 0:04:51.600 with submissions submissions were one training personnel and testing equipment 0:04:51.600 --> 0:04:55.960 in frigid conditions. To consolidating and extending the United States 0:04:56.000 --> 0:05:00.640 sovereignty over the largest practicable of practice I think, participal 0:05:00.800 --> 0:05:05.360 area of the Antarctic continent. This was publicly denied um 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:08.560 even before the expedition ended. Always it's always been denied 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:14.279 to the three Determining the feasibility of establishing, maintaining, and 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:18.480 utilizing bases in the Antarctic for investigation and investigating possible 0:05:18.480 --> 0:05:22.640 based sites. Number four, Developing techniques for establishing, maintaining, and 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:26.480 utilizing air bases on ice, with particular attention to later 0:05:26.520 --> 0:05:32.600 applicability too, of such techniques to operations in interior Greenland, 0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:35.520 where conditions are comparable to those of the antarctics. So 0:05:36.320 --> 0:05:39.240 what are you guys doing living there? All the fifty 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:42.680 listeners we have in Greenland? Yeah? How many people live 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:47.200 in Greenland anyway? And all of them listen to us? Yet? Yeah. 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:54.360 The fifth submission was amplifying existing stores of knowledge of electromagnetic, geographic, geological, 0:05:54.839 --> 0:06:01.480 hydrographic and meteorological propagation conditions in the area. This is 0:06:01.520 --> 0:06:04.799 fancy talking, guys, I'm sorry. And somebody printed the script 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:07.560 like front to back, so it's like it's fine and 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:14.120 cheap paper. And six is supplementary objectives to the Ninook Expedition, 0:06:14.279 --> 0:06:18.520 a smaller which which was a smaller expedition to Greenland 0:06:19.080 --> 0:06:22.000 off of the east of Greenland. But yeah, I guess 0:06:22.160 --> 0:06:25.240 Greenland is rather inhospitable from what I've heard. Not the people, 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:27.919 I'm sure they're wonderful, but the climate. Well, no, that 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:31.400 was God. Who was it the discovered Greenland? Do either 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:34.640 of you remember? Because they named it Greenland in an 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:38.080 attempt to encourage people to move there, to make it 0:06:38.200 --> 0:06:42.840 sound more hospitable and nicer. It's a greenland Vikings, I think, 0:06:42.880 --> 0:06:44.960 but it was. But but actually that was I think 0:06:44.960 --> 0:06:47.559 in the medieval warm period or something like that. Before 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:49.920 then it was actually and it actually wasn't all iced over, 0:06:50.360 --> 0:06:52.719 not nearly as much. It was kind of greenish. It 0:06:52.800 --> 0:06:56.400 was a lot greener that is today. Yeah. So, in 0:06:56.440 --> 0:06:59.080 an effort to try to summarize, as many of you 0:06:59.160 --> 0:07:02.159 have been asking for are lately, uh, in like five 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:06.960 sentences or less, what this mystery is. The mystery here 0:07:07.400 --> 0:07:10.600 is that, um, a lot of people think that this 0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:14.080 is just a big cover up for one of many 0:07:14.160 --> 0:07:16.680 different reasons, and I want to play it a little 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:19.400 close to the chest and not tell you sure, um, 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:22.440 but basically that the Navy was sent to battle with 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:27.600 like UFOs, or like Aliens, or or Nazis, or or 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:31.800 to hide some stuff from public consumption. Um. So that's 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:35.000 our mystery, is what really was Operation High Jump and 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:38.000 what was what were their actual missions? First of all, 0:07:38.160 --> 0:07:40.800 when the military wants to hide something, they just take 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:44.200 it to area. I've got to shoot that one down 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:46.680 right away. But they can't get all of Antarctica in 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.400 the temperature is totally different. Yeah, but well maybe they could, 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:54.080 because if you just melt it down, who I don't 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:57.040 know how much there is. Let's talk about Operation High 0:07:57.080 --> 0:07:59.280 Jump for a minute. We're going to talk about who 0:07:59.360 --> 0:08:02.920 was involved and like what ships were involved, and maybe 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:05.520 maybe Joe knows some things about some of these ships. 0:08:05.560 --> 0:08:11.000 I don't know not. Operation High Jump was organized officially 0:08:11.160 --> 0:08:15.640 organized by Rear Admiral Richard E. Bird, Jr. The United 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:19.000 States Navy retired. He was the officer in charge of 0:08:19.080 --> 0:08:23.200 Task Force sixty eight, which was not retired at He 0:08:23.280 --> 0:08:25.920 was not retired at the time he was retired. Eventually 0:08:26.560 --> 0:08:28.400 he was still active, but he was the officer in 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:31.880 charge of Task Force sixty eight, which is what Operation 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:34.800 High Jump. All of the people who were a part 0:08:34.800 --> 0:08:37.920 of it, they were part of Task Force, and uh 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:40.640 a lot of them were like Task Force sixty eight 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:45.680 point one. Why not? Yeah, And it was led by 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:50.280 Rear Admiral Richard H. Kruzen because Bird wasn't there on 0:08:50.320 --> 0:08:52.840 the ground per se the whole time. He showed up 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.280 pretty late and left pretty early. Yeah, that was kind 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:57.400 of his gig, but he was not actually the point man. 0:08:57.520 --> 0:09:00.400 It was kind of his gig because you may may 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:03.920 not know this about bird. He claims to have been 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:07.080 the first person to reach both the North and South poles. 0:09:07.120 --> 0:09:09.800 There's a lot of contentions about this claim he did. 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:13.320 It is documented he reached the South pole, fine, but 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:15.360 a lot of people think he didn't actually reach the 0:09:15.360 --> 0:09:18.640 North pole. There's a lot of contention about people who 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:20.960 reached the poles. Every time somebody says that, they're like, 0:09:21.120 --> 0:09:23.920 and if you can't easily prove it, as in, you 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:26.640 took a hundred people or film the whole thing, it 0:09:26.760 --> 0:09:29.040 was always contesting if it took a hundred people. It's 0:09:29.080 --> 0:09:31.200 it's kind of difficult sometimes. Well, I mean, I guess 0:09:31.240 --> 0:09:33.000 if you use the right if you have the right instrument, 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:36.400 but it's hard. I mean, there's not our listeners I 0:09:36.400 --> 0:09:38.840 think probably know this, but maybe not. There's not actual 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:42.520 polls just like sticking out of the ground that say 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:44.360 like this is the North Pole, and this is this 0:09:44.440 --> 0:09:47.840 outpoll and we congratulations, you've made it. Yeah, technically, there 0:09:47.840 --> 0:09:50.679 have been people who have gone figured out their location 0:09:50.800 --> 0:09:53.880 said I am at the pole, stuck a pole in 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:56.720 the ground and if you wait twenty five minutes, that 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:00.120 poll is no longer at the north because of the 0:10:00.200 --> 0:10:04.480 ice shelves moving, and to be fair, I meant like 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:08.080 naturally occurring poles. It's not like everybody could say, yeah, 0:10:08.120 --> 0:10:10.600 when you get to that pole, you're at the North Pole, 0:10:11.160 --> 0:10:13.720 because it's the North pole. Tops got that little thing 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:15.320 sticking off the top of it that you used to 0:10:15.600 --> 0:10:17.760 spin with your fingers, right, Yeah. It is a little 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:20.320 known fact that God does not the Earth does not 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:22.720 spin because God is just like whipping us around like 0:10:22.720 --> 0:10:25.080 a top every once in a while. That's not that's 0:10:25.080 --> 0:10:28.000 not how it works. Sorry, um no, but we'll talk 0:10:28.040 --> 0:10:31.360 about that on a different episode. Anyway. Bird had been 0:10:31.559 --> 0:10:35.679 previously on a funded expedition, The first United States expedition 0:10:35.800 --> 0:10:40.360 to the Antarctica was actually it was called like Birds 0:10:40.360 --> 0:10:42.600 Expedition or something like that, and he led it and 0:10:42.960 --> 0:10:44.800 he was that was his big thing, was leading these 0:10:44.960 --> 0:10:48.800 extravagant expeditions because these things always turn out so well, right, 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:50.880 So that's why he was like in charge of the 0:10:50.880 --> 0:10:54.839 whole thing. I think he convinced some some lawmakers and 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:58.880 the president that it was worth it, or somebody said, hey, 0:10:58.920 --> 0:11:02.079 that guy, we should bring him in. He's done it before. 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:04.200 The impression I have is that he brought it to 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:06.600 their attention actually that he was like, you know what 0:11:06.640 --> 0:11:09.800 we should do again, go to the South Pole. That's 0:11:09.800 --> 0:11:13.400 a good idea. And again you know, actually probably did 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:14.760 say something in the order if you know, there's a 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:16.840 lot of people going down there and setting a basis, 0:11:16.960 --> 0:11:19.520 we better go down and just sort of stake a claim. Yeah, 0:11:19.720 --> 0:11:22.960 and we'll talk about a lot of the actual reasons 0:11:23.559 --> 0:11:27.080 um a little bit later. There were five different groups 0:11:27.080 --> 0:11:30.960 on the expedition, and they went different ways. Um. I 0:11:30.960 --> 0:11:32.520 don't know if you guys got a chance to look 0:11:32.520 --> 0:11:35.320 at the map, um, there were different like approaches that 0:11:35.400 --> 0:11:40.160 people they did, and I mean one of the it 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:42.920 was kind of interesting actually they kind of they ended 0:11:43.000 --> 0:11:48.400 up kind of completely coming from totally opposite directions to Antarctica, 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:53.760 and basically the Navy just kind of circumvented the entire circucumnavigate, 0:11:53.880 --> 0:12:00.360 circumnavigating um, the entire continent of Antarctica. They made like 0:12:00.360 --> 0:12:03.720 a big circle um and kind of simultaneously around it, 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:07.000 which again has a lot of people scratching their heads. 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:11.199 The East group was three ships, which was the uss 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:16.199 Pine Island back up here. It was this entire expedition 0:12:16.320 --> 0:12:20.120 was broken into how many groups, five groups total. Yeah, okay, 0:12:20.160 --> 0:12:22.839 so that's what we're describing each of the groups. Yeah, okay, 0:12:22.880 --> 0:12:24.680 just make sure I was on board where we were. Yeah, 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:30.440 super important to the whole story. Um, the USS Pine Island, 0:12:30.720 --> 0:12:34.280 which was a seaplane tender, and there were over thirty 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:41.840 aircraft aircraft, aircraft, over thirty aircraft that also participated in 0:12:41.880 --> 0:12:45.880 this expedition, both seaplanes and pontoon helicopters, which I think 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.760 there's an actual term for, but I could not remember 0:12:48.800 --> 0:12:52.240 what it was. Um, I don't know, it's a good question. 0:12:52.520 --> 0:13:00.240 A little floaty helicopters. Yeah, yeah, with pontoons on they land. Yeah, 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:04.040 the USS Brownson, which was a destroyer, and the U 0:13:04.160 --> 0:13:07.079 S S. Canisteo, which was a tanker. And these were 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:09.800 all like kind of state of the art ships by 0:13:09.800 --> 0:13:12.040 the way, as we're going through this, Um, a couple 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:14.400 of them were actually like the most state of the 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:17.000 art ships of the time, but most of them were 0:13:17.240 --> 0:13:19.880 pretty new. Well this is like the year after World 0:13:19.920 --> 0:13:23.280 War two in the US. Yeah, oh yeah, we built 0:13:23.320 --> 0:13:27.160 a lot of ships and so hey, that's probably what 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:28.760 was this was all about. It's like, you know, we 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:32.160 got some board sailors, okay, something to do. Yeah, yeah, 0:13:33.320 --> 0:13:38.239 oh sorry. The central group was the USS Mount Olympus, 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:40.760 which was in charge of all of the communications for 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:44.320 this expedition and later become became kind of the floating 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:48.320 communications hub once they got to the space where they 0:13:48.360 --> 0:13:51.760 were going, which was the Ross Ice Shelf right off 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:56.319 the Ross Sea. So you know, those of you, yeah, 0:13:56.400 --> 0:13:59.360 those of you who know the ant art, the landscape 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:01.640 of the ant art, know what I'm talking about, but 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:04.080 probably no one else does. So talk about the second. 0:14:05.080 --> 0:14:07.679 If you look, if you look at a map of Antarctica, 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:10.320 and you see like there's what else which is to 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:13.280 the east of the Antarctic Peninsula that stretches up towards 0:14:13.320 --> 0:14:17.480 South America, and then on the and then go way 0:14:17.520 --> 0:14:20.640 around that peninsula in the's a ross ice shelf, and 0:14:20.640 --> 0:14:23.360 and there's all sorts of ceas and there's just every 0:14:23.440 --> 0:14:26.920 like every every regular intervals like this season there's a 0:14:26.960 --> 0:14:29.720 different yeah, and then and it's like, I don't see 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:31.840 any particular reason why you should call this a c 0:14:32.120 --> 0:14:34.840 because there's nothing like sticking out and kind of defining 0:14:34.840 --> 0:14:36.720 it as a bay of c or anything else. It 0:14:36.840 --> 0:14:39.440 is my understanding that the reason that those are named, 0:14:39.440 --> 0:14:41.760 and please feel free to emails of us if this 0:14:41.800 --> 0:14:44.400 is wrong, But it was my impression that the reason 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:47.840 that they're all named different things. Um, the lots of 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:50.760 the landmasses are named different things too, and that's because 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:52.920 a bunch of different countries have common been like this 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:55.160 is our c it's this thing, okay, and this is 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:59.760 where ore, this is our We claim this whole area here. 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.640 Everything we can see is ours. You can get all 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.760 yours over there, and this is whatever we're doing. That's 0:15:06.800 --> 0:15:09.320 my understanding at least, so I think so. Yeah. And Argentina, 0:15:09.400 --> 0:15:11.480 by the way, it's it's illegal in Argentina to sell 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:13.960 a map of the country that does not include their 0:15:14.080 --> 0:15:16.080 chunk of Antarctic. I believe that. And they have a 0:15:16.120 --> 0:15:21.280 pretty substantial chuck. Yeah, and that's a waste of paper. Yeah. Um, 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:24.560 So back to our ships. The U S S. Yancey 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:28.040 was also part of the central group. The USS Merrick 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:33.400 Uh and the Yancy We're both on supplies, that's all 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:36.360 they were. The U. S. S. Senate, which is sc 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:39.560 N an E E T not like Senate like our 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:42.560 like this Congress in the Senate, which was a submarine, 0:15:43.240 --> 0:15:48.360 and the USS Burton Island and the U S. C. 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:53.640 G C, so the United States Coast Guard craft car 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:58.440 whatever cutter, UH north Wind, the Barton Burton Island and 0:15:58.480 --> 0:16:00.800 the North Wind. We're both ice for akers, and the 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:05.880 north Wind was it was the only non naval vessel 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:13.960 that was sent on this expedition. But who killed it? Um? 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:17.320 But it was also literally state of the art. It 0:16:17.440 --> 0:16:19.480 was part of the Wind class. It was her and 0:16:19.520 --> 0:16:22.760 her sister ship, which was called the south Wind UM 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:25.600 I believe south Wind, and they were like state of 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:28.760 the art, right off the line ice breakers, and they 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.520 were in service for a really, really really long time. 0:16:31.520 --> 0:16:33.320 This was one of the first expeditions that they were 0:16:33.320 --> 0:16:36.200 sent on, so again we're sending fancy tools down here. 0:16:37.000 --> 0:16:39.080 There was the Carrier Group, which was just one ship. 0:16:39.120 --> 0:16:41.360 It was the U S S Philippine Sea. And then 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:43.360 the West Group, which was the U S S, the 0:16:43.440 --> 0:16:46.120 U S S. Current Tuck, which was another seaplane tanker, 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:49.240 the U S S Henderson, a destroyer, and and finally 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:53.320 the USS Casapon which was another tanker. Okay, how many 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:57.720 more ships do we have? This list is huge. I 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:00.600 told you there was a lot of ships. They had 0:17:00.600 --> 0:17:02.640 a lot of ships to go through. Yeah, the Western 0:17:02.640 --> 0:17:06.760 Group ships reached the Marquesis Islands, which is part of 0:17:06.760 --> 0:17:10.480 French Polynesian Islands or French Polynesia. Yeah. Here, that's a 0:17:10.560 --> 0:17:16.720 nice place, like all that stuff. Yeah, I'm gonna go someday, 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:21.639 probably not as soon as you. Yeah, the Polynesian Islands 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:26.320 are super nice French Polynesian Islands. There's also US Polynesian 0:17:27.200 --> 0:17:29.720 I think, so there's a bunch of different Polynesians. We 0:17:30.000 --> 0:17:33.840 keep tracking at the moment. These islands are parallel with 0:17:34.040 --> 0:17:38.440 Northern Peru, kind of um close to the equator. Actually, yeah, 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:41.080 not exactly a great place for as your as to 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:43.840 set up as your base of Antarctic operations. Yeah, it's 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.920 basically halfway up the world. Yeah, they think they wanted 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:49.880 to just stop off and like party for a couple 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:52.840 of weeks. Maybe that was like it really is. It 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:54.600 was funny as I charted the court, you know, just 0:17:54.800 --> 0:17:56.840 because I have Google Earth opening and I was trying 0:17:56.840 --> 0:17:58.879 to figure out which. By the way, figuring out north 0:17:58.920 --> 0:18:00.640 on the South Pole is really pain in the butt. 0:18:00.800 --> 0:18:03.760 But the point is I was looking and saying, okay, 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:06.040 so where is this relation to the United States, And 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:08.600 if you went from if you left California and you 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:13.280 went on a degree angle. It is almost exactly halfway 0:18:13.320 --> 0:18:17.800 between the US and Antarctica, and it seems to be, 0:18:17.880 --> 0:18:20.000 as you said, kind of a stop off, a little 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:22.480 bit out of the way. That well, one thing I 0:18:22.480 --> 0:18:25.000 will say is that it is it's not my understanding 0:18:25.000 --> 0:18:27.280 that all of these ships were coming from the same ports, 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:31.120 you know, especially like even in the same group, right, 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:33.840 the Western group was all coming from different ports, and 0:18:33.880 --> 0:18:35.679 they had to have someplace where they were like, all right, 0:18:35.760 --> 0:18:38.440 meet there and then we'll all go through the dangerous 0:18:38.480 --> 0:18:40.720 part together, because that's why we're in a group, is 0:18:40.720 --> 0:18:42.639 so that we can, you know, all work as a 0:18:42.640 --> 0:18:45.040 team to go down. So I think that it was 0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:49.040 probably a pretty convenient spot. I suspect that some of 0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:51.639 the ships were not coming from America, so I was like, 0:18:51.800 --> 0:18:53.480 let's just all meet here in the party for a 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:55.239 little while and then go down. Yeah, it was very 0:18:55.280 --> 0:18:58.000 probably something coming from who knows where, Japan, you know, 0:18:58.080 --> 0:19:01.199 Pearl Harbor and god knows where. So they didn't actually 0:19:01.240 --> 0:19:07.360 reach that um set of islands until December twelfth, nineteen six. 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:11.520 So this when when we're talking about this expedition running 0:19:11.520 --> 0:19:14.560 from nineteen to ninety seven, I know you have the 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:16.720 impression that it was like a year, but it was 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:19.480 really like less than six months. It was like a 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:23.000 couple of months. Yeah, but less than it was less 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:25.480 than a half a year. And keep in mind because 0:19:25.520 --> 0:19:27.680 I actually had this question initially, it's like, why are 0:19:27.720 --> 0:19:30.639 you going there in the winter. That's so dumb, But 0:19:30.680 --> 0:19:34.679 it's actually it's actually the summer in Antarctic the best 0:19:34.720 --> 0:19:36.800 time to be there, if there is a good time. 0:19:36.880 --> 0:19:41.400 There's a little confused that part of the world. Yeah. Yeah, 0:19:42.359 --> 0:19:44.920 one they all got there, a bunch of the seaplanes 0:19:45.119 --> 0:19:50.119 started exploring southerly just to make sure, you know, conditions 0:19:50.119 --> 0:19:52.639 are good, you know, is are there islands that we 0:19:52.680 --> 0:19:54.919 should stop at, because they think, you know, there was 0:19:54.920 --> 0:19:57.960 a lot of stuff that was still uncharted. I mean, 0:19:58.160 --> 0:20:01.000 we didn't have satellites back in those days. We we 0:20:01.000 --> 0:20:05.159 were pretty sure we knew where things were. But you know, 0:20:05.200 --> 0:20:08.280 when you can't take pictures from space, you're like, well, 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:10.240 I don't know, I think there might be an island there, 0:20:10.280 --> 0:20:12.679 but that could be from one of those fake maps 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:17.000 that's you know, to test us. We did. Yeah, so 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:20.119 that was on December is when they launched those So 0:20:20.200 --> 0:20:23.480 after twelve days they launched all of these seaplanes to 0:20:23.520 --> 0:20:27.320 explore down in the South regions. The eastern group of 0:20:27.359 --> 0:20:31.600 ships reached Peter the First Island in late December. There's 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:35.120 not really a date attached to this um late December 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:40.080 of forty six. The Peter the First Island is just 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:45.080 about two hundred and eighty miles away from Antarctica. That's 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:49.119 kind of closed. That's to four and fifty KOs for 0:20:49.359 --> 0:20:55.640 you folks who don't use the smart measurements. It's currently 0:20:55.640 --> 0:20:59.960 claimed by Norway along with our favorite little island, Bouvet Island. 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:01.960 One of the way, is the boat still there? I 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:06.400 think so. I don't know. I haven't done our national monument. Yeah, 0:21:06.440 --> 0:21:09.800 it's the Norwegian National Monument. Actually, is this real weird 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:12.400 boat on a tiny little island on the totally other 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:14.359 side of the world. You go away had half a 0:21:14.480 --> 0:21:16.280 sense of humor. They would like take the boat away 0:21:16.320 --> 0:21:18.960 and replace it with another boat that like a sailboat 0:21:19.040 --> 0:21:21.000 or god knows what. You know. They really should just 0:21:21.080 --> 0:21:22.800 best what the world's head. You know what we should 0:21:22.800 --> 0:21:24.960 do is we should start a Kickstarter campaign or go 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:27.560 fund me campaign to get all of us to go 0:21:27.640 --> 0:21:30.160 down to Bouvet Island to just the three of us 0:21:30.240 --> 0:21:33.680 and just replace the ship our Don't you think I 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:38.320 will go. I will take that challenge higher standing. I 0:21:38.400 --> 0:21:41.960 believe it's gonna be rather cold. Yeah, that's what Parker 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:43.960 is there for. I don't like the coal. That's what 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:46.000 ton Tons are for. I don't like the coal kind. 0:21:46.160 --> 0:21:48.919 And it's not that bad in the summertime. Their summertime, 0:21:48.920 --> 0:21:53.439 not ours. Famous last words. Uh. Now, Arctica has that 0:21:53.520 --> 0:21:55.520 kind of peninsula that Joe was talking about a little 0:21:55.520 --> 0:21:59.400 earlier that runs north towards South America. I've granted every 0:21:59.400 --> 0:22:03.639 peninsula off of Antarctica runs north, but this one like 0:22:03.720 --> 0:22:08.040 really runs north. It's it's the only peninsula. Yeah, and 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:10.600 there are two kind of like gulfs. There's the one 0:22:10.600 --> 0:22:16.240 gulf that's like inside the peninsula and gulfs on the outside, 0:22:16.600 --> 0:22:20.600 both of which have ice shelves over the gulf's ross 0:22:20.760 --> 0:22:24.639 the Ross ice shelf, which is where Little America is once. 0:22:25.720 --> 0:22:27.520 I don't know if it's still there or not. Probably 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:30.160 still there. There were a lot of Little America's. It's 0:22:30.240 --> 0:22:34.239 kind of like south of New Zealand kind of on 0:22:34.280 --> 0:22:37.520 the other side, it's hard, like like Steve was saying, 0:22:37.600 --> 0:22:41.119 like it's almost impossible to say, like, it's not like 0:22:41.200 --> 0:22:46.400 there's nout. Yeah, you can't say, well, it's like it's 0:22:46.400 --> 0:22:49.000 like north, it's like east. It's like you need to 0:22:49.000 --> 0:22:51.000 go by longitude. I mean that's the only way to 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:53.760 do it. So starting at zero degrees and just working 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:55.320 your way around, that's kind of way to do it. 0:22:55.400 --> 0:23:00.520 I didn't do that. So's so realistically, what you have 0:23:00.600 --> 0:23:02.760 to do is if you really care about where the 0:23:02.960 --> 0:23:07.600 Ross ice shelf is is just google it. It'll pop up. Yeah, 0:23:07.920 --> 0:23:10.440 it's it's white. You have to seem out a lot 0:23:11.480 --> 0:23:14.280 before you can see anything about white. But then it'll 0:23:14.280 --> 0:23:16.720 show up and it's fine. Just I was just to 0:23:16.720 --> 0:23:19.040 help you get a little bit of bearings. The Eastern 0:23:19.080 --> 0:23:21.480 group arrived at the Bay of Whales, which is a 0:23:21.600 --> 0:23:27.720