On experimental fishing in the Weddell Sea with m/s "Polarhav"

What we were looking for was to find out if there were any viable collections of Crabeater seals, especially the birthing grounds and pups we were interested in. This seal species stayed out in the drift ice, usually in broken ice out towards the edge of the ice belt, in contrast to other seal species, which all stayed close to or on land. We were given permission to catch Crabeaters out in the drift ice, but we did not receive any kind of subsidy for trial fishing, which was applied for, it was flatly refused. Nor could we be included under the minimum quota scheme, so everything was entirely the responsibility and risk of the shipping company.
– At this time, Norway had stopped whaling in Antarctica, only Japan was still fishing, both from the whaling station and from the shore station on South Georgia. We didn't know much about this, and we assumed that at this time of year we would be the only boat within an area of ​​thousands of miles. Therefore, we prepared ourselves as best we could in every conceivable way, considering what we might encounter on the trip. For my part, I studied and read through everything that was available in terms of information about weather and ice conditions and about wildlife in the sea and on the ice and on

land. There weren't many places to find such information after all. I found most of it in the British Admiralty "Antarctic Pilot" and I also had a hydrographic atlas from the US Hydrographic Office that I had received from an American officer who had been an observer on a previous trip. It probably gave the latest and best information available about ice, weather, ocean currents and other conditions at different times of the year. We had previously been on three trips to Antarctica and broken through the pack ice to land, but that was in the summer in December-January.
It was now winter or early spring in the south, so we expected harsher weather and ice conditions and lower temperatures. – I had asked for a new radar for the trip, and it was granted for the time being, but then it was decided that the old RCA radar would receive a thorough factory overhaul instead, and that was done. A technician eventually came along on the trip from Ålesund to Bergen to fine-tune it and it worked very well, but it was still a three-cm cheap type that we were not very happy with when the weather was bad in icy waters.

In Bergen, we took aboard a helicopter with a pilot and mechanic, as well as marine biologist Torgeir Ørritsland, who was to join us and study the wildlife in the ice.
Arrangements were made for us to replenish bunkers and provisions in Montevideo, and a final bunker replenishment in Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands. There we would also mount the helicopter on the platform and test-drive it.
We left Bergen on July 18 and arrived in Montevideo on August 12. After a short time at sea we had trouble with the radar. In Montevideo we got hold of a specialist, a German who had worked at the RCA factory in the USA, but he was unable to find the fault, so we had to leave without getting it fixed. It was not completely unusable, but it did not work at short distances.
We received a new supply of bunkers and provisions. Our steward had a heart attack at sea and was now hospitalized, and later sent home. The cook took over as steward. A motorman escaped from the boat and did not come back on board. He was also sent home later. We went to sea again on August 16. We arrived at Port Stanley on August 20, and left on the 22nd. While we were there, we mounted the helicopter and had it placed on the back of the platform, and several test runs were made. Everything seemed fine. We were able to top up the bunker tanks before we went out. We agreed with Falkland Radio to exchange reports.
On August 25th we came across ice. The weather was fine and the temperature was slightly below zero. Position S.5920 V.5311.

From now on we were out searching every day from morning to evening, weather permitting. The main thing was to find seals, but just as important was to find ice that we thought would be good enough for the seals to lay their young. We could only compare the ice conditions on the Newfoundland field and the seal's habits there, but we knew nothing about the Crabeater's habits.
We knew that there had been large-scale seal hunting in Antarctica in the 1800th century, but it was primarily fur seals that they were after, and they were so heavily taxed that they were practically extinct. Now the population was growing again after being completely peaceful for a long time. Elephant seals had also been caught, but they were probably a little less sought after, as only the blubber was of value. For both of these species, the hunt took place on the beaches of the islands.
We found no reports or information about the capture of Crabeaters in the pack ice. Perhaps this could indicate that they did not have the habit of gathering in large groups? This could be consistent with what we had seen on our previous trips through the pack ice. There could be quite a few seals spread out across the ice, but never any gathering.

When we started searching, we quickly found out that there were not so few seals in the ice. On good days, quite a few could be found, but never in a group. From the seals that we shot that had young in them, we saw that it was still too early for the molt. We had been informed that the molt would be around the end of August/September, but we could quickly determine that this was about a month too early.
We first worked our way inwards in a southerly direction, thinking we would investigate in firmer and more solid ice. We pushed ourselves about 60 miles in through the back, and gradually it turned into heavy, multi-year Weddell Sea ice, which we found it best to just get out of, it was also noticeable that it became more and more lifeless the further in we got, in the end we did not see a single animal. We had to keep in mind all the time that we should not take unnecessary chances, as we were completely alone in an area of ​​several thousand miles.

Polar Sea 1964

From what I had read and found out about the Weddell Sea, it is an ocean that should be treated with all possible respect. It is an area with heavy ice, unstable currents and a lot of bad weather. You can be stranded in a backwater where the ice barely moves for weeks, but you can just as easily enter a current area that sets the heavy ice in motion, so that it crushes everything in its path.
We turned north towards the ice edge, and as soon as we started to notice a slight swell, the seals were there again. After a few forays east and west we found that an area north-east of South Orkneys looked most promising, and we mostly stayed there, but otherwise took detours both east and west to monitor any changes.

In mid-September we made a fairly long round trip west, thinking we would see what the ice conditions were like when we passed Elephant Island up the north end of Palmers Peninsula. It turned out that there was mostly big, ugly ice here and that the constant westerly wind kept it tightly packed with straight edges. There were also no seals to be seen, the further west we got the more lifeless it became, so we turned back to the area we had crossed before.
At first it was winter weather, from 5-6 to 12-14 degrees below zero and variable wind conditions, but the wind direction remained fairly steady around west-northwest with occasional gales. Gradually the weather became milder with temperatures slightly below and slightly above zero. There was a lot of precipitation, rain, sleet and snow, along with poor visibility. For helicopter flying it was as bad as it could be. Only on a few days was visibility good enough to be usable. The times the helicopter was out they probably saw a few seals, but never gathered in flocks.
Towards the end of September/October, the weather became rather worse, with a lot of precipitation and poor visibility, and the wind constantly coming from the west, usually gale force, and occasionally stormy.
We thought we understood that the seal casting season was not far off. The seals we shot had had milk, and the pups were as far as we could see fully developed, so we thought the casting could start at any time. Around the end of the month, the large ice floe we had been working on began to drift out to sea and break up due to the strong, prolonged westerly wind. Where we had hoped the seal would find suitable ice for casting, there was soon no usable ice left, and we had to go in search of new areas of usable ice. It turned out not to be so easy to find. We went south towards the ice floe, but everywhere we encountered tightly packed, large, ugly ice with a lot of slush in between. We went west along the edge, thinking we might find better ice if we got a little leeward of the islands north of Palmers Peninsula. There was a gale blowing all the time and off the edge there were masses of large blue ice floes and small icebergs, which were very difficult to see and stay clear of at night.

On October 11th, a strong gale blew and there were lots of small mountains and big ice everywhere. We looked to see if we could find a good sandbank on the edge, so we could hide in it and lie still for the night. We found a place that looked good and went a little in front of the edge and lay still, but with the engine running. Here we lay calmly and well, if we got too close to a big ice, we just walked away a little and stopped again. There was a big swell on the edge.

At 05:00 on the 12th we moved a little away from a blue ice that was coming quite close. At 06:30 I went in the barrel to get out of the ice and continue westward. It was now getting light and I immediately saw that the ice edge was further away than it had been in the evening. The swell had nevertheless grown and was very heavy.

I gave it full speed, but the ship was stuck, not moving forward at all. With the heavy swell that was going on, I could hardly believe it.

This was a situation we were familiar with from the ice off Labrador. When there was a tight, straight edge, we often went in and lay down on a slushy edge to get some peace and quiet, but from experience we knew that one could easily be fooled and get stuck if one was not careful. We never went in further than we had a good swell, and it was a fixed rule to turn the ship towards the swell and the edge. If one then noticed that the swell was beginning to subside, one immediately went out towards the edge, either all the way out or until one got a good swell again.

What happened here was in fact completely inexplicable. Although the wind was strong, it was not directly against the ice edge, but halfway along the edge. Nor was there any land to the leeward side to hold back the pressure of the ice. That the finely ground ice and slush could be so tightly packed that we could not move an inch when the swell was so strong, it was simply incredible. The swell just kept increasing and the pressure was getting harder and harder.
Gradually the ship was lying across the swell and on each swell it was thrown (pressed) 10-15 meters sideways through the ice without being able to see the slightest blue streaks in the mud on either side. There was tremendous strain on the hull, but I wasn't that afraid of it, as usual in such circumstances it was the rudder and propeller that we were most afraid of. We kept the propeller running to try to keep the ice a little away from the rudder, but it was no use. The ice was so tightly packed that even at full speed we didn't see the slightest hint of propeller water. The rudder was pressed from board to board every time the ship was thrown sideways into the ice, the safety valve on the steering gear squealed like a stuffed pig. Once we had a small blue spot under the stern that was slapping against the rudder, and now it looked really hopeless, but we managed to blow it into small pieces with dynamite in the end.

When the swells were at their worst, the floorboards in the engine room would pop up and the decks and deck beams would spring up so that it was easily visible. The strain was colossal, but it was still not what we feared, we knew that the ship was solid. But right to lee of us and very close by there was a small iceberg that was slowly but surely approaching as the ice packed even more. If we aimed and aimed, the direction would not change, and it was only a matter of time before we would get it right into the side if the conditions did not change. When that happened, the ship would be finished within minutes, there was no doubt about it.

On October 13, the situation was very precarious all day long. During the night the wind increased to a strong gale from the VNW, and the swell gained tremendous force. The ship took a beating that is indescribable. Twice, with great difficulty, we managed to break free of the sound flakes that splashed under the starboard spar and threatened the rudder and propeller. The iceberg on the lee side was getting closer and closer, but it was not going fast, the distance was now about 20 meters when the ship sang on the swells. It was quite clear that if the weather did not change for the better at the very first, we would never get the ship out of here. In the morning, everyone was told to get ready to go on the ice if necessary. Later in the day, we prepared all the survival equipment we could think of.
Two fishing boats were made ready so that they could be launched at a moment's notice. There were not many flat, solid ice floes to be found, as almost all the ice had been ground to slush and lumps, but we were lucky and found a fairly large, solid ice floe about 100 metres from the ship, and we planned to use this as a landing place for the helicopter. There we towed 8 barrels of aviation fuel and various other equipment, and the helicopter was warmed up and ready to take off on the platform. We were 25-30 miles from the nearest land on the South Orkneys, and we hoped that we would be able to get there by helicopter if the ship went down. In Antarctic Pilot we found information that there was a disused meteorological station there and that there was supposed to be an emergency depot there, so we could only hope that it would hold up, because it was certainly old.

For me, this day was the worst dilemma I've ever had in my 25-30 years as a skipper. The question was whether I should raise the alarm and try to call for help while we had the possibility of radio contact. I realized that the situation was now, everything on board would be out of order as soon as we came into direct contact with the iceberg, so it would be too late. The same with the helicopter, it was ready to go on the platform, and we had to make sure to get it away before we came into contact with the iceberg, because then it would be thrown between the walls. We also didn't have to take off too early, because it was heavily dependent on the power source on board the boat. If it had first hit the ice, it had to be kept running so that it wouldn't get cold. We conferred with the pilots and mechanics, and they thought the transport to land would go well.

I was still a bit worried, as a lot could happen along the way, you would have to fly 9-10 times to get everyone to land, there was a question of visibility, there could be technical difficulties, when the ship was gone there wasn't much to help you with in that case. Something else I thought about was the drift of the ice. To my great surprise, there had been very little drift in the ice these days we had been stuck, with the strong wind we had it is difficult to understand why. What I was now afraid of was that the ice would start to drift normally and then the distance to land could soon be doubled or tripled. However, all of this was something we could do nothing about, it just had to stand the test.

We had daily radio contact with Falkland Radio for the exchange of weather reports, and we had that today as well, and now I got the station chief on the phone and put him in touch with our doubtful situation. I said frankly that I had very little faith that we would save the ship, I explained to him carefully about our evacuation plans, I asked him to check discreetly whether there were other ships in this area, but by all means not to let anything about the situation come out publicly before he possibly lost all contact with us.

I knew only too well what a stir there would be if newspapers and radio got wind of the situation, but at the same time, the first and foremost thing to consider was the best possible safety for the crew of 25 men.

We also had contact on medium wave with the weather station on Signy Island, about 50 miles NW of us. We hoped to be able to reach this station on the lifeboat radio if necessary. – Falkland Radio came in later and was able to tell us that there were 12 Japanese whaling boats ready to sail on South Georgia, all 16 knot boats, which was good news for us.
During the evening and night the wind died down a little and the swell subsided a little. The distance to the iceberg remained constant, and towards nightfall we managed to sail a ship's length ahead so we had a little more distance to the mountain. – After the 14th the swell increased again somewhat, and we were stuck again.
On the 15th we advanced 5-6 ship lengths, and we now expected to get out of the pinch. – In the days that followed we pushed everything we could towards the edge, but we made little progress. The ice on the edge was constantly shifting, sometimes the edge was as close as 2 miles, at other times it was 4-5 miles away.
On the 17th, the helicopter flew a circuit of over 100 miles. All it saw was big, ugly ice and a few single seals here and there out towards the ice edge. There were no cubs to be seen.

On the 18th we discovered that the rudder had been damaged, the rudder stock was probably somewhat twisted, perhaps about 10 degrees.
On the 22nd we finally managed to make our way through to open water.
I had pondered quite a bit about what could have been the cause of the ice situation we had had during this time when we had been stuck. We were not unfamiliar with tightly packed southerly points from the Newfoundland field when there was a strong northeasterly wind, but we had never seen anything that came halfway up to this. Only once had we had something similar, but nowhere near as hard. It was on the first trip with the "Polar Sea", we were fishing off the Labrador coast about 30 miles from land when we got a strong northeasterly storm. The ice drifted south, and the ice we were in was pressed down between Belle Isle and Labrador Land. There was a heavy swell, and there was a tremendous pressure on the ice, which was ground up to slush and lumps with the occasional blue ice piece here and there. Then it happened that we were stuck, even though the swell was strong. It was still not half as hard as what we had experienced here. It was difficult to understand why the ice could pack so incredibly tightly here, where there was no land to hold it back. The only explanation I can find is that there must have been a strong current going against the wind, and that may be true to some extent, given that we changed very little position during the time we were stuck. But then the wind was not actually against the edge of the ice, but rather slanted along the edge, and at southern latitudes the ice would drift 30-40 degrees to the left of the wind, which was west and NNW all the time. That would mean ice drift in a northeast or east-northeasterly direction, which would take the ice out to sea more or less.

Another thing is that according to the information we had from the Hydrographic Office atlas, the current in this area should be moving in a northeasterly direction, thereby causing ice drift even further north. Based on observations from a number of observation points right here in our area, the current should be moving in a northeasterly direction at a speed of 0.4-0,5 knots.
Only one thing is certain: the Weddell Sea is a capricious ocean from which one can expect the worst at any time. Many have been fooled there before, and not everyone has come out of it as well as we did.

In the days that followed we walked along the edge looking for seals and usable ice. It looked rather hopeless. In fact, the edge was so tightly packed that we could not get more than a few ship lengths in. In other places there were headlands torn out, but there it was just big, ugly, washed-off ice, often loose and exposed. We saw few seals, we picked one here and one there out on the edge, and we could see that there were no longer any pregnant females, it was mostly young animals and males we found now. The casting was probably over or in progress now, but the question was where it would go.
We never got an answer to that question. The prolonged strong westerly wind had completely destroyed the ice conditions in the area where we were now staying. We had pinned our hopes on the large pack ice with good catch ice where we crossed around the first month. There were also lots of pregnant otters there, and we had the opportunity to follow the development of the young from day to day, but when the time was near when we expected the casting to begin, we had a westerly wind storm that put the entire pack of ice out to sea so that it began to disintegrate. After that, we were stuck for 11 days during what was probably the casting season, and were prevented from finding new ground. We just had to face it that the bad weather we had just encountered during this important period had probably ruined our trip for us.
We sent the helicopter out on several reconnaissance flights, but found the same miserable conditions wherever they went. On October 29th, we found two crabeater pups on the ice with their mothers. We estimated one to be 4-6 days old. It had milk in its stomach, the umbilical cord was gone, it had not developed teeth. It was lying with its mother, but it was not on the cast sheet. It was clear that it had been in the water with its mother. The other was probably at least two weeks old, it also had milk in its stomach, but it was very large and well developed. From what we had seen before, the pups were very large and well developed before birth, and it could perhaps be that they followed their mother into the water after a short time and that the seal did not gather in large groups during the cast, like the harp seal. This was also a question we did not get an answer to.
We were now weighing what to do. It was clear that we would have to travel quite a distance to find other ice and fishing conditions. The casting season was probably over, the bunkers were getting low after all the hard work to get out of the jam, and with a rudder damage that we didn't know how bad it could be, we thought it best to end the trip.

On October 31st we made our last aerial reconnaissance without observing anything positive. We then dismantled the helicopter and cleared the sea everywhere. In the twilight of November 1st we left the ice and set course for Montevideo. Departure S.6020 V 4015. It became clear when we got into the sea that due to the damage to the rudder the autopilot would not work, so we had to steer by hand for the rest of the trip. Otherwise everything worked fine except for the radar, which we could well need now, as there was poor visibility at the beginning and many icebergs in the water.

We arrived in Montevideo on November 7. Marine scientist Ørritsland, pilot Bergerud and mechanic Svensson disembarked here and flew home. – On November 10, we went to sea again. Arrived in Bergen on December 7. We landed the helicopter with the associated equipment, before continuing on to Brandal to unload the skins, a total of 1125 skins and 71 tons of blubber. – We had a few specimens of all the seal species that existed in Antarctica, weddle seal, grey seal, fur seal, elephant seal, leopard seal and crabeater. Of these, the leopard seal was definitely the one with the finest skin quality, both the adults and the young. The crabeater cubs were probably not so bad, but of the adult animals there was hardly a single one that was not disfigured by killer whales. They had 5-6 stripes from killer whale teeth down their backs and sides, either as fresh wounds or as old scars. The leopard, on the other hand, had no such wounds. This predator was certainly able to take on the killer whale, it had a set of teeth that could scare the life out of anyone, and it can move at incredible speed through the water. The killer whale is without a doubt the seal's worst enemy.

It sometimes happened on the Newfoundland field that groups of them would come into the ice, and the seals would panic and escape onto the ice as quickly as possible. Sometimes they would huddle together on the floe so that they would continue to sink, and they would not run away from people if they ever got that close in such circumstances. The orcas that gathered here were probably not the intelligent, good-natured kind that chat and laugh and play, as many conservationists tell us.

This was a bloodthirsty gang of murderers who were out to kill for fun and who hunted in packs in a rather cunning manner.

– Another strange example we saw occasionally down in Antarctica, inside the fast ice. There would be flocks of penguins that were wondering about going into the sea, but they would stop on the ice edge and stand there discussing the matter for a while. They were probably afraid there might be killer whales in the water. So they could just take one of the flock and push him into the sea. If it went well, the rest of the flock would follow. Because the penguin was probably just as dangerous as the leopard seal, I would think.

On December 15th we arrived at Bolsønes Verft for docking. When we got to the slip and saw the rudder, we could hardly believe what we saw, we would have been more than lucky to have brought it home. The rudder blade itself was twisted and dented so much that it was hard to believe, the heavy rudder stock of 9 inch special steel was not only twisted, but it was stretched at the edge of the casing so that it had to be burned off to get it out. The steering gear itself (Frydenbø) was pressed sideways about one cm and the approximately 30 heavy fastening bolts (1 1/4 inch?) were correspondingly stretched without breaking. It was almost a miracle that nothing was broken under the colossal strain it received when it was thrown from side to side by the ice pressure in the swell for a couple of days. – You can’t get better advertising for Frydenbø steering gears.

(Article written for the book "On the Ground", Ishavsmuseet 2003)