His plan was to take a suitable balloon, and the apparatus for inflating it, to a place as far north as a ship could safely go, then to fill the balloon and wait for a favourable wind which should carry him right over the Pole and beyond until inhabited country was reached. By the summer of 1896 all his preparations were complete. His balloon was an enormous one, capable of holding 162,000 cubic feet of gas, and was fitted with a rudder sail and a long trail-rope, by means of which Andrée hoped to be able to some extent to steer his course across the ice. Two companions were to accompany him on his voyage, and on June 7th the party embarked with all their apparatus, and were conveyed to Spitzbergen.
They landed at Dane’s Island, where their first work was to build themselves a shed. They then got their gas-making apparatus into order, and filled the balloon, and by the 27th of July were all ready for a start. But the wind was contrary, and day after day they waited in vain for a change, until at last the captain of the ship which had brought them warned them they would be frozen in for the winter unless they returned without delay. Very reluctantly, therefore, they abandoned their venture for that year, and went home, leaving behind them the shed and gas-generator for another occasion.
The winter passed, and by the end of next May they were back again at Dane’s Island. Their shed and apparatus had suffered damage during their absence, and had to be repaired, and their preparations were not complete until the end of June. But again the wind was contrary, and for three weeks more they waited impatiently. All this while the balloon remained inflated, and by the long delay must have lost a considerable amount of its buoyancy. At last the wind changed, and though it was not exactly in the direction they wished, being a little west of south, instead of due south, Andrée felt he could wait no longer, and at half-past two in the afternoon of July 11th set sail, with his two friends, on his daring voyage.
What followed is soon told. Eleven days later one of the carrier pigeons taken by Andrée in his balloon was picked up by a fishing-boat off Spitzbergen. Fastened to it was the following message:—“July 13th, 12.30 P.M. 82° 2´ north lat., 15° 5´ east long. Good journey eastward. All goes well on board.—Andrée.”
This was the latest news ever heard of the ill-fated voyagers. Later on two of Andrée’s buoys, thrown out from the balloon, were found; but the messages these contained were dated on the evening of July 11th, only a few hours after the start. If the date of the first found message can be relied on, it would seem that after forty-eight hours Andrée’s balloon was still sailing well, and he had already accomplished the longest voyage aloft ever made.
Of his subsequent fate, and that of his companions, nothing is known. Search expeditions have failed to find any trace of them or of the balloon, and the many rumours received have been proved to be false. There can be no possible reason to doubt that these brave men perished in their daring attempt, and that their bones lie in the Arctic Sea or in the waste of ice and snow that surrounds the Pole.
CHAPTER VI
THE AIRSHIP
So far in our story we have traced the origin and progress of the balloon, showing how from small beginnings it has grown to be an important invention, of great use to the scientific observer, the soldier, and the explorer, and the means of teaching us much fresh knowledge.
But in spite of the high hopes of early aeronauts, and the extravagant prophecies made when the first balloons ascended into the sky, it has long been evident that the balloon alone has not solved the problem of human flight or accomplished the conquest of the air. An ordinary balloon is, in fact, nothing more than a mere lifting machine, no more capable of sailing the sky, in the proper sense of the word, than a cork floating in the water is capable of sailing the sea. It has no movement of its own, but drifts simply at the mercy of the wind, and quite beyond control. By the discharge of ballast, or by the letting out of gas, the aeronaut can indeed cause it to rise or sink at pleasure, and sometimes when two currents of air are blowing aloft in different directions at the same time he may, by passing from one to the other, “tack” his balloon to some extent across the sky. Otherwise he has no power of guiding or directing it in the least degree, and should he lose sight of the earth above the clouds, has even no method of telling in which direction he is travelling.