Fedor petrovich litke and his expeditions to novaya zemlya
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23 wind forced Litke to start tacking. Despite his best efforts, however, a strong current out of the strait, combined with the easterly gale, carried the brig further out to sea. Rather than wasting time in further fruitless tacking he decide to head north and to pursue another of his objectives, namely reaching and identifying Mys Zhelaniya. 45
Setting a direct course for Poluostrov Admiral’teystva, Litke was within sight of that peninsula by the morning of the 29 th but then the wind died and the brig was becalmed for an entire day. In the evening a northeasterly wind arose, forcing it to run off to the northwest until the land was barely visible. On the morning of the 30 th , however the wind swung more into the north and Litke was able to head back towards land, aiming for Ostrov Vilyalm. At noon on the 30 th , however, the observed latitude was 76°41′30″N, which was some 83 km north of Litke’s dead-reckoning position, the result of assistance from a strong north-flowing current. By 10 pm the Krestovyye Ostrova were in sight to the SEbE. By the early hours of the 31 st , however, Litke was groping his way northeastwards in dense fog. A clearing around 5 am revealed the coast only 8 km to leeward and he wisely swung away. Then at noon, still in fog, a change in the colour of the water and a sounding of only 64 m made him swing away from the coast once again. To this point, at a latitude of 76°30′N, no ice had been encountered but at 8 am on 1 August the brig passed several icebergs and that evening a drop in the air temperature and a marked calming of the sea despite a fairly strong wind were signs that there must be ice fairly close to windward in the fog. Shortly before midnight the edge of the pack was sighted, extending from NNW to SSE – almost exactly the same location where Litke had encountered it in 1822. When the weather cleared, to the south Litke spotted, at a great distance, the cape which he had mistaken for Mys Zhelaniya the previous year and was forced to admit that it was Mys Nassau and that the islands which he had taken to be the Oranskiye Ostrova were in fact the Ostrova Barentsa. Recognising, reluctantly, that the ice eliminated any chance of reaching Mys Zhelaniya, Litke started back southwards, initially in clear weather with light winds. Over the next few days calms alternated with near gale-force winds. Thus on the morning of 5 August Novaya
was sighted and by 4 pm the brig was rounding Sukhoy Nos. It entered the mouth of Matochkin Shar at 6 pm on 6 August and at 9 pm dropped anchor in the lee of Baran’iy Mys, where it had anchored in 1822. 46 Next day Leytenant Lavrov set off in the cutter to survey Matochkin Shar; his instructions were to focus on the north shore since Rozmyslov had hugged the south shore. On reaching the eastern entrance he was to assess the ice conditions in the Kara Sea. Meanwhile Yefremov was ordered to make a detailed survey of the western entrance of the strait while Litke made careful observations to determine the exact location of a site on shore and studied the geology. He found that the bedrock was shale with large quartz veins. His observations revealed the location of the site to be 73°19′33″N; 54°20′06″E; compass variation 10°30′E; and dip of the needle 78°46′. His tidal observations revealed that the tidal period was 10 hours 1 minute and the tidal range at spring tide (full moon) 60 cm. 47
ibid, p. 225. 46 ibid, p. 230. 47 ibid, p. 233 24 The crew, meanwhile, were kept busy tightening the rigging and filling the water barrels. Attempts were made at fishing with nets but without success. Hunters were also sent out but they had little luck, bagging only two swans and winging a jaeger and a snowy owl. On the night of the 9 th /10 th three reindeer were spotted on the south shore and Litke sent a party of hunters after them. They were unsuccessful, however, returning with just a few ducks. On the 11 th some walrus swam past, heading west; a party set off after them by boat in hopes that they might haul out somewhere near, but they too were unsuccessful, returning with just a few more ducks. Lavrov returned on the 11 th , having reached the eastern end of the strait; his crew had had to row all the way, having encountered headwinds in both directions. On the way east progress had been further hampered by a very strong west-flowing current which had almost brought the boat to a complete halt in the narrows near the middle of the strait. Lavrov had encountered some ice near the east end of the strait but had managed to fight his way through to Mys Vykhodniy, the northern cape at the eastern entrance. As far as he could see the Kara Sea was still completely ice-covered, the ice abutting on the coast both to the north and south. In light of this Litke abandoned any idea of taking Novaya Zemlya through the strait with a view to surveying the Kara Sea coast. Lavrov had encountered herds of walrus in the eastern part of the strait and had killed a bear, whose skin he brought with him. He had seen a number of dilapidated huts on the shores of the strait and one, at Mys Drovyaniy (near the southeastern cape at the east end) which appeared to be almost habitable. There were large amounts of driftwood scattered along the shores and he and his men had enjoyed cheerful fires every night. By Lavrov’s measurement the length of Matochkin Shar, from Mys Baran’iy to Mys Vykhodniy, was 47 Italian miles, i.e. 85.5 km, just 5.5 km longer than Rozmyslov’s measurement. 48 Aiming to head south to survey the south coasts of Novaya Zemlya Litke weighed anchor at 4 am on 12 August and headed out to sea. Almost immediately he ran into gale-force westerlies and heavy rain; afraid of being driven onto a lee shore he clawed his way westwards and northwestwards. By the early hours of the 13 th the brig was somewhere off Sukhoy Nos, i.e. well to the north of its starting point. By the morning of the 14 th the wind had swung into the east; taking advantage of this Litke started running south and by 8 am on the 15 th was within sight of Severnyy Gusiniy Mys and by noon the brig was off the middle of Gusinaya Zemlya. Anticipating foul weather on the basis of a rapid drop in the barometer Litke then held further offshore. He approached the coast again next morning and by the evening of the 16 th Yuzhniy Gsiniy Mys was in sight, but then another gale on the 17 th drove the brig some 40 km offshore again. It then worked its way back eastwards again and soon after noon on the 18 th the low, dark, smooth rocks of the Ostrova Podrezov in the mouth of Kostin Shar were sighted. From there Novaya Zemlya continued to run south along the west coast of Ostrov Mezhdusharskiy. At the south end of this island lies what must once have been a separate islet, now joined to Ostrov Mezhdusharskiy by double spits enclosing a lagoon, Laguna Obmannyy Shar [Fraudulent Strait Lagoon]. The name refers to the numerous ships which have been wrecked here. Mistaking this for the southern entrance to Kostin Shar, and unable to see the low spits until the last minute, many ships have piled up here. Spotting the danger, however, Litke rounded Kostin Nos, the southern tip of this southern ‘island’, and at 9 pm dropped anchor 6.5 km southwest of Mys Krestovyy, the low southeastern tip, identifiable by a large number of crosses. 48 ibid, p. 231. Yüklə 1,69 Mb. Dostları ilə paylaş:
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