#knut fraenkel

[othmeralia]

The Andrée's Arctic Balloon

Photo: Perspektivet Museum

In 1897, a group of Swedish explorers went to the North Pole in an air balloon and disappeared. Their fate would not be known for 30 more years. Tendrils of this story can be found in the letters between Svante Arrhenius and Georg Bredig.

The Andrée's Arctic balloon expedition took place in 1897 in which S. A. Andrée, Knut Frænkel, and Nils Strindberg voyaged by hydrogen balloon from Svalbard in July 1897, the plan was to fly over the north pole, as a way to advance Sweden's place in the race to the north pole.

Svante Arrhenius tells Georg Bredig about his friend Strindberg’s impending expedition in a letter written only months before the expedition.

“Strindberg is supposed to leave his bride and travel with Andrée to the North Pole with the 4th version of the Perpetuum mobile (they leave on May 17th).” - Letter from Svante Arrhenius to Georg Bredig, May 1899

On July 21, 1897, Arrhenius wrote

“One topic of lively discussion here is the polar expedition and how its three explorers are faring. The trip may take a month or maybe even longer. Perhaps they are sitting in snowdrifts and cannot travel further. Such a situation must be unpleasant.”

Letter from Svante Arrhenius to Georg Bredig

Andree was Sweden's first balloonist and proposed the expedition. Fraenkel was a Swedish engineer and Strindberg was a Swedish scientist and photographer. Unfortunately, the expedition was not completed and all three expedition members perished.

The balloon quickly lost hydrogen within the first two days of the expedition and crashed into a pack of ice, leaving the explorers in Svalbard. In October 1897 the three men made it to Kvitøya (White Island) in Svalbard. The island is almost completely covered in an ice cap and uninhabited. The three men were not able to survive the harsh arctic weather and perished.

Posing with the wreck (via Tekniska museet)

No one knew the fate of the explorers until August 5, 1930, when, due to a particularly warm summer, sealers could access the island. There they found the remains of the three men, their boat, journals, and exposed rolls of film that Stringbeg had taken. 93 photographs were able to be developed.

The photographs capture the balloon’s crash and the months following. The photographs show the camps they set up, hunting polar bears, and other realities of living in the arctic.

Photo: Neil Strindberg

To see more photos that have been developed visit

To learn more about the Papers of Max and Georg Bredig visit the Technical Museums Flickr

#photography #history #archives #exploration #arctic exploration #S. A. Andrée #Nils Strindberg #Knut Fraenkel #svalbard #Nils Gustaf Ekholm #othmeralia

[all-action-all-picture]

Epic Flights No. 6 - North with the Eagle. Back page feature from Hotspur in 1980.

#hotspur #epic flights #terry patrick #solomon andree #ornen #nils strindberg #knut fraenkel #1897 #1980 #back page feature #11jul #06dec

[hauntedbystorytelling]

Nils Strindberg :: Örnen efter landningen. Ur serien Ingenjör Andrées luftfärd. Den 14/7 1897. | src Moderna Museet

Nils Strindberg :: The Gondola after the Landing, 14 July, 1897. From the series The Flight of the Eagle | src Moderna Museet

Nils Strindberg :: The Örnen (Eagle) after the Landing. From the series The Flight of the Eagle; 14 July, 1897. | src Moderna Museet

Andrée and Knut Frænkel with the crashed balloon on the pack ice, of the disastrous Andrée’s Arctic Balloon expedition, 1897 [Photographed by the third expedition member, Nils Strindberg. The exposed film for this photograph and others from the failed 1897 expedition were recovered in 1930.]

#nils strindberg #arctic expedition #crashed balloon #accident #failure #north pole #hot air balloon #s.a. andree #knut fraenkel #explorer #1890s #salomon andree

[gravity-rainbow]

S. A. Andrée and Knut Fraenkel, standing next to their fallen balloon, 1897. Photographed by Nils Strindberg.

[barbosaasouza]

They Left For The Arctic Via Hot Air Balloon - Their Doomed Expedition Was Found Three Decades Later

On August 5, 1930, a group of men on a sealing expedition made their way across a rarely exposed ice sheet in the Svalbard Arctic Region along the Norwegian archipelago only to discover a scene that was long thought to have been lost to history. While the group, named the Bratvaag Expedition, had intended to hunt seals and study the structure of the glaciers in the area, they instead found themselves unintentionally excavating the remains of the disappeared S.A. Andre Expedition, which had gone missing in that very region of the Arctic over 30 years before. The 1897 balloon expedition was intended to be Sweden's opportunity to become the first country to officially explore the North Pole as part of an Arctic Race whose hype and nationalistic fervor in many ways parallelled that of the Space Race of the 1960s. Led by Salomon August Andre, a Swedish explorer and engineer, accompanied by Nils Strindberg and Knut Fraenkel, the expedition aimed to pilot a hot air balloon from Svalbard, Norway, to either Russia or Canada, passing directly over the North Pole in the process. Tragically, the three men who committed themselves to the S.A. Andre Expedition never made it back, and their fate was left unknown. Once their final camp was rediscovered in 1930, the mystery of what truly happened to the lost explorers finally began to unravel, with their bodies, goods, journals, and even film cameras preserved by the icy tundra. They Left For The Arctic Via Hot Air Balloon - Their Doomed Expedition Was Found Three Decades Later published first on https://superworldrom.tumblr.com/

[hauntedbystorytelling]

Nils Strindberg :: Titel saknas. Ur serien Ingenjör Andrées luftfärd / No title. From the series The Flight of the Eagle, 1897. | Moderna Museet

Nils Strindberg :: The Eagle (Örnen) has Landed on the Ice Floe, 14 July, 1897. From the series The Flight of the Eagle. | src Moderna Museet

Nils Strindberg :: Titel saknas. Ur serien Ingenjör Andrées luftfärd, 1897. | Moderna Museet

Salomon Andrée Arctic Expedition. Launched in 1897 and they were never heard of again; the balloon crash-landed and a group of three survived for 75 days trying to get back to land. The film laid buried in the ice untill it was recovered in 1930.

related post, here

#balloon #hot air balloon #crashed balloon #accident #fail #failure #north pole #expedition #1890's #nils strindberg #1890s #arctic expedition #salomon andree #knut fraenkel #failed expedition #ornen #the flight of the eagle

[barbosaasouza]

They Left For The Arctic Via Hot Air Balloon - Their Doomed Expedition Was Found Three Decades Later

On August 5, 1930, a group of men on a sealing expedition made their way across a rarely exposed ice sheet in the Svalbard Arctic Region along the Norwegian archipelago only to discover a scene that was long thought to have been lost to history. While the group, named the Bratvaag Expedition, had intended to hunt seals and study the structure of the glaciers in the area, they instead found themselves unintentionally excavating the remains of the disappeared S.A. Andre Expedition, which had gone missing in that very region of the Arctic over 30 years before. The 1897 balloon expedition was intended to be Sweden's opportunity to become the first country to officially explore the North Pole as part of an Arctic Race whose hype and nationalistic fervor in many ways parallelled that of the Space Race of the 1960s. Led by Salomon August Andre, a Swedish explorer and engineer, accompanied by Nils Strindberg and Knut Fraenkel, the expedition aimed to pilot a hot air balloon from Svalbard, Norway, to either Russia or Canada, passing directly over the North Pole in the process. Tragically, the three men who committed themselves to the S.A. Andre Expedition never made it back, and their fate was left unknown. Once their final camp was rediscovered in 1930, the mystery of what truly happened to the lost explorers finally began to unravel, with their bodies, goods, journals, and even film cameras preserved by the icy tundra. They Left For The Arctic Via Hot Air Balloon - Their Doomed Expedition Was Found Three Decades Later published first on https://superworldrom.tumblr.com/

[barbosaasouza]

Haunting Photos Discovered In The Arctic Ice 33 Years After A Doomed Expedition Set Out

Traveling in a hot air balloon is a dicey way to fly, even in the 21st century, on a non-breezy day. Traveling in a hot air balloon above the Arctic Ocean in 1897 is beyond perilous - it's quixotic. But in an attempt to discover and fly over the North Pole, Swedish engineer S.A. Andre and his companions, physics professor Nils Strindberg and civil engineer Knut Fraenkel, hoped to accomplish such a feat when they took off from Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago about 650 miles from the North Pole, in July 1897. After two days, their hydrogen-filled silk balloon, Ornen (Eagle), deflated rapidly and landed on ice. The balloonists weren't hurt, but they were ill-prepared for survival in stark icy climes, especially with colder weather approaching. The exact date they perished, and how, are not known, but the last entry in Andre's diary is October 8, 1897, when he noted they had to stay in their tent due to bad weather. They might have been felled by the cold weather and physical exhaustion; other possibilities include botulism or drowning. No one knew their fate until 33 years later, when sealers and scientists aboard the Norwegian sealing ship Bratvaag discovered the balloonists' frozen boat, camp, and cadavers. Among the men's belongings, they found journals kept by Andre and Fraenkel, along with Strindberg's camera and remarkably intact film. This list features some of the 93 photographs salvaged from Strindberg's camera. They are haunting, a reminder of harsh Arctic conditions - and the explorers who dare to venture there so the rest of us know how difficult survival can be. Haunting Photos Discovered In The Arctic Ice 33 Years After A Doomed Expedition Set Out published first on https://superworldrom.tumblr.com/

[barbosaasouza]

Haunting Photos Discovered In The Arctic Ice 33 Years After A Doomed Expedition Set Out

Traveling in a hot air balloon is a dicey way to fly, even in the 21st century, on a non-breezy day. Traveling in a hot air balloon above the Arctic Ocean in 1897 is beyond perilous - it's quixotic. But in an attempt to discover and fly over the North Pole, Swedish engineer S.A. Andre and his companions, physics professor Nils Strindberg and civil engineer Knut Fraenkel, hoped to accomplish such a feat when they took off from Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago about 650 miles from the North Pole, in July 1897. After two days, their hydrogen-filled silk balloon, Ornen (Eagle), deflated rapidly and landed on ice. The balloonists weren't hurt, but they were ill-prepared for survival in stark icy climes, especially with colder weather approaching. The exact date they perished, and how, are not known, but the last entry in Andre's diary is October 8, 1897, when he noted they had to stay in their tent due to bad weather. They might have been felled by the cold weather and physical exhaustion; other possibilities include botulism or drowning. No one knew their fate until 33 years later, when sealers and scientists aboard the Norwegian sealing ship Bratvaag discovered the balloonists' frozen boat, camp, and cadavers. Among the men's belongings, they found journals kept by Andre and Fraenkel, along with Strindberg's camera and remarkably intact film. This list features some of the 93 photographs salvaged from Strindberg's camera. They are haunting, a reminder of harsh Arctic conditions - and the explorers who dare to venture there so the rest of us know how difficult survival can be. Haunting Photos Discovered In The Arctic Ice 33 Years After A Doomed Expedition Set Out published first on https://superworldrom.tumblr.com/