People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 November 1896 — Nansen’s Predictions. [ARTICLE]

Nansen’s Predictions.

Nearly everything IN ansen piedicted about his journey has come true. He said he expected to cross the unknown polar area, and he has done it. He foretold exactly the general direction in which his ship would drift while fast in the ice, but it is not certain that he correctly assigned the cause of this drift. ... Nan sen invented the model of the “Pram,” making her hull round and slippery like an eel, with no corners or sharp edges for the ice to seize upon. She is the strongest vessel ever used in Arctic exploration. He said that pressure would simply lift her on the ice, and so her bottom. near the keel, was made almost flat, in order that she might not capsize while on the icy surface; and her screw and rudder were also ingeniously protected. The many experts who said her design would not save the “Fram” from instant destruction were mistaken; for she met these resistless ice pressures, and they merely lifted her out of her cradle and she rested safely on the surface. Nansen said that, owing to the probable predominance of water in the far. north, he expected to find there higher temperatures than along the north coast of Asia. This remarkable prediction has been fulfilled. The lowest tempature observed on the “Fram” was 61+ degrees Fahrenheit, w T hile farther south, in the Kara Sea, —63 degrees, and at the mouth of the Lena River—94 degrees have been registered.—Cyrus C. Adams in McClure’s Magazine for December.