Leopard seal
Geoffry Williams found this site while tracking down my father.
He last saw him in 1964, fixing the Radar on the ship that took him to Antarctica.
I have placed his story below, and as an entry in the thesaurus: Leopard seal.
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Here is a story sent to me by Geoffry Williams, who found my site while tracking down my father Noel, who he had last seen fixing the Radar on the ship that took him to Antarctica.
It’s a small world.
.
.
I went to Antarctica in 1964, leave of absence from AWA (granted to me by Sir Lionel Hooke) to Wilkes base (the old original base I believe it is mostly buried in ice now.)
As we were boarding the Nella Dan at Melbourne there was Noel in the wheelhouse fixing the Radar. The captain wanted Noel to repair the long-range echo sounder as well but there was no time. Noel said to the captain, Geoff would fix it for you on the way down, which I did.
We stayed there for 14 months. There were 23 people and 25 Huskies and what seemed like millions of Adelie penguins in many rookeries.
Another chap and myself took motor bikes; they were great for visiting the islands off shore when the sea was frozen for the winter. We could travel over 40 miles from shore. We always kept a wary eye out for fresh frozen ice as it was a long way to the bottom. We would visit many Weddell seals on the ice. They would lie around breather holes and sun them selves. They were very friendly and allow us to scratch them.
THE LEOPARD SEAL
There was occasional Leopard seals. One day we noticed the penguins were lined up along the ice shelf over the sea and would not enter. There was a leopard seal waiting. A Dennis Brophy and myself decided that we would capture the seal. Dennis tied some meat on a rope and I had a lasso. We walked the edge of the ice flow into the bay; Dennis dangled the meat in the water calling here seally. I stood next to him with my lasso. In an instant this huge head what looked like 3 foot long with a mouth open and full of huge Triple Crown teeth. It had no neck, just a wedge shape from the tip of its nose to its tail which looked to be at least 15 foot long and weigh about 600 pounds, it was huge and reared up level with my head. There was no way this thing could be lassoed. I can’t imagine what we were thinking of. We ran as fast as we could in our mucluks and bulky clothes. The seal took no notice of the bait, shot out of the water and came after us. He could move fast on the ice. Dennis and I were very careful not to slip over. We ran for the shore and the safety of the rocks. The seal circled us several times then gave up, headed back to the water taking the meat, rope and my lasso.
From Geoffrey Williams, Wilkes, 1964
HUSKIES
Our Doctor was Lyndon ??? One day we had to do a tooth extraction on an old Husky (Mucluk). The only anesthetic we had was ether. The dog died despite our best efforts and care. Next week one of the radio operators (we only had Morse code in those days). Dave Rodgers came down with appendicitis. We were very worried but he survived. Much to everybody’s relief.