The wreckage of the massive Airship Italia’s cabin lay strewn across the frozen tundra, along with nine men from its crew, some in critical condition. Meanwhile, the aircraft’s balloon component, loosed from the cabin by the impact of the crash, drifted away in the violent Arctic wind with several of crewmembers still aboard. The airship’s captain, the Italian pilot and General Umberto Nobile, lay helpless on the large ice pack, having just moments before watched the crash through a porthole window in the Italia’s cabin. His arm and leg were broken, and he felt a tightness in his chest, assuming he was done for.
The other survivors who were healthy enough to walk scavenged the crash site for supplies, and miraculously located two pre-packed survival kits and the small wireless transmitter they had brought along in case they needed to broadcast a distress signal back to Norway, where they had launched from. Using the materials they recovered - food, tents, weapons, and warm clothes - the survivors from the ship’s cabin set up a small camp and hunkered down to rest and prepare for the long haul on the drifting ice pack as they waited for rescue from their doomed attempt to reach the North Pole…
- As images and footage of actual events are not always available, we sometimes utilizes similar historical images and footage for dramatic effect. All content is researched, produced, and presented in historical context for educational purposes. -
