A final act of pure courage
QUESTION Was the body of polar explorer Captain Oates recovered?
Lawrence edward Grace ‘Titus’ Oates was a member of the ill-fated Terra nova expedition to the South Pole, led by captain robert Falcon Scott.
a cavalry officer, Oates had served in the Second Boer war, during which he had been recommended for the Victoria cross and mentioned in despatches by Lord Kitchener. He was recruited for Scott’s polar expedition to look after the horses.
a team of five men, including Scott, reached the pole on January 17, 1912 — just over a month after norwegian explorer roald amundsen — and embarked on the brutal return journey. By March, and incapacitated by frostbite, gangrene and malnutrition, Oates chose certain death instead of compromising the expedition and to save his companions from the burden of caring for him.
He walked out of his tent into a blizzard, having uttered the famous words: ‘I am just going out and may be some time.’
Scott recorded in his diary on March 15, 1912: ‘we knew that poor Oates was walking to his death, but though we tried to dissuade him, we knew it was the act of a brave man and an english gentleman.’
Scott, Dr e. a. wilson and Lt H. r. Bowers, royal Indian Marine, struggled on for another 20 miles. Their frozen bodies were discovered by a search party on november 12, 1912. Oates’s body was never found, though his reindeer skin sleeping bag was recovered and is in the Scott Polar research Institute in cambridge.
a cairn of snow was built around the three corpses and their belongings. a cross made of skis was added to the top.
Because it was erected on the vast ross Ice Shelf, which is constantly fed by glaciers, the bodies are now believed to be 50 ft beneath the surface.
The whereabouts of the body of the fifth member of the party, Petty Officer edgar evans, who died following an accident on February 17, 1912, is unknown.
emma Crane, Cheltenham, Glos.
QUESTION Why should we use a higher gear when driving in icy conditions?
Rule 231 of the Highway code states: ‘Drive extremely carefully when the roads are icy. avoid sudden actions as these could cause loss of control.’
It recommends: ‘You should drive at a slow speed in as high a gear as possible; accelerate and brake very gently.’
Skids occur when the force a wheel is exerting against the road surface exceeds its grip. Once in a skid, the driver has no control over the car.
when grip is reduced due to rain, standing water, snow, ice or even a poor road surface, you need to moderate acceleration, braking and steering.
In icy conditions, it is easy to press the accelerator too hard and simply spin the wheels, instead of moving forward. using a higher gear helps prevent this by reducing the acceleration available.
new cars are fitted with anti-lock braking systems and electronic stability control, which cut in when loss of grip is detected. They try to restore grip by reducing the drive or braking to one or more wheels, so the driver has control over the direction of motion and might be able to avoid an accident.
However, it is always better not to lose grip in the first place — an essential skill of driving.
Deliberate loss of grip is a rally-driving technique and is certainly not recommended on the public highway!