SALOMON

AUGUST

See also:

• ANDREE, KARL (1808-1875)
• SALOMON AUGUST ANDREE (1854-1897 ?)

ANDREE (1854-1897 ?)  , Swedish engineer, was born at Grenna, on Lake Vetter, on the 18th of October 1854 . After education at the Stockholm technical college, he studied aeronautics, and in 1895 elaborated a plan for crossing the north polar region by a balloon which should be in some degree dirigible by sails and trailing ropes . After an abortive effort in 1896, the winds being contrary, he started with two companions from Danes Island, Spitsbergen, on the I1th of July 1897 . The party was never seen, again, nor is the manner of its fate known . Of several expeditions sent in search of it, the first started in November 1897, on the strength of a report of cries of distress heard by shipwrecked sailors at Spitsbergen; in 1888 and 1899 parties searched the north Asiatic coast and the New Siberia Islands; and in May 1899 Dr Nathorst headed an expedition to eastern Greenland . None was successful, and only scanty information was obtained or inferred from the discovery of a few buoys (on the west of Spitsbergen, northern Norway, Iceland, &c.) which the balloonists had arranged to drop, and a message taken from a carrier pigeon despatched from the balloon two days after its ascent . There were also messages in two of the buoys, but they dated only from the day of the ascent . The others were empty .