1959 Winter Over Personnel of Wilkes Station
WILKES - Winter 1959 all IN on V3(58-59) Officer in charge: William Robert John Dingle Medical Officer: John Boda Cook: Albert Leonard Giddings Senior Diesel Mechanic: Hartley Ricketts Robinson, killed in tractor accident 7 July 59 Diesel Mechanic: H Brandt Diesel Mechanic: Cpl John Stanley Marsden Williams RAAF Air Frame Fitter who stayed at Wilkes?? Radio Supervisor: Allan Claude Marriner Radio Officer: Alynn Stuart Flett Radio Officer: Ross Lawrence Harvey Biologist: R Penny USARP Meteorologist: H L Hansen USARP Senior Weather Observer: William Henry (Harry) Alderdice Weather Observer: Kenneth Hardy Weather Observer: Ian Maxwell Tod Weather Observer or Electronics Technician?? H Nye USARP Physicist: John Victor Denholm Physicist: George Prosper De la Harpe Geophysicist: Robert Underwood
Eighteen expeditioners including three US personnel, overwintered. Four of the party had served previously with ANARE. On 4 May a doctor flew from Mirny to treat a seriously ill member of the Russian party.
Tragedy struck on 7 July when the senior diesel mechanic, H R Robinson, was killed in a tractor accident. Magnetic storms caused an 11-day radio black-out. A satellite station 80 km inland was occupied intermittently for glaciological and meteorological observations.
Reference "Antarctic Events Database" data of the Australian Antarctic Data Center
Wilkes 1959 Winter Crew
Large version of Wilkes base group photo 1959. Photo thanks to AAD Image Library.
