Adam's Bridge joining Sri Lanka and India

In 1980 and 1981, I worked two years in Southern India where I had a role of supervising the construction of 230 Red Cross funded cyclone shelters along the coastline of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. As I had to visit Ramanathapuram regularly, a site where we were building a cyclone shelter, I sometimes visited Rameswaram and from the tip of the island, would look across Palk Strait where the fabled Adam’s bridge or Rama Setu made legendary by the Ramayana, joined India to Sri Lanka. On Wednesday this week I was on the other side, at Mannar Island, and was able to look back in the other direction. I started looking for further information and found this excellent article below by Nimal Chandrasena called: 

A journey to Mannar and the ‘Dancing Islands’

“Imagine being on one of those legendary islands of ‘Adam’s Bridge’ or ‘Rama Setu’ of the Ramayana fame! Many centuries ago, this 30 km stretch was a natural bridge connecting Sri Lanka to the southern tip of India; now, the ocean has reclaimed its own, leaving only a chain of sprinkled islands. On December 9, 2011, I was standing on the second island of the chain of limestone shoals between the Rameshwaran Island, off the south-eastern coast of India’s Tamil Nadu and Mannar Island, off the north-western coast of Sri Lanka. If the legends and folklore regarding Rama, Seetha, Ravana and Hanuman are to be believed, this ‘bridge’ is a critical part of the Sri Lanka’s past. The Indian Ocean gently lapped my feet; and the warm sand ‘sucked’ at my feet; yet I walked effortlessly across several small islets, on the second island. Sea gulls swarmed, and marine life was plentiful. The marks of crabs and worms on the sand were everywhere, and fish were jumping out of water. The sand dunes are largely devoid of any vegetation and are mostly perpetually dry, because the sea is shallow. The setting sun, orange in haze, lit the scene, and the sea breeze was strong. The sailors, who accompanied us, waited patiently, giving us time to be ‘sucked in’ by the ambience of the place; and I am glad that India abandoned the Sethusamudran Project....” The historical poem Mahavamsa, compiled by a senior Buddhist monk Mahanama in 5th Century A.D. begins with an account of Vijaya and his ministers landing on Lanka-dvipa in 543 B.C. on the historical day of the Buddha’s passing away. Prince Vijaya and 700 of his followers were expelled by the King (Vijaya’s father – Sinhabahu, from their Vanga Kingdom, which is West Bengal; present day ‘Singur’, a town in the Gangetic delta), as a punishment for evil conduct towards villagers (Mahawamsa VI.34-47). It appears that the expellees, shamed by half-shaven heads, may have sailed from a Gangetic port, crossed the Palk Straits, and arrived in a part of the north-western coastline of Sri Lanka. When the Vijayan immigrants landed from their ships, they sat down wearied, resting their hands upon the ground. Since their hands were reddened by touching the dust of the red earth, they named the region, and the island, ‘Thambapanni’ (Mahawamsa Chapter VII.36). The Thambapanni area, also, called ‘Tammanava’ in Sinhalese, is clearly located in the Mannar District, although the exact landing location may never be known. For many years, I had longed to see Thambapanni, but it was part of the ‘no-go’ conflict-zone, since the 1980s. The Mannar peninsula, which consists of Mannar Town, and several smaller townships, including Talaimannar and Pesalai, were LTTE strongholds and caught in the middle of the civil war for at least three decades. The area was liberated in 2009. In December 2011, my wife and I, accompanied by some friends and a retired Brigadier Hiran Halangode, embarked on a journey to Mannar, to see these historical areas. Brig. Hiran, of the Gemunu Watch (1 GW), had once been the Area Commander in charge of security at Mannar during January to July 2000. We set out to visit ‘Thambapanni’, Mannar and the ‘Mannar Island’, the peninsula off Sri Lanka’s north-western coastline, on the way to the ‘Dancing Islands’ a series of sand islands that separate Sri Lanka from India across the Palk Straits On December 9, we travelled to Mannar via the Mannar-Medawacchiya Road (A14), from Anuradhapura. After a 2-3 hour drive, we arrived at Mannar, and then crossed the causeway to enter ‘Mannar Island’. The above Space images were taken by NASA appears above. Reveal a mysterious ancient bridge in the Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. The recently discovered bridge currently named as Adam’s Bridge is made of chain of shoals, c.18 mi (30 km) long. The bridge’s unique curvature and composition by age reveals that it is man made.   Adam’s Bridge The sandy islands, between India and Sri Lanka (see Plate 1), comprise the renowned Rama’s Bridge (Rama Setu) of Valmiki’s Ramayana fame. It appears that according to Islamic tradition, ‘Adam’ crossed these shoals in order to stand on one leg for 1,000 years on the mountain of Samanala (Adam’s Peak) as a penance for his indiscretion in Eden; hence, the name “Adam’s Bridge”. The actual ‘bridge’, which is about 30 km long, is a chain of limestone shoals between the Rameshwaran Island, off the south-eastern coast of Tamil Nadu and Mannar Island. Geological evidence suggests that the bridge is a former land connection between India and Sri Lanka. In the Ramayana epic, Rama built the bridge, with the assistance of the monkey god Hanuman, to allow passage for his army in the rescue of Sita from the demon King - Ravana of Lankadeepa. There are 16 sand islands, eight of which belong to Sri Lanka, and the other eight, to India. Our maritime boundary is at the middle point. The ferry service, from Talaimannar to Dhanushkody, used to operate through the Palk Straits in this area, until it was suspended in 1983, due to the conflict. Brig. Hiran reminisced about his visit to the eighth island in 2000, accompanied by the Sri Lanka Navy. On that occasion, he had hoisted the Sri Lankan National Flag on the island, which marks the end of Sri Lanka’s jurisdiction. By mid-afternoon, after some lunch at Pesalai, we reached Urumali beach, where the Navy has established a small-scale, commercial venture, which allows tourists to take a journey in a naval craft to see the ‘bridge’ for a fee of Rs. 600 per person. As part of the deal, you get life jackets, a bottle of water, and some food. All crafts are escorted by a second craft, with a Life Saver crew of young sailors.  We commenced our journey at 3.30 p.m., and headed for the second island. The naval officer’s remark that the sea journey would take 45 minutes in each direction was a bit off the mark; it took only about 25 minutes in each direction! The journey in the boat was delightful, despite the inevitable drenching one gets, as the craft moves at high speed (30 knots). It is a must to have your camera well covered, because everything gets dripping wet. As far as we could see, it was just the vast Indian Ocean surrounding us in all directions, except for the fast diminishing view of the Mannar coastline, behind us. Then, all of a sudden the distant series of sand dunes comes into view. One is mesmerised by the approaching vista of the sand dunes in the middle of the ocean. We stopped the boat engines about 200 metres short of the second island, in shallow water only a metre deep. The sailors then jumped off and dragged the boats onto the sandy shores, so that we could safely disembark. Imagine being on one of those islands! The sand dunes are mostly perpetually dry (Plate 2), as the sea in the area is very shallow, only one m to 10 m deep in places. They are largely devoid of any vegetation, except for the very rare seedling or juvenile plant. The sand dunes apparently keep ‘shifting’; hence, the term ‘dancing’ islets. Natural ocean processes were visibly at play, shifting and rolling the sand from one location to another. The series of islets was reportedly passable on foot up to the 15th century until storms deepened the channel. Some historical, temple records found in India apparently state that Rama’s Bridge was completely above sea level until it broke in a cyclone in 1480 A.D! Brig. Hiran explained that during the height of the conflict, refugees used this route to escape the trauma. People paid good money to be brought in by boats and to be dropped off at certain points, after which they walked across the islands to India, probably stopping and resting from time to time. We spent a memorable 45 minutes on the island, and enjoyed the little snack while chatting away, and being mesmerised by the ambience of the surroundings. We thought the paper bag, in which the snack was provided, was a good idea. But the styrofoam container which held a small piece of cake was excessive; a small paper wrapping would have been much better, perhaps with a printed message – To please return all litter back to the main shore. At some shoreline edges, the sand, mixed with some sort of clay, stuck to our feet and slippers; this could not be washed off, but had to be rubbed off. The sand was also tinged strongly black with ilmenite, the iron-black, titanium-containing mineral.By about 5 p.m., we returned to the Urumali beach. Again, the Navy crafts were efficient; the sailors extremely courteous. The return trip drenched us completely as the sea was choppy that afternoon, and the craft, moving at speed, ‘rolled’ with the waves. Before we left, we chatted with the Naval Officers, who were doing a fantastic job. Our feedback, on the ‘food packaging’, was likely appreciated. I felt elated that our coastline was protected in this way, and the Navy must be congratulated for the job they are doing. Thank ‘God’ for India abandoning the Sethusamudram Canal Project! Imagine what would have happened if India’s “Sethusamudram Project” had gone ahead. The somewhat atrocious suggestion was that a “shipping by-pass” should be constructed through ‘Adam’s Bridge’ by dredging the Gulf of Mannar straits to allow ships to get across to the Bay of Bengal by a shorter distance. As pointed out by ‘Taraki’ (Daily Mirror, October 6, 2004 (http://tamilnation.co/forum/sivaram/041006.htm), the project would have given India a firm grip on one of the world's most strategic and busiest sea-lanes. All the Middle East’s oil supplies are shipped from ports in the Persian Gulf to Southeast Asia through the sea lanes that pass through the Gulf of Mannar and curve off the western, southern and south-eastern coast of Sri Lanka. The known biodiversity values of the straits (i.e. extensive whale and fish populations and other marine resources) are so important in the region. The environmental impact of any dredging of the straits to make it navigable by large ships would have been immense. Historians, geologists, and marine scientists have also said that Rama Setu cannot be considered a man-made entity, in the absence of material evidence. Responding to this India’s Bharatya Janatha Party (BJP) railed, claiming that 'Ram Setu' is a sacred structure and any denial of God Rama’s existence constitutes "blasphemy and an insult to Hindus". I firmly believe that: “...Epics should be read as epics, not as authentic histories...” (See: http://sethusamudram.info/content/blogsection/6/33/); therefore, I am glad that the Project has been stultified, largely due to the politics being played out in India. Photo caption: Talaimannar, situated at the tip of Mannar Island, is where Nala Sethu (Adam's Bridge) - the string of coral reefs, shoals and shifting sandbanks that connect India with Sri Lanka - begins. This bridge was allegedly built by the monkey-general Hanuman, who then crossed over from India with his simian army in a series of giant leaps to rescue Sita. The above Space images were taken by NASA appears above. Reveal a mysterious ancient bridge in the Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. The recently discovered bridge currently named as Adam’s Bridge is made of chain of shoals, c.18 mi (30 km) long. The bridge’s unique curvature and composition by age reveals that it is man made.  http://www.ramayanaresearch.com/adams.html Before we left, we chatted with the Naval Officers, who were doing a fantastic job. Our feedback, on the food packaging’, was likely appreciated. I felt elated that our coastline was protected in this way, and the Navy must be congratulated for the job they are doing. Thank ‘God’ for India abandoning the Sethusamudram Canal Project!

Imagine what would have happened if India’s “Sethusamudram Project” had gone ahead. The somewhat atrocious suggestion was that a “shipping by-pass” should be constructed through ‘Adam’s Bridge’ by dredging the Gulf of Mannar straits to allow ships to get across to the Bay of Bengal by a shorter distance.

As pointed out by ‘Taraki’ (Daily Mirror, October 6, 2004 (http://tamilnation.co/forum/sivaram/041006.htm), the project would have given India a firm grip on one of the world's most strategic and busiest sea-lanes. All the Middle East’s oil supplies are shipped from ports in the Persian Gulf to Southeast Asia through the sea lanes that pass through the Gulf of Mannar and curve off the western, southern and south-eastern coast of Sri Lanka.

The known biodiversity values of the straits (i.e. extensive whale and fish populations and other marine resources) are so important in the region. The environmental impact of any dredging of the straits to make it navigable by large ships would have been immense.

Historians, geologists, and marine scientists have also said that Rama Setu cannot be considered a man-made entity, in the absence of material evidence. Responding to this India’s Bharatya Janatha Party (BJP) railed, claiming that 'Ram Setu' is a sacred structure and any denial of God Rama’s existence constitutes "blasphemy and an insult to Hindus". I firmly believe that: “...Epics should be read as epics, not as authentic histories...” (See: http://sethusamudram.info/content/blogsection/6/33/); therefore, I am glad that the Project has been stultified, largely due to the politics being played out in India.

Thanks to the Sunday Times Sri Lanka for permission to use this article.

2001 Gujarat earthquake 12 years later.

Today 26th of January 2013, those shattering memories cascade back of the Gujarat Earthquake.    I think  of that massive earthquake that struck Gujarat in India 12 years earlier.Here is an entry from  my diary.:

This 6 March 2001

The last 35 days have been the toughest of my life. More difficult than the North Pole expedition of 86, tougher than any mountain I've climbed. The first 5 days I had no sleep and since then for the last 30 days I've survived with a handful of hours every night. God knows how I've kept it up. Finally I am having this weekend off after having spent the last 14 days in Bhuj and Bachau. The dust, the dirt and stench of decomposing bodies permeates every pore of your body. People speak of a death toll of over 100,000 now which I can readily believe.

Running and coordinating a team of over 150 foreign delegates, supervising a 350 bed hospital plus two other field hospitals, getting vital relief goods out to over a million of the worst affected people, organising pycho-social counselling teams, orthoppaedic centres for those 2000 or more children who lost limbs has been a momentous challenge. We now have a team of highly trained professionals from 21 countries working together with the Indian Red Cross.

The Gernman Red Cross water sanitation team provided water for the 400 bed Finnish-Norwegian Red Cross hospital in Bhuj with the most up to date operating theatre and fantastic after care.

Phil Goff, our Minister of Foreign Affairs arrived last night and is travelling today with the NZ High Commissioner and a top level mission from NZ, from Delhi to Bhuj on our plane (which we have chartered for the first 3 months) to see our operation. As I desperately need some time to myself I have sent my deputy, Alan Bradbury, another NZ'er with them to show them round. I have dinner with them when they get back

Ablai my son and Naila are well. Naila's Mum is here at the moment which has been good as she has been able to support her while I've been away. But what was it like: .

In a narrow street behind a school in Bhuj town, a crowd of people wait anxiously for the arrival of an Indian Red Cross truck. It might not sound much but this truck will bring enough tents to provide shelter for a minimum of 2,300 people.

This distribution of tents is the second one of the day by the Indian Red Cross in Bhuj and the supply cannot meet the demand. Wherever one looks in the town, there is rubble. Bhuj has suffered terribly from the earthquake that hit western India two weeks ago. A town with a population of more than 150,000 people, it had one of the highest official death tolls with a minimum of 6,000 people killed while the number of injured was put at more than 60,000.

Among those waiting slightly apart is a woman holding a baby in a bundle. Hina Chanchal's husband is among the crowd of men surrounding Indian Red Cross officials to see if they are on the list of people who will be given tents.

Like all the others there, Hina lost her home in the earthquake. Although none of her family was killed, she saw the teenage daughter of a neighbour die after being trapped under the debris for several hours. She too had a narrow escape after having to run back inside the house to get her baby.

"It is almost as if God had put a protective corridor around me," she says. "Everyone in front of me and behind me had debris falling on them. I and my baby seemed to have a clear escape route."

Now she and her family of 8 that includes her mother and sister, live by the side of a street. The nights are cold in Gujarat at this time of the year and with each passing day spent living in the open, their desperation at their plight increases.

The mother and first baby born in the Red Cross Field Hospital, Red Cross Camp,Bhuj.

The sad tragedy is that there are so many people just like Hina. The crowd at the distribution point are vociferous and jostle each other but a small contingent of policemen keep them in check. The earthquake has left hundreds of thousands of people homeless. And all of them have their own desperate story.

One man, a welder who had his own business, no longer has a home or a business. After making sure his family won't have to sleep under the stars in a tent sent by the French Red Cross, he will leave them to search for work in a town 40 kilometres away.

The loss of everything that one has worked so hard for is difficult to take. But amidst the despair, there is a happy smile.

"The Red Cross is doing a fantastic job, keep up the good work," says Vijay Kantilal Mandalia as he leaves the area, carrying a tent in his arms.

He too has lost his building supplies business as well as his home.

"We were happy before, we had achieved something. Now we have nothing and are living on a road. Whatever possessions survived the earthquake, didn't survive the looters. The clothes I am wearing, I have borrowed, even the shoes," he says. "What shall we do? I just don't know."

Nevertheless he is relieved he has a tent. "I knew before the earthquake of the work of the Red Cross. I knew I could go to them for help," he says. "We don't need food, just shelter. Nobody else has given us shelter - until now."

The Indian Red Cross has so far distributed more than 67,300 blankets, 4,200 tents and 6,100 tarpaulins sent from donor Red Cross and Red Crescent societies. With the International Federation targeting 300,000 in its appeal for Gujarat's earthquake victims, the emergency relief operation is set to continue for a few months still.
What was it like in the first few days ? Patrick Fuller, who was our communications man in Delhi at the time, write this:
THE DAY THE EARTH SHOOK (2415 words)


Friday 26th January was meant to be a day of celebration across India. But as Republic Day parades were getting underway in towns and villages across the country at 8:40 am disaster struck. At the time I was making a cup of tea in my suburban Delhi home, looking forward to a leisurely day with my family. Suddenly there was a low rumbling which lasted for about 15 seconds. The kitchen cupboards shook and I could only assume that it must have been a 21 gun salute from the military parade. As I turned on the TV a news flash announced that an earthquake had struck the north eastern State of Gujarat with tremors being felt as far afield as the State of Uttar Pradesh, 1500 kms away. Initial casualties were reported to be low, 40-50 killed in Ahmedabad, the commercial capital of Gujurat. I instinctively called Bob McKerrow, the head of delegation and sent a quick e-mail to notify the disaster response unit at the Federation headquarters in Geneva. Information began to filter in from Indian Red Cross branches in the quake zone and by 10:30 it became apparent that the potential scale of this disaster could be awesome. A colleague from Reuters called to say the situation looked a lot worse and the death toll could reach into the thousands. Myself, Bob and Alan Bradbury, our regional disaster preparedness delegate, had already activated our operations cell at the delegation and within three hours of the disaster our colleagues in Geneva had issued an alert to the international donor community and a preliminary appeal was launched later that day for 2 million Swiss francs.

Arriving the next morning on the first flight in to Ahmedabad, Alan and myself couldn’t help wondering whether the disaster had been exaggerated. Buildings along the road from the airport to the Red Cross office appeared untouched and the everyday bustle in the streets seemed normal. The next few hours proved us wrong as we set about assessing the scale of destruction in different pockets of the city. Wherever a building had collapsed tension was high with local residents and police struggling to hold back the crowds of curious onlookers. A ten storey building appeared to have been sliced in two. One half had collapsed, the other half remained standing with bisected rooms open to the sky , exposing the final, private moments of former residents. In one flat an unmade bed, in another a kitchen table with the remains of uneaten breakfasts. Friends, relatives and neighbours scrabbled desperately in the rubble below in the hope of finding anyone alive. Two men rushed into the site carrying a car jack in the vain hope that it would lift a huge concrete slab under which the cries of a child had been heard.



Ahmedabad was bad but Alan and I knew that there was worse to come. The epicenter of the quake was over 400 kms away near the ancient city of Bhuj in the district of Kutch. No information had emerged from Bhuj, but we knew that power and telecommunications were down and the airport was closed. It was decided that I would head off by road to Bhuj while Alan set about establishing a logistics cell at the Indian Red Cross office in Ahmedabad. What followed was a road trip from hell. Our vehicle broke down twice and we finally limped into Bhuj eleven hours later with the driver almost asleep at the wheel. Before we even reached Bhuj, I sensed the worst. Passing the junctions with the towns of Bachau and Anjar hundreds of ghostly figures were encamped by the road. At the sight of our vehicle many leapt into the road, desperately trying to wave us down in the hope that we could provide some help. As we approached Bhuj the driver slammed on the brakes. An overturned bus lay on its side on the road ahead. In the dark the bus had careered into a gaping crack caused by the quake which zigzagged across the road.


At 02:00 on Sunday morning we arrived to what seemed like a ghost town. Empty streets shrouded in darkness, the only signs of life being groups of people crouched around small fires on each street corner. We found the local branch of the Indian Red Cross where the Branch secretary Dr. Morbia and his extended family were sleeping in the backs of cars or on mattresses in the middle of the street. Everyone in Bhuj was too frightened to return to their homes. I joined them in the dirt, but despite being exhausted, sleep didn’t come easily. Adrenalin was pumping through my system and it was bitterly cold. No sooner had I dropped off I was awoken by a violent judder at 06:30. The neighbourhood came alive with a cacophony of children's screams and excited chatter. The people of Bhuj were scared. They had lived through twenty seconds of horror the previous morning and were worried that their nightmare would be repeated.


As we headed to the District Collectors offices the next morning the scale of damage was evident, we passed a girls school which had been flattened, an office building lent precariously out into the middle of the road and an ancient Hindu temple, its pillars dismembered, lay collapsed like a classical ruin. The streets were choked with fleeing residents sat atop their salvaged possessions on trucks and tractor trailers. To add to the chaos anxious relatives were coming in to the town to search for their families. The scene at the district administration based at the collectors offices was pandemonium. I met the State Minister of Health, who was overall responsible for the Governments emergency response operation. The message I got was clear, do anything you want to help but do it fast. Everyone had been traumatised by this disaster. Most had lost friends or relatives and few had slept during the past 48 hours. I asked the Minister for a meeting later in the day, he pointed to his 4-wheeled drive and said ‘come and find me in my office’.

During those initial few days I felt a huge weight of responsibility. It was my role together with colleagues of the Indian Red Cross to feed back information to our teams in Delhi and Geneva. Based on this information they would be guaging their response to the disaster. The immediate needs were evident, the remaining population of Bhuj were camped outside the remains of their homes, in the backs of cars or in small tent cities dotted around the town. Hundreds of thousands of people would need tents or plastic sheeting to make into shelters. Blankets would be a priority as the nights were bitter and the medical needs of those who had been injured during the quake had to be addressed without delay. My only link with the outside world was a satellite-phone that I had carried from Delhi. Plugged into a car battery I made contact with Delhi and reported back on my initial findings. I discovered that an emergency task force had already been assembled by the Federation and was on its way to Bhuj. Then came the press calls. Somehow the international media had decided that I was the first international relief worker to have reached Bhuj and the phone began to ring red hot with interview requests. In between meetings and interviews I found time to visit some of the most stricken areas around Bhuj. The old part of the city had been decimated. A population of 60-70,000 people had simply vanished. Thousands were presumed dead and thousands had simply fled the city. An army bulldozer up ahead was clearing a passage through the narrow lanes which were choked with debris. The odor of decaying bodies had already begun to seep into the air and as I climbed over a pile of rubble my foot sank into something soft. Fearing the worst, I looked down and realised I was climbing over the back of a huge bull that had been crushed by falling masonry. Walking down an empty passageway I heard an alarm clock go off, it was 9 o’clock am. The clocks unfortunate owner had probably been asleep when the quake struck, oblivious to their own fate.

24 hours after my arrival in Bhuj the first of the team had arrived. Helvor Lauritzen, the team leader from the Norwegian Red Cross and a veteran of relief operations in Turkey and Goma, had flown in to take control. The next day the remainder of the team arrived, Colin, a logistics expert sent by the British Red Cross, Inigo a relief administrator from the Spanish Red Cross, Giuseppe from the Italian red Cross and Richard from the German Red Cross who would carry out the medical assessment and Gunther a water and sanitation expert from the Austrian Red Cross. I found it remarkable that within a couple of days of the disaster, this team had come from all corners of Europe to assemble in a remote Indian town to spearhead what would be a huge operation. Realising the scale of the disaster the Federation now issued a revised appeal for 25.5 million swiss francs, with the intention of reaching 300,000 people in the coming four months with non-food relief supplies.

Within 50 hours the first international relief supplies began to arrive from all directions. A convoy of trucks rolled in with 30 tons of blankets and plastic sheeting that the Swiss Red Cross had flown in to Ahmedabad and more trucks were en route with supplies from the Indian Red Cross warehouse in Delhi. On Tuesday the first cargo flights began to arrive directly into Bhuj airport. One of the first flights came from the British Red Cross which was funded by DFID (Department for International Development) loaded with blankets and plastic sheeting. An ERU (emergency response unit) from the Finnish Red Cross landed with a medical team and part of the 400 bed field hospital that would be set up in Bhuj. The logistical hurdles were immense. The lack of lifting gear at the airport meant that we were reliant upon volunteers from the Indian Red Cross to offload the aircraft, many of whom were in a state of shock. Trucks and cars were in short supply as most trucks had been comandeered by the authorities and truck drivers from Ahmedabad were reluctant to travel to Bhuj. During the next 48 hours we were struggling to cope with the influx of flights and took it in turns to maintain a 24 vigil at the airstrip. Every morning I awoke from my bundle of blankets on the cold ground to the sight of Colin Blakemore, our logistician, his boots poking out of the end of a large cardboard box into which he had crept exhausted at the end of each night.

By Thursday the field hospital was up and running with the first patients waiting outside. The camp that we had set up around the hospital site was really taking shape, resembling something from the TV series ‘MASH’. Tents to house the delegates had sprung up everywhere along side giant rub-halls used for storing the relief goods. In the space of a week over 90 delegates from Red Cross Societies around the world had arrived in Bhuj, each with a specific function. The British Red Cross had sent in an ERU of logisticians, the Germans a water and sanitation ERU that provided clean water supply to the hospital. The Norwegian and Finnish ERUs were establishing the field hospital and the Japanese Red Cross had sent in a team with a mobile medical camp. As fresh supplies arrived at the camp, convoys of trucks began to roll out of the compound each morning laden with blankets and tents for distribution in outlying villages.

It had been one of the most intense weeks of my life, an emotional roller coaster with a succession of highs and lows. Perhaps the biggest paradox of such disasters is the level of humour that abounds. Journalists and aid workers alike we were all shocked by what we had seen, but our experiences were shared through moments of laughter - perhaps an instinctive coping mechanism to counter our distress. I knew it was time to go when I got a call from my wife Jo following a live TV interview with Matt Frei of the BBC. “You looked like death warmed up and you sounded so desperate”, she said, and she was right. I looked in the mirror for the first time and hardly recognised myself under the stubble and dirt. Flying back to Delhi I reflected on some of the remarkable people I had met during the week. The volunteer doctors that I met at the soup kitchen where the towns population used to take lunch, rich and poor together. They had had no water for four days and had resorted to drinking the saline drips meant for their patients. The young soldier who walked into my tent to volunteer. It was apparent that he was in shock yet every day he mobilised a force of 50 other volunteers who worked relentlessly at the airport offloading the planes. The two young backpackers Siobhan and Zak who had traveled nonstop for hundreds of miles from Pondicherry in South India. Within an hour of arriving they were putting up tents and loading trucks. The army surgeon who single-handedly had carried out 45 amputations in the first twenty four hours, the list is endless.. . While thousands died, the stoicism of the survivors constantly amazed me and some of the survival stories were almost beyond belief. A man who had been sleeping on his charpoy (wood and rope bed) on a rooftop was catapulted together with his bed into a tree, escaping unscathed. The woman who was taking a bath when the earthquake struck. Together with her bath she plunged through three floors and stepped out with a few scratches. The true scale of this tragedy will never be known. Tens of thousands died on that fateful day and over a million lost their homes. The thousands of freshly shaved scalps that can be seen across Kutch today are testimony to the massive loss. In Hindu tradition, families who have lost loved ones undergo a ritual shaving to mark a ten day mourning period. Ironically there is now a shortage of barbers in Bhuj.

And if you are not exhausted by reading this far, read what my colleagues in Delhi Bhavesh Sodagar wrote as a young man just joiuning the Red Cross. He has a great blog;

2001 Gujarat earthquake 12 year later.

Gujarat (india) earthquake ten years on

Today 26th of January 2013, those shattering memories cascade back of the Gujarat Earthquake.    I think  of that massive earthquake that struck Gujarat in India 12 years earlier.Here is an entry from  my diary.:

This 6 March 2001

The last 35 days have been the toughest of my life. More difficult than the North Pole expedition of 86, tougher than any mountain I've climbed. The first 5 days I had no sleep and since then for the last 30 days I've survived with a handful of hours every night. God knows how I've kept it up. Finally I am having this weekend off after having spent the last 14 days in Bhuj and Bachau. The dust, the dirt and stench of decomposing bodies permeates every pore of your body. People speak of a death toll of over 100,000 now which I can readily believe.

Running and coordinating a team of over 150 foreign delegates, supervising a 350 bed hospital plus two other field hospitals, getting vital relief goods out to over a million of the worst affected people, organising pycho-social counselling teams, orthoppaedic centres for those 2000 or more children who lost limbs has been a momentous challenge. We now have a team of highly trained professionals from 21 countries working together with the Indian Red Cross.

The Gernman Red Cross water sanitation team provided water for the 400 bed Finnish-Norwegian Red Cross hospital in Bhuj with the most up to date operating theatre and fantastic after care.

Phil Goff, our Minister of Foreign Affairs arrived last night and is travelling today with the NZ High Commissioner and a top level mission from NZ, from Delhi to Bhuj on our plane (which we have chartered for the first 3 months) to see our operation. As I desperately need some time to myself I have sent my deputy, Alan Bradbury, another NZ'er with them to show them round. I have dinner with them when they get back

Ablai my son and Naila are well. Naila's Mum is here at the moment which has been good as she has been able to support her while I've been away. But what was it like: .

In a narrow street behind a school in Bhuj town, a crowd of people wait anxiously for the arrival of an Indian Red Cross truck. It might not sound much but this truck will bring enough tents to provide shelter for a minimum of 2,300 people.

This distribution of tents is the second one of the day by the Indian Red Cross in Bhuj and the supply cannot meet the demand. Wherever one looks in the town, there is rubble. Bhuj has suffered terribly from the earthquake that hit western India two weeks ago. A town with a population of more than 150,000 people, it had one of the highest official death tolls with a minimum of 6,000 people killed while the number of injured was put at more than 60,000.

Among those waiting slightly apart is a woman holding a baby in a bundle. Hina Chanchal's husband is among the crowd of men surrounding Indian Red Cross officials to see if they are on the list of people who will be given tents.

Like all the others there, Hina lost her home in the earthquake. Although none of her family was killed, she saw the teenage daughter of a neighbour die after being trapped under the debris for several hours. She too had a narrow escape after having to run back inside the house to get her baby.

"It is almost as if God had put a protective corridor around me," she says. "Everyone in front of me and behind me had debris falling on them. I and my baby seemed to have a clear escape route."

Now she and her family of 8 that includes her mother and sister, live by the side of a street. The nights are cold in Gujarat at this time of the year and with each passing day spent living in the open, their desperation at their plight increases.

The mother and first baby born in the Red Cross Field Hospital, Red Cross Camp,Bhuj.

The sad tragedy is that there are so many people just like Hina. The crowd at the distribution point are vociferous and jostle each other but a small contingent of policemen keep them in check. The earthquake has left hundreds of thousands of people homeless. And all of them have their own desperate story.

One man, a welder who had his own business, no longer has a home or a business. After making sure his family won't have to sleep under the stars in a tent sent by the French Red Cross, he will leave them to search for work in a town 40 kilometres away.

The loss of everything that one has worked so hard for is difficult to take. But amidst the despair, there is a happy smile.

"The Red Cross is doing a fantastic job, keep up the good work," says Vijay Kantilal Mandalia as he leaves the area, carrying a tent in his arms.

He too has lost his building supplies business as well as his home.

"We were happy before, we had achieved something. Now we have nothing and are living on a road. Whatever possessions survived the earthquake, didn't survive the looters. The clothes I am wearing, I have borrowed, even the shoes," he says. "What shall we do? I just don't know."

Nevertheless he is relieved he has a tent. "I knew before the earthquake of the work of the Red Cross. I knew I could go to them for help," he says. "We don't need food, just shelter. Nobody else has given us shelter - until now."

The Indian Red Cross has so far distributed more than 67,300 blankets, 4,200 tents and 6,100 tarpaulins sent from donor Red Cross and Red Crescent societies. With the International Federation targeting 300,000 in its appeal for Gujarat's earthquake victims, the emergency relief operation is set to continue for a few months still.
What was it like in the first few days ? Patrick Fuller, who was our communications man in Delhi at the time, write this:
THE DAY THE EARTH SHOOK (2415 words)




Friday 26th January was meant to be a day of celebration across India. But as Republic Day parades were getting underway in towns and villages across the country at 8:40 am disaster struck. At the time I was making a cup of tea in my suburban Delhi home, looking forward to a leisurely day with my family. Suddenly there was a low rumbling which lasted for about 15 seconds. The kitchen cupboards shook and I could only assume that it must have been a 21 gun salute from the military parade. As I turned on the TV a news flash announced that an earthquake had struck the north eastern State of Gujarat with tremors being felt as far afield as the State of Uttar Pradesh, 1500 kms away. Initial casualties were reported to be low, 40-50 killed in Ahmedabad, the commercial capital of Gujurat. I instinctively called Bob McKerrow, the head of delegation and sent a quick e-mail to notify the disaster response unit at the Federation headquarters in Geneva. Information began to filter in from Indian Red Cross branches in the quake zone and by 10:30 it became apparent that the potential scale of this disaster could be awesome. A colleague from Reuters called to say the situation looked a lot worse and the death toll could reach into the thousands. Myself, Bob and Alan Bradbury, our regional disaster preparedness delegate, had already activated our operations cell at the delegation and within three hours of the disaster our colleagues in Geneva had issued an alert to the international donor community and a preliminary appeal was launched later that day for 2 million Swiss francs.

Arriving the next morning on the first flight in to Ahmedabad, Alan and myself couldn’t help wondering whether the disaster had been exaggerated. Buildings along the road from the airport to the Red Cross office appeared untouched and the everyday bustle in the streets seemed normal. The next few hours proved us wrong as we set about assessing the scale of destruction in different pockets of the city. Wherever a building had collapsed tension was high with local residents and police struggling to hold back the crowds of curious onlookers. A ten storey building appeared to have been sliced in two. One half had collapsed, the other half remained standing with bisected rooms open to the sky , exposing the final, private moments of former residents. In one flat an unmade bed, in another a kitchen table with the remains of uneaten breakfasts. Friends, relatives and neighbours scrabbled desperately in the rubble below in the hope of finding anyone alive. Two men rushed into the site carrying a car jack in the vain hope that it would lift a huge concrete slab under which the cries of a child had been heard.



Ahmedabad was bad but Alan and I knew that there was worse to come. The epicenter of the quake was over 400 kms away near the ancient city of Bhuj in the district of Kutch. No information had emerged from Bhuj, but we knew that power and telecommunications were down and the airport was closed. It was decided that I would head off by road to Bhuj while Alan set about establishing a logistics cell at the Indian Red Cross office in Ahmedabad. What followed was a road trip from hell. Our vehicle broke down twice and we finally limped into Bhuj eleven hours later with the driver almost asleep at the wheel. Before we even reached Bhuj, I sensed the worst. Passing the junctions with the towns of Bachau and Anjar hundreds of ghostly figures were encamped by the road. At the sight of our vehicle many leapt into the road, desperately trying to wave us down in the hope that we could provide some help. As we approached Bhuj the driver slammed on the brakes. An overturned bus lay on its side on the road ahead. In the dark the bus had careered into a gaping crack caused by the quake which zigzagged across the road.


At 02:00 on Sunday morning we arrived to what seemed like a ghost town. Empty streets shrouded in darkness, the only signs of life being groups of people crouched around small fires on each street corner. We found the local branch of the Indian Red Cross where the Branch secretary Dr. Morbia and his extended family were sleeping in the backs of cars or on mattresses in the middle of the street. Everyone in Bhuj was too frightened to return to their homes. I joined them in the dirt, but despite being exhausted, sleep didn’t come easily. Adrenalin was pumping through my system and it was bitterly cold. No sooner had I dropped off I was awoken by a violent judder at 06:30. The neighbourhood came alive with a cacophony of children's screams and excited chatter. The people of Bhuj were scared. They had lived through twenty seconds of horror the previous morning and were worried that their nightmare would be repeated.


As we headed to the District Collectors offices the next morning the scale of damage was evident, we passed a girls school which had been flattened, an office building lent precariously out into the middle of the road and an ancient Hindu temple, its pillars dismembered, lay collapsed like a classical ruin. The streets were choked with fleeing residents sat atop their salvaged possessions on trucks and tractor trailers. To add to the chaos anxious relatives were coming in to the town to search for their families. The scene at the district administration based at the collectors offices was pandemonium. I met the State Minister of Health, who was overall responsible for the Governments emergency response operation. The message I got was clear, do anything you want to help but do it fast. Everyone had been traumatised by this disaster. Most had lost friends or relatives and few had slept during the past 48 hours. I asked the Minister for a meeting later in the day, he pointed to his 4-wheeled drive and said ‘come and find me in my office’.

During those initial few days I felt a huge weight of responsibility. It was my role together with colleagues of the Indian Red Cross to feed back information to our teams in Delhi and Geneva. Based on this information they would be guaging their response to the disaster. The immediate needs were evident, the remaining population of Bhuj were camped outside the remains of their homes, in the backs of cars or in small tent cities dotted around the town. Hundreds of thousands of people would need tents or plastic sheeting to make into shelters. Blankets would be a priority as the nights were bitter and the medical needs of those who had been injured during the quake had to be addressed without delay. My only link with the outside world was a satellite-phone that I had carried from Delhi. Plugged into a car battery I made contact with Delhi and reported back on my initial findings. I discovered that an emergency task force had already been assembled by the Federation and was on its way to Bhuj. Then came the press calls. Somehow the international media had decided that I was the first international relief worker to have reached Bhuj and the phone began to ring red hot with interview requests. In between meetings and interviews I found time to visit some of the most stricken areas around Bhuj. The old part of the city had been decimated. A population of 60-70,000 people had simply vanished. Thousands were presumed dead and thousands had simply fled the city. An army bulldozer up ahead was clearing a passage through the narrow lanes which were choked with debris. The odor of decaying bodies had already begun to seep into the air and as I climbed over a pile of rubble my foot sank into something soft. Fearing the worst, I looked down and realised I was climbing over the back of a huge bull that had been crushed by falling masonry. Walking down an empty passageway I heard an alarm clock go off, it was 9 o’clock am. The clocks unfortunate owner had probably been asleep when the quake struck, oblivious to their own fate.

24 hours after my arrival in Bhuj the first of the team had arrived. Helvor Lauritzen, the team leader from the Norwegian Red Cross and a veteran of relief operations in Turkey and Goma, had flown in to take control. The next day the remainder of the team arrived, Colin, a logistics expert sent by the British Red Cross, Inigo a relief administrator from the Spanish Red Cross, Giuseppe from the Italian red Cross and Richard from the German Red Cross who would carry out the medical assessment and Gunther a water and sanitation expert from the Austrian Red Cross. I found it remarkable that within a couple of days of the disaster, this team had come from all corners of Europe to assemble in a remote Indian town to spearhead what would be a huge operation. Realising the scale of the disaster the Federation now issued a revised appeal for 25.5 million swiss francs, with the intention of reaching 300,000 people in the coming four months with non-food relief supplies.

Within 50 hours the first international relief supplies began to arrive from all directions. A convoy of trucks rolled in with 30 tons of blankets and plastic sheeting that the Swiss Red Cross had flown in to Ahmedabad and more trucks were en route with supplies from the Indian Red Cross warehouse in Delhi. On Tuesday the first cargo flights began to arrive directly into Bhuj airport. One of the first flights came from the British Red Cross which was funded by DFID (Department for International Development) loaded with blankets and plastic sheeting. An ERU (emergency response unit) from the Finnish Red Cross landed with a medical team and part of the 400 bed field hospital that would be set up in Bhuj. The logistical hurdles were immense. The lack of lifting gear at the airport meant that we were reliant upon volunteers from the Indian Red Cross to offload the aircraft, many of whom were in a state of shock. Trucks and cars were in short supply as most trucks had been comandeered by the authorities and truck drivers from Ahmedabad were reluctant to travel to Bhuj. During the next 48 hours we were struggling to cope with the influx of flights and took it in turns to maintain a 24 vigil at the airstrip. Every morning I awoke from my bundle of blankets on the cold ground to the sight of Colin Blakemore, our logistician, his boots poking out of the end of a large cardboard box into which he had crept exhausted at the end of each night.

By Thursday the field hospital was up and running with the first patients waiting outside. The camp that we had set up around the hospital site was really taking shape, resembling something from the TV series ‘MASH’. Tents to house the delegates had sprung up everywhere along side giant rub-halls used for storing the relief goods. In the space of a week over 90 delegates from Red Cross Societies around the world had arrived in Bhuj, each with a specific function. The British Red Cross had sent in an ERU of logisticians, the Germans a water and sanitation ERU that provided clean water supply to the hospital. The Norwegian and Finnish ERUs were establishing the field hospital and the Japanese Red Cross had sent in a team with a mobile medical camp. As fresh supplies arrived at the camp, convoys of trucks began to roll out of the compound each morning laden with blankets and tents for distribution in outlying villages.

It had been one of the most intense weeks of my life, an emotional roller coaster with a succession of highs and lows. Perhaps the biggest paradox of such disasters is the level of humour that abounds. Journalists and aid workers alike we were all shocked by what we had seen, but our experiences were shared through moments of laughter - perhaps an instinctive coping mechanism to counter our distress. I knew it was time to go when I got a call from my wife Jo following a live TV interview with Matt Frei of the BBC. “You looked like death warmed up and you sounded so desperate”, she said, and she was right. I looked in the mirror for the first time and hardly recognised myself under the stubble and dirt. Flying back to Delhi I reflected on some of the remarkable people I had met during the week. The volunteer doctors that I met at the soup kitchen where the towns population used to take lunch, rich and poor together. They had had no water for four days and had resorted to drinking the saline drips meant for their patients. The young soldier who walked into my tent to volunteer. It was apparent that he was in shock yet every day he mobilised a force of 50 other volunteers who worked relentlessly at the airport offloading the planes. The two young backpackers Siobhan and Zak who had traveled nonstop for hundreds of miles from Pondicherry in South India. Within an hour of arriving they were putting up tents and loading trucks. The army surgeon who single-handedly had carried out 45 amputations in the first twenty four hours, the list is endless.. . While thousands died, the stoicism of the survivors constantly amazed me and some of the survival stories were almost beyond belief. A man who had been sleeping on his charpoy (wood and rope bed) on a rooftop was catapulted together with his bed into a tree, escaping unscathed. The woman who was taking a bath when the earthquake struck. Together with her bath she plunged through three floors and stepped out with a few scratches. The true scale of this tragedy will never be known. Tens of thousands died on that fateful day and over a million lost their homes. The thousands of freshly shaved scalps that can be seen across Kutch today are testimony to the massive loss. In Hindu tradition, families who have lost loved ones undergo a ritual shaving to mark a ten day mourning period. Ironically there is now a shortage of barbers in Bhuj.

And if you are not exhausted by reading this far, read what my colleagues in Delhi Bhavesh Sodagar wrote as a young man just joiuning the Red Cross. He has a great blog;

30-minute window to find Antarctic plane

30-minute window to find Antarctic plane

Twin Otter at the glacier landing strip at Terra Nova Bay, Antarctica.

0830 IST 25 January 2013. Rescue teams waiting for a break in the weather in a search for a missing plane in Antarctica will have just 30 minutes to complete the operation, due to conditions at such a high altitude.

Three Canadians were flying a Twin Otter that failed to make it through the Queen Alexandra mountain range on a trip from the South Pole to the Italian base Terra Nova Bay in the Ross Sea.

An emergency locator beacon was activated at 10pm on Wednesday (NZ time) from the northern end of the range, but rescue teams have been forced to wait until cloud lifts in the area on Friday.

It is not known whether the plane crashed or made an emergency landing, but the transmitter sent a clear position before its battery ran out.

Two helicopters and an expert rescue team are ready to fly to the spot pinpointed by the Twin Otter's transmitter at the northern end of the mountain range near the Ross Ice Shelf.

Pilot Bob Heath(left)  who has 25 years' experience polar flying and training pilots, and two other men have been missing since Wednesday.

New Zealand Search and Rescue mission coordinator Kevin Banaghan says the cloud is forecast to scatter and winds should die down, but conditions will still be punishing.

"The actual position itself is at 13,000 feet, so it's quite high. These helicopters can only operate with that elevation for about half an hour. So they've got to get in, get the job done and get out as

quickly as they can."

Mr Banaghan said a search plane flew over that spot earlier on Friday but could not get a clear view through cloud and had to turn back. The cloud is forecast to scatter in the next day and 90-knot winds should die down.

The missing men have a survival kit on board that could last them five days. Long-time friend Tony Szekely said he has faith in Bob Heath's survival skills and remains optimistic the men will be found alive.

"Bob's been trained in Antarctic survival, is very knowledgeable. I'm optimistic because it is Bob and not somebody else. He's one of the best pilots I know."

Thanks to Radio New Zealand.

Mount Dixon Rockfall, New Zealand 21 Jan 2013

The rockfall of Mt. Dixon yesterday brought back reminders of that day in 1991 when the top fell off Aoraki Mt. Cook when I lived at Franz Josef. As soon as we heard about it, Rusty Knight from the Helicopter Line flew us in to have a look at this stunning geological event. Yesterday's huge rockfall is another of these events that make of realize how brittle and dangerous our New Zealand mountains are.


It is hoped a geologist will visit the scene of a huge rockfall in the Aoraki Mt Cook National Park later today to advise whether it is safe for one of the park's largest mountain huts to reopen.

The 28-bed Plateau Hut was closed yesterday and 15 climbers flown out from it, after a huge rockfall on nearby Mt Dixon early in the afternoon.

The rockfall was three kilometres long and left debris as close as 150 to 200 metres from the hut.

Department of Conservation community relations programme manager at Mt Cook, Shirley Slatter, said geologists from GNS Science had been contacted and had already looked at photos of the rockslide. It was hoped they would be able to fly into the site later today.

"Graham Hancox (a GNS senior engineering geologist) has looked at the footage and does not think there is any danger to the hut,  but we want someone to go in and have a look at it and give us a report."

Two of the guided parties who were at Plateau Hut yesterday opted to fly on to other locations to continue climbing, while others were flown back to the village.

A party of three who were climbing in the area intended to stay at the Bowie Bivy last night before returning to the hut later today.

Plateau Hut is the base for the majority of climbs on Mt Cook and Mt Tasman as well as the other surrounding high peaks.

Once the geologist's report was available, Mrs Slatter said climbers would be advised of any potential risks.

Images reveal the extend of a rockfall on Mt Dixon in Aoraki/Mt Cook National Park on January 21.

MT DIXON ROCKSLIDE SPARES CLIMBERS

A massive rockfall three kilometres long left 15 climbers amazed as they sat in a hut in the Aoraki Mt Cook National Park. The rockfall came off the west face of Mt Dixon about 2.15pm yesterday.

Shirley Slatter, Department of Conservation community relations programme manager at Mt Cook, said there were 12 climbers, including guides, in the hut at the time and a guide she had spoken to was "pretty amazed" by what was happening. A party of three also made its way back to the hut late in the afternoon.

Helicopter company Heliworks put on a flight for DOC staff to check out the slide and the nearby hut yesterday afternoon.

The decision was made to close the hut as debris came to rest within 150 to 200 metres of Plateau Hut. The climbers were flown out from the hut last night, with some choosing to be flown to other huts in the park to continue climbing.

"There is the potential for more to come off. It can happen anywhere in the [Southern] Alps. It is just below the hut, but it has the potential, if more comes off, to overtop where it is and go up a slight rise towards the hut," Mrs Slatter explained.

Mrs Slatter said it was the largest rockslide in the park since the top 10 metres fell off Mt Cook in 1991. She estimated yesterday's slide involved about a quarter of the material displaced in the Mt Cook rockslide.

Footprints from parties which had left Plateau Hut earlier in the day were visible crossing the Grand Plateau before disappearing under the debris.

Further up Mt Dixon, footprints from another climbing party were 20 metres from the debris.

Another three-person party was expected to stay in the Bowie Ridge bivvy last night before climbing the north ridge of Mt Dixon today.

"They will have a wee surprise when they come down tomorrow as they will actually have to cross the debris to get to the hut."

The guides she had spoken to at Plateau Hut were confident the trio would be able to get to the hut but Mrs Slatter said a decision would need to be made as to whether it was safe for them to stay there.

Thanks to the Timaru Herald for permission to run this article.

Maori first to reach Antarctica?

Over 20 years ago I wrote an article for the New Zealand Adventure magazine based on over a decade of research, that a New Zealand Maori or perhaps more safely described as Polynesian, Ui-te-Rangiora,  reached the Antarctic waters, and the scene he described is not unlike sailing into the Ross sea. The frozen ocean is expressed by the term Te tai-uka-a-pia, in which tai is the sea, uka, (Maori huka) is ice, a pia means— a, as, like, after the manner of; pia, the arrowroot, which when scraped is exactly like snow, to which this simple people compared it as the only or best simile known to them. Further information at the end of this article. 

Sir Mark Soloman, John Key and Ranui Ngarimu are joined by the Scott Base Leadership team with the Pou Whenua carving at Scott Base, Antarctica.

Most New Zealand newspapers ran the headline story today stating that New Zealand's Maori links have been stamped firmly on Antarctica today with the unveiling of a pou whenua at Scott Base's 56th birthday.

Ngai Tahu leader Sir Mark Solomon and Prime Minister John Key jointly uncovered the totara carving in a formal ceremony this morning with Scott Base staff and invited guests from the United States' McMurdo Station.

As they removed the sleeping bag covering, the sun briefly shone and a patch of blue sky appeared above, a brief break in the constant snowfall that has blanketed the base soon after the Prime Minister arrived on Friday.

Solomon joked with the crowd that th.e pou did not mean Ngai Tahu was about to lodge a claim on Antarctica.

''I thought I better reassure the Prime Minister that.''

He said it was a privilege that Ngai Tahu, as the southern-most iwi, was asked to carve the pou.

The new Maori carving Pou Whenua at Scott Base Antarctica.

The pou, called Navigator of the Heavens, was made of totara from the West Coast, which he was confident would withstand the rigors of Antarctica's harsh environment, despite it developing several cracks since its arrival on the frozen continent.

Key said the pou was a ''very meaningful addition'' to the base.

''Scott Base has a place in the hearts and minds of New Zealanders even if they haven't visited here. Maori culture is enshrined in who we are as New Zealanders and to have this representation here is a lovely touch.'

Two woven tukutuku panels were also unveiled, a project headed by Ngai Tahu master weaver Ranui Ngarimu, kaiawhina to Sir Mark.

One panel symbolised Maori ancestors interwoven with New Zealanders who had died in Antarctica, including the 257 passengers and crew killed in the 1979 Mt Erebus plane crash.

The other paid tribute to the scientific work ongoing on the southernmost continent.

West Coast weavers from Arahura, Ngai Tahu's main pounamu site, wove the tukutuku but Scott Base staff also helped, Ngarimu said.

Antarctica New Zealand chief executive Lou Sanson said about a third of his staff at the base were military and many were Maori.

Several years ago, the issue was raised of enhancing the cultural identity of New Zealand's Antarctic base, which led to the pou's inception.

A new carved wooden sign for Scott Base was also unveiled today. (thanks to stuff.co.nz for permission to quote this article and use photos.

It was S. Percey Smith that led me into believing that Maori could have been the first people to reach the Antarctic waters, in particular Ui-te-Rangiora. I spent 13 months in Antarctica in 1969-70 and traveled in the Ross sea by ice breaker so I had a first hand chance to study ice and talk to experts on ice, glaciologists from NZ, the US and Soviet Union.  Photo: Bob McKerrow

I started off this article off by asserting that Ui  te Rangiora reached the Antarctic waters and described a scene like entering the Ross sea and seeing the Antarctic continent. Here is Percy Smith's article that provides excellent background reading.

HAWAIKI: THE ORIGINAL HOME OF THE MAORI; WITH A SKETCH OF POLYNESIAN HISTORY

THE POLYNESIANS AS NAVIGATORS

Author: S. Percy Smith

Publication details:Whitcombe and Tombs Limited, Christchurch

Part of: Tidal Pools: Digitized Texts from Oceania for Samoan and Pacific Studies. Victoria University

But I now come to one made by this daring navigator, Ui-te-rangiora, in his celebrated canoe Te Ivi-o-Atea, which outshines all the others, and shows him to have been a man worthy of taking his place amongst many of our own most fearless navigators of ages long subsequent to the seventh century. In the history of Te Aru-tanga-nuku, who in his time was also a great voyager, we find the following: "The desire of the ariki Te Aru-tanga-nuku and all his people on the completion of the canoe, was to behold all the wonderful things seen by those of the vessel Te Ivi-o-Atea in former times., These were those wonderful things:—the rocks that grow out of the sea, in the space^*beyond Rapa^†; the monstrous seas; the female that dwells in those mountainous waves, whose tresses wave about in the waters and on the surface of the sea; and the frozen sea of pia, with the deceitful animal of that sea who dives to great depths—a foggy, misty, and dark place not seen by the sun. Other things are like rocks, whose summits pierce the skies, they are completely bare and without any vegetation on them." The above is as literal a translation as I can make, and the meaning is quite clear; that the bare rocks that grow out of the frozen sea are the icebergs of the Antarctic; the tresses that float on the monstrous waves are the long leaves of the bull-kelp—over 50 feet long—quite a new feature to a people who dwelt in the tropics, where there is nothing of the kind; the deceitful animal that dives so deep, is the walrus or the sea-lion or sea-elephant. The frozen ocean is expressed by the term Te tai-uka-a-pia, in which tai is the sea, uka, (Maori huka) is ice, a pia means— a, as, like, after the manner of; pia, the arrowroot, which when scraped is exactly like snow, to which this simple people compared it as the only or best simile known to them. Now, the Antarctic ice is to be found south of Rapa, in about latitude 50° in the summer time, and consequently both Ui-te-rangiora and Te Arutanga-nuku at different times (250 years apart) must have gone to those high latitudes, as the story says, "to see the wonders of the ocean."

Since the above account of these Antarctic voyages was written in 1897—I have come across a further confirmation of the story. When relating my visit to Eastern Polynesia to the Maoris of the Nga-Rauru tribe, west coast, New Zealand, I was asked if I had also visited that part of the ocean where their traditions state that the seas run mountains high, coming along in three great waves at a time, and where dwelt the monster, the Maraki-hau. Now, the Maraki-hau is a well-known figure depicted on ancient Maori carvings, and the origin of which has much exercised our Ethnologists; it has the body and face of a man, but the lower half is a fish's body and tail,—in fact, it is just like a mer-man. But it has in addition, two long tusks coming out of its mouth which the Maoris call ngongo, (or tubes); these are as long as from the mouth to the waist of the figure. To my mind this is the Maori representation of the walrus, or sea-elephant, which they could see only in high latitudes. The old man who questioned me on the subject, clearly had it in his mind that the Maraki-hau dwelt in that mysterious part of the world from whence their ancestors came to New Zealand. It would seem that this confirms the

Who, after this, will deny to the Polynesians the honour that is their due as skilful and daring navigators? Here we find them boldly pushing out into the great unknown ocean in their frail canoes, actuated by the same love of adventure and discovery that characterises our own race. Long before our ancestors had learnt to venture out of sight; of land, these bold sailors had explored the Antarctic seas, and traversed the Pacific Ocean from end to end. Considering the means at their command—their lightly-built canoes (sewn together with sinnet), the difficulty of provisioning the crew, the absence of any instruments to guide them—I feel justified in claiming for these bold navigators as high a place in the honour-roll as many of our own distinguished Arctic or Antarctic explorers.

Many people have doubted the ability of the Polynesians to make the lengthy voyages implied in finding the race in places so widely separated as Hawaii, Easter Island, New Zealand, and the N.W. Pacific south of the line. But we cannot doubt the very definite statements made in their traditions. The love of adventure, of moving about from place to place, which is so characteristic of the race even in these days has always been a feature in their lives. More often than not they made these adventurous voyages with the definite object of establishing new colonies in which to settle, taking with them their Lares and Penates, their domestic animals, seeds, plants, and families, It has already been pointed out the effect the vast number of islands in Indonesia must have had on the people, in increasing their powers of navigation.

Front row l to r: Bob Headland, Robin Judkins and Bob McKerrow. Back row: Ed Cotter, Suzanne and Phil Ryder, Tara Kloss and Colin Monteath Photo: Robb Kloss

In 2008 I met Bob Headland in Christchurch,  who is the author of  Chronological List of Antarctic Expeditions and Related Historical Events and published by Cambridge University Press. Bob had spent a lot of time at the Scott Polar Research Institute and knew the Antarctic better than most. In his respected book he lists "Ui-te-Rangiora and other Polynesian navigators sailed as far south as the frozen ocean. "

I spoke to Bob about this and put forward my theory that voyages are not done as continuous journeys, but when a new island is found, the sailors may take a break of weeks, months or many years. It may have been that Ui-te-Rangiora spent time on Campbell Island, or another sub-Antarctic island where they hunted seals for skin and clothing, used seal and whale bones and the stunted wood from trees to repair canoes, before venturing towards Antarctica. Seal and penguin meat would have given them the 5000 plus calories a day and the Omega 13 solution to keep very fit and healthy. Bob, thought this very plausible.

Kieran Mulvaney in her recent book At the Ends of the Earth: A History of the Polar Regions wrote this 

 "Given the Polynesian proclivity for traveling extraordinarily long distances and colonizing far flung islands throughout the Pacific, it is not wholly improbable that he or one of his countrymen-perhaps even one of the early settlers in Aotearoa-was the first to dip a tentative toe into the frigid waters of Antarcica."

 The Discovery channel Timeline of the Antarctic states this on their website: 

Ui-te-Rangiora (a 7th Century Maori navigator from the island of Rarotonga) is believed to have first encountered the Ross Ice Shelf. According to disputed legend, Uti-te-Rangiora lead a fleet of Waka Tiwai’s south until they reached “a place of bitter cold where rock-like structures rose from a solid sea”.

We will probably never know for sure whether Ui-te-Rangiora put foot on the Antarctic continent, but it is likely he sailed into the Antarctic Ocean before turning back.

Perhaps Sir Mark Solomon's words were said in jest  when he "joked with the crowd that the pou did not mean Ngai Tahu was about to lodge a claim on Antarctica."

''I thought I better reassure the Prime Minister that.''

But NZ Maori and other Polynesians have a greater claim to Antarctica having been the first in the Antarctic waters.