1872
Roald Amundsen born July 16
1925 To 88 degrees north
N 24 and N 25
- Aircraft type: Dornier Do J Wal (“Whale”)
- Registrations: N 24 and N 25
- Length: 17.25 m
- Wingspan: 22.5 m
- Height: 5.2 m
- Weight: 3630 kg
- Maximum take-off load: 2600 kg (specific recommendation)
- Top speed: 185 km/h
- Range: 800 km
- Engines: Rolls-Royce Eagle (two in tandem facing fore and aft)
- Manufacturer: Dornier Flugzeugwerke
Roald Amundsen records that N 24 and N 25 eventually took off from Kings Bay with loads of 3100 kg, thus exceeding the maximum recommend by the Dornier technical director on the ground by some 500 kg.
The duralumin fuselage had a flat and strengthened underside. From either side projected Claude Dornier’s patented large sponsons, which served both to stabilise the aircraft on the water and to support the single wing by means of strong struts. As a monoplane, the flying boat was well suited for landing on sea and ice.
Neither N 24 nor N 25 has survived to the present day. N 24, of course, was abandoned on the ice. N 25 was later used for various flights, including one in 1930 from Germany to New York via Iceland, Greenland and Labrador. It was transferred to the Deutsches Museum in Munich in 1932 but destroyed during a bombing raid on the city in 1944. The Dornier museum in Friedrichshafen now has a full size replica of N 25 on display.
Fortunately, the model Amundsen received from the Dornier factory before the flight in 1925 has survived and still hangs from the ceiling of the Uranienborg living room.
Sources:
Amundsen, Roald, and others: Our Polar flight : the Amundsen-Ellsworth Polar flight, 1925 📜
