N4 Down, Mark Piesing
N4 Down, Mark Piesing
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N-4 Down
The Hunt for the Arctic Airship Italia

Author: Mark Piesing

Narrator: Matt Jamie

Unabridged: 11 hr 17 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: HarperAudio

Published: 08/31/2021


Synopsis

""GRIPPING. ... One of the greatest polar rescue efforts ever mounted."" —Wall Street JournalThe riveting true story of the largest polar rescue mission in history: the desperate race to find the survivors of the glamorous Arctic airship Italia, which crashed near the North Pole in 1928.Triumphantly returning from the North Pole on May 24, 1928, the world-famous exploring airship Italia—code-named N-4—was struck by a terrible storm and crashed somewhere over the Arctic ice, triggering the largest polar rescue mission in history. Helping lead the search was Roald Amundsen, the poles’ greatest explorer, who himself soon went missing in the frozen wastes. Amundsen’s body has never been found, the last victim of one of the Arctic’s most enduring mysteries . . .During the Roaring Twenties, zeppelin travel embodied the exuberant spirit of the age. Germany’s luxurious Graf Zeppelin would run passenger service from Germany to Brazil; Britain’s Imperial Airship was launched to connect an empire; in America, the iconic spire of the rising Empire State Building was designed as a docking tower for airships.But the novel mode of transport offered something else, too: a new frontier of exploration. Whereas previous Arctic and Antarctic explorers had subjected themselves to horrific—often deadly—conditions in their attempts to reach uncharted lands, airships held out the possibility of speedily soaring over the hazards. In 1926, the famed Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen—the first man to reach the South Pole—partnered with the Italian airship designer General Umberto Nobile to pioneer flight over the North Pole. As Mark Piesing uncovers in this masterful account, while that mission was thought of as a great success, it was in fact riddled with near disasters and political pitfalls.In May 1928, his relationship with Amundsen corroded beyond the point of collaboration, Nobile, his dog, and a crew of fourteen Italians, one Swede, and one Czech, set off on their own in the airship Italia to discover new lands in the Arctic Circle and to become the first airship to land men on the pole. But near the North Pole they hit a terrible storm and crashed onto the ice. Six crew members were never seen again; the injured (including Nobile) took refuge on ice flows,unprepared for the wretched conditions and with little hope for survival.Coincidentally, in Oslo a gathering of famous Arctic explorers had assembled for a celebration of the first successful flight from Alaska to Norway. Hearing of the accident, Amundsen set off on his own desperate attempt to find Nobile and his men. As the weeks passed and the largest international polar rescue expedition mobilized, the survivors engaged in a last-ditch struggle against weather, polar bears, and despair. When they were spotted at last, the search plane landed—but the pilot announced that there was room for only one passenger. . . .Braiding together the gripping accounts of the survivors and their heroic rescuers, N-4 Down tells the unforgettable true story of what happened when the glamour and restless daring of the zeppelin age collided with the harsh reality of earth’s extremes.

About Mark Piesing

Mark Piesing writes for the Guardian, FT, Economist and Wired, among other publications. He lives in Oxford, England. This is his first book.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Eli - on April 01, 2024

Good storytelling! Thoroughly enjoyed this one.......more

Goodreads review by Peter on October 17, 2022

What Mark Piesing has done is dragged into the spotlight (or should that be searchlight to remain in keeping with the topic) an epic story of discovery, rivalry, endurance, and deceit. This is a story that deserves a wider audience not just for the tale of daring do but also the lessons to be learne......more

Goodreads review by Greg on January 16, 2023

An engaging account of the Airship Italia’s heroic attempt to land explorers at the North Pole. Thorough background on prior arctic journeys is provided as well, painting the backdrop for Commander Nobile’s arctic quest. Nicely woven into the narrative are political intrigue (e.g. the rise of Fascis......more

Goodreads review by Nicola on July 12, 2022

Just finished this on the plane back to Ireland this morning. It got me through one of those overcrowded flights where the guy beside me kept coughing and the child behind me kept prodding my back with the full force of his two feet. Fortunately, I had this fantastic story to keep me sane. A guy I m......more

Goodreads review by Shrike58 on June 30, 2022

The generalities of the story of Umberto Nobile and the loss of the "Italia" I've been aware of for years, but it was a pleasure to get a deep dive into the man's life, and how he became involved with the Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen. This is very much a tale of the Golden Age of Aviation......more