An excessively great mistake: a story of “Snow cruiser” ATV
A wardroom with comfortable armchairs, a sleeping quarter for 5 people, a kitchen with a sink and a cooker, a welding workshop, a darkroom, a storage facility for gear and provisions. Sounds almost like a description of a luxurious hotel or something of this kind. But no, that has nothing to do with a hotel. This is what one all-terrain vehicle was equipped with. The history remembers this machine as a “Snow cruiser”. “Snow cruiser” had enough space and supplies to provide a crew of 5 people an autonomous life for 12 months in the most extreme of conditions.
Getting off track
The man, who constructed it, didn’t intend to create a gigantic all-terrain machine. There were tracked tractors and they did their job pretty well. American, Thomas Poulter, a 40-year-old physicist and South Pole researcher was pretty much satisfied with that fact. Until he had to save a life of a researcher, who was locked out on a remote station. Because tracked tractors, that Poulter used for this rescue operation, could not deal with severe arctic conditions and, most of all, they were useless on arctic terrain. They simply could not cope with snow-cowered cracks in the ice cover of the continent. He had to change his route 3 times!
«The station was located amongst total lifelessness and it seemed like I had been transported to immemorial times of Ice Age. My eyes could only see one invariable landscape – a mantle of ice merging with the horizon at a distance».
All-terrain tracked vehicles weren’t very big. They could transport people or cargo but they weren’t equipped for trips inland. The complex ice-cover of the Antarctic was cut with wide cracks hidden underneath the layer of snow or firn. And that was the most dangerous thing for researchers in the Antarctic. Poulter put his life at great risk trying to overcome these obstacles in an ordinary vehicle.
The “Snow cruiser” project
Although that expedition turned out to be quite tough, Poulter started preparations for the next one. He was planning to go to the Antarctic with his own all-terrain vehicle. According to his plan, that machine was supposed to change an approach to arctic exploration. He invented a vehicle, whose length helped it to overcome those evil cracks. It simple was enormously long and its overhangs were so large that its nose would overcome the crack by the time the front wheel fell into it.
However, the biggest of all problems were not ice cracks and not severe arctic winds but a lack of finances.
Thomas Poulter worked as research supervisor at the Research Foundation of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago. While he was working on his new ambitious project, American economics was working its way through tough times of Depression. Despite major financial problems, the Government decided to support Poulter’s project and provided the necessary funds. Poulter had already been working on it for over 2 years. The Government gave him money and set him strict time limits – the project must be finished in 11 weeks. Because in 11 weeks a ship was setting off on an expedition to the South Pole from Boston port. So, the construction of the unheard of all-terrain vehicle began on August 8th 1939.
The vehicle was given a framework that weighed 13,5 tonn and was made from extra strong steel. And also two diesel generators and four electric motors for each of the wheels. Wheelhouse and inner compartments were constructed to be comfortable enough for the crew to stay and live on board of “Snow cruiser”. Tires were the burning question of the construction. Finding a tire with huge diameter seemed like a nightmare. Fortunately, Poulter found what he needed at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. Goodyear produced the tires of a suitable diameter for march buggies, which rode at Louisiana marshes.
Into the Antarctic white
After few short tests, “Snow cruiser” started its expedition on October 24th 1939. The first part of the route, 1400km from Chicago to Boston, was on general use roads. They were easy to drive on, expect bridges due to the vehicle’s width and weight. Therefore, the crew decided to go straight through the water obstacles to detour from the bridges on their way. That was the only sort of the «field tests» that “Snow cruiser” had had before the actual expedition. They arrived to the port in time. In a couple of days, the crew built a gigantic platform ramp, using which Poulter drove the Cruiser on board of the ship.
Conditions in the area of expedition were truly severe: cold waters, enormous drifting icebergs and unceasing Antarctic winds. The ship with the huge “Snow cruiser” on board was slowly approaching the last stop before the big journey into the white of the Antarctic. The last checkpoint before the conquest of the inhospitable Antarctic terrains was Little America exploration base.
The very start of the movement of “Snow cruiser” was the very start of a long train of mistakes and mishaps that accompanied its expedition. The ATV turned out to be way too heavy (30 tons are not a joke) and it almost broke the platform ramp it was driven down. But being excessively heavy, “Snow cruiser” started sinking into the snow and would stop only being a meter deep.
At the start that fact didn’t concern the crew at all. However, Poulter quickly realized that he had made a ton of mistakes constructing that 30tons ATV. Excessive heaviness of “Snow cruiser” was only the tip of the iceberg. The construction had only two axels. Moreover, tires of the ATV were smooth and narrow. And this was not the end of the ‘construction miscalculations’ list. Even a choice of motors proved to be wrong! They overheated quickly.
Poulter tried his best to solve the surfaced problems and paper over the cracks. Firstly, he suggested attaching spare tires to the front in order to expand the contact patch. Unfortunately, that didn’t help much. There were some chains on board of “Snow cruiser” and they drew the crew’s attention. They decided to use them on the back wheels. Finally, “Snow cruiser” started moving through the Antarctic. Nevertheless, it was moving backwards. The ATV managed to drive only a tiny part of the planned distance – 148km out of 8000 planned.
Out of the Antarctic white
Despite of trying his best, Poulter had to admit that “Snow cruiser” was not suitable for the Antarctic. For the next 12 months, the vehicle was used as a temporary base.
Expedition returned home, but “Snow cruiser” did not. The approaching war and lack of finances decided “Snow cruiser’s” fate. The ATV never came back home into Chicago hangar. It was left there, in the cold emptiness of the Antarctic. Only few times people would remember about the ever so great “Snow cruiser”. It is thought, that the area where “Snow cruiser” was left, has become an iceberg by now and “Snow cruiser” might have drowned with all its excessive greatness.