RUSSIA: Off the Ice

Lord of the drifting ice pack that crushed and sank his Soviet icebreaker Chelyuskin (TIME, Feb. 26, March 12), jungle-bearded Professor Otto Schmidt has somehow kept his crew alive, fed and sheltered for two months in the — 20°F wilderness of the Arctic Ocean north of Bering Strait, while a semicircle of rescuers hovered from Cape Van Karem, Siberia, to Alaska. Last month a rescue plane swooped onto the ice pack, loaded the Chelyuskin's ten women and two babies aboard, got back safely to Cape Wellen, Siberia. Since then the ice pack,...

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