They flew 800 miles from McMurdo Station on the Antarctic coast to the South Pole on Oct. 31, 1956 in an aging R4D, affectionately and sometimes derisively called a "Gooney Bird." It was the Navy version of the piston-powered, twin engine DC-3 airliner that had gone into service 20 years earlier. The R4D had none of the sophisticated navigation gear nor the power of the turboprop LC130 Hercules the New York Air National Guard used to pick-up Dr. Jerri Nielsen from a research station at the South Pole last month.

Shinn, originally from Eden, NC was one of seven Navy men aboard the R4D, including Rear Adm. George Dufek. The 77-year-old Shinn, now living in Pensacola, recalled his flight in an interview at the Museum of Naval Aviation where the plane is on display. It was named Que Sera Sera - French for whatever will be will be - the title of a then-popular song. The name turned out to be very appropriate, Shinn said. Just as the Air Guard did this year, the Navy waited for winter to wane before attempting a polar landing, although not long enough for Shinn. The Cold War had literal meaning in the Antarctic. Dufek was in a hurry, worried that the Russians might get there first.

An earlier flight in another R4D to seek a refueling site between McMurdo Station and the pole nearly ended in disaster. Flying into a valley, the plane got caught in a windshear and began falling. Fortunately it was equipped with small rockets called JATO for jet-assisted take-off. Shinn fired all 11 JATO bottles to stop the fall just as the wing tip hit the ice. There was "lots of noise, lots of fuss" but damage was minor and the plane flew fine. Dufek did not want to go to the pole with a bent wing so they borrowed Que Sera Sera from another crew.

The polar landing was a bit rough, but not unusual for the terrain, recalled Strider, 69, from his home in Newport News, Virginia. Strider is the only other surviving member of the landing party. Their JATO assisted takeoff appeared uneventful to those watching from an Air Force C- 124 Globernaster that circled overhead. It was not.

The high altitude of the ice cap--about 10,000 feet at the pole--starved engines of oxygen and robbed wings of their lift. That, along with the plane's 28,000-pound weight, made JATO necessary to take off in the best situation. The JATO bottles usually were fired after the plane hit 30 knots, but Que Sera Sera remained stuck with the engines at full power. "We just sat on the ice like an old mud hen," Shinn said. To break loose, Shinn fired four JATO bottles. That did the trick, but he was worried about having enough JATO left to get airborne. They barely made it only to be enveloped in ice and snow. We couldn't see anything, but that was no big deal," Shinn said. He relied on instruments to keep flying.

Source: Pp3-4, The Antarctican Society Newsletter Vol 99-00, No 3 December 1999.