Polar Star (airplane)

Polar Star was the single all-metal Northrop Gamma monoplane flown by the polar explorer Lincoln Ellsworth, an early adopter of aircraft for exploring the polar regions who worked closely with Roald Amundsen. The low-wing design reduced the effect of wind, it ran on wide skis that could be swapped for wheels or floats, and it had a cruising range of about 8,000 kilometres. The aircraft was shipped to the Antarctic in 1934 aboard the motor vessel Wyatt Earp. The first two attempts to fly it there failed, the first when its skis broke on the ice. In late 1935 Ellsworth and pilot Herbert Hollick-Kenyon made a successful 14-hour flight, and although the fuselage was damaged on landing the aircraft was able to fly again. Ellsworth gave Polar Star to the Smithsonian Institution in 1936, and it is now kept at the National Air and Space Museum.