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What did Richard E. Byrd’s 1926 flight diary suggest about the North Pole journey?
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Richard E. Byrd
Richard E. Byrd.
The discovery of Richard E. Byrd’s flight diary in 1996 cast significant doubt on his claim that he and pilot Floyd Bennett were the first to reach the North Pole by airplane in May 1926.12
Entries in the diary suggest that the aircraft was approximately 150 miles (240 km) short of the North Pole when Byrd decided to turn back due to concerns regarding an oil leak in the starboard engine. If these diary entries are accurate, the credit for the first definitive flight over the North Pole belongs to Roald Amundsen, Lincoln Ellsworth, and Umberto Nobile, who completed a well-documented journey in a dirigible three days after Byrd’s flight.21