COMMUNISTS TO RESCUE FASCISTS, 1928: 1/4: N-4 Down: The Hunt for the Arctic Airship Italia, by Mark Piesing @PorterSqBooks.
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
4.5 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 20 January 2024
⏱️ 9 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
https://www.amazon.com/N-4-Down-Arctic-Airship-Italia/dp/0062851527
Triumphantly returning from the North Pole on May 24, 1928, the world-famous exploring airship Italia—code-named N-4—was struck by a terrible storm and crashed somewhere over the Arctic ice, triggering the largest polar rescue mission in history. Helping lead the search was the famed Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, the poles’ greatest explorer, who himself soon went missing in the frozen wastes. Amundsen’s body has never been found, the last victim of one of the Arctic’s most enduring mysteries . . .
During the Roaring Twenties, zeppelin travel embodied the exuberant spirit of the age. Germany’s luxurious Graf Zeppelin would run passenger service from Germany to Brazil; Britain’s Imperial Airship was launched to connect an empire; in America, the iconic spire of the rising Empire State Building was designed as a docking tower for airships.
1913 MUSSOLINI
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is CBS I on the World with John Bachelor. |
| 0:07.0 | This is CBS I on the World with John Bachelor. This is CBS. |
| 0:13.0 | I'm the world. I'm John Bachelor. |
| 0:15.0 | I welcome Mark Pizing, author of N4 Down. |
| 0:19.0 | This is the story of the early part of the 20th century and the search for achievement, adventure, |
| 0:27.0 | and conquest of the North Pole. |
| 0:30.0 | The subtitle, The Hunt for the Arctic airship Italia. |
| 0:34.0 | Mark, congratulations. |
| 0:36.0 | Good evening. |
| 0:37.0 | We go immediately to an exciting scene in your book. |
| 0:40.0 | July 25, 1925, we're in Norway at a house, an alpine-like house in an part of Norway that |
| 0:49.7 | it's on the bunice fjord that leads into the also fjord and the name of the |
| 0:56.8 | alpine house is Uranaborg who is present at the meeting and why is this important for Arctic exploration? |
| 1:04.0 | Good evening, Mark. |
| 1:05.0 | Good evening, John and thank you very much for having me on your show. |
| 1:08.0 | Yeah, present at the meeting with you got some of the main characters of the story.'ve got Rauled Amundsen who is obviously |
| 1:15.2 | that the famous Arctic Explorer first man to the South Pole led the first expedition through |
| 1:22.4 | the Northwest Passage. |
| 1:24.0 | You had A Burton Nobley, who's probably less well known, |
| 1:28.0 | who was a genius Italian airship designer, pilot and had aspirations I guess you could say to be a |
| 1:37.8 | Polar Explorer and you had Lincolnel's worth, who's some of the audience I know, kind of, |
| 1:44.4 | erred to Ellsworth fortunes. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from John Batchelor, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of John Batchelor and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.