MOSCOW - A South African rescue ship managed to push its way far enough through the thickening sea ice around Antarctica yesterday to begin the helicopter evacuation of Russian scientists and technicians from a cargo ship trapped closer to the coast.
Two helicopters from the rescue vessel Agulhas picked up 21 of the 107 people aboard the stranded ship, the Magdalena Oldendorff, and dropped off 1,100 pounds of food before the brief twilight of the Antarctic winter vanished.
A blizzard that whipped the stranded ship with 55-mph winds cleared yesterday. If the good weather holds, said Vladimir Kuchin of Russia's Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, the pilots will rescue 40 people today and a smaller group Saturday.
The situation remains dangerous, however. Extremely low temperatures could thicken the ice around the rescue vessel, forcing it to move farther north - away from the Magdalena - or risk getting trapped.
Plans call for a skeleton crew to remain aboard the Magdalena and await an Argentine icebreaker, due to arrive late next week. The icebreaker would then lead the Magdalena, which is owned by a German line and chartered by the Russian scientists, to safety.
The Agulhas' captain reported Wednesday that his ship probably could not get close enough to the Magdalena to send helicopters directly to and from the stricken vessel. But the ship penetrated the ice much farther than expected, sailing to within 125 miles of the trapped vessel, Kuchin said yesterday.
The Magdalena is moored to a 13-story ice shelf that forms Muskegbukta Bay off the Antarctic coast. The site is about 50 miles from South Africa's Sanae research station, just east of the Weddell Sea.
The Russian scientists and technicians were sailing home from two Antarctic research stations late last month when the Magdalena was trapped by growing ice floes.
Besides the Russians, the ship - formerly the Nizhneyansk, which had been owned by the Far East Russian shipping line - carries five South African contract pilots and 28 crew members of various nationalities.