Global Oil Finder

Going over these dunes was tricky because we had to keep up our speed to keep from sinking into the sand and getting stuck.  So, we picked the lowest part of each line of dunes and went over it as fast as we could go. This resulted in several thrills as we often found ourselves sailing through the air over the steep backside of a dune.

On one occasion, the first Land Rover in our convoy sailed over the back of a large sand dune and got stuck nose-down in the sand.  Jim Carter and I were second over and just missed the stuck vehicle as we got stuck ourselves.  We quickly ran clear as the third Land Rover sailed over the dune and also got stuck; Don DePriest and Del Weigand jumped out and ran as fast as they could because they knew the Dodge Power Wagon was coming over right behind them.  Fortunately, the Power Wagon truck slowed down as it climbed the dune, stopped as it reached the top, and then slowly descended down the back.  We continued northwest back to our camp at Tazerbo without further incident.

That evening as we sat around our campfire we were surprised when a European wearing a French beret walked up and greeted us. He told us he was Professor W.W. Rajkowski from the University of Durham, England. He said he was Polish, but now a British subject.  He was delighted to share our western-style dinner with us and told us his story.  Rajkowski said he had been wandering in the desert for over nine months with a Libyan guide and two camels, which were now staying at the Police post.  As an anthropologist, he had been far to the south studying the local inhabitants in the Tibesti Mountains and Kufra Oasis.  He was presently living at the Tazerbo Police Post and preparing to travel west across the desert to the Oasis of Sebha.

The next morning, Professor Rajkowski joined us for breakfast and then took Del Weigand, Jim Carter and me along with him to find “the castle of the last Tubbu King of Tazerbo,” which he had heard about but not yet seen.  Apparently, these mysterious Tubbu people were people from Central Africa that had moved into the Sahara.  They constantly fought with the Tuaregs, who finally drove them back south.  We walked through Tazerbo Oasis guided by Rajkowski and local residents, and then came to ruins of a mud-brick citadel surrounded by ruins of circular animal pens.  This “castle” was small and in a very poor state.  Rajkowski estimated that the Tubbu people had abandoned it about 150 years ago.  Following this tour, Rajkowski left our camp and we never saw him again.

We broke camp at Tazerbo and our convoy traveled northwest along the desert track towards Zella.  About mid-day, we came across a World War II British army truck with a complete shower unit on it, a burned-out British truck, and a World War II airstrip marked by gasoline drums.  That day we crossed about 140 miles of flat, sandy, gravel plain, known as a serir, with a few sand dunes before we stopped to camp for the night.  The next day the trucks and one Land Rover continued north to join the tracks we had made when we traveled from our Bir Zelten camp to Tazerbo.  Using two Land Rovers, Don DePriest, Del Weigand and I drove northwest to check out some hills shown on our maps.  In the desert, hills usually mean rock outcrops which provide the only geological data available in sand covered areas.

After traveling some 35 miles northwest, we found some low buttes capped with hard limestone located near the western border of Concession 71.  After examining the outcrops we headed due east to re-join our convoy.  On the way, we encountered more parallel ridges of sand dunes and got several more thrills as we drove over the dunes at high speed to find a very steep drop-off on the other side.  We got stuck in the sand several times but got out using steel sand-tracks, which we always carried (another British Long Range Desert Group invention from World War II).  We rejoined our convoy and followed our old tracks back to our permanent camp near Bir Zelten in Concession 59.  We had covered a total of about 900 miles on our reconnaissance trip to Concession 71. It was now December 11, and the winter weather in the desert consisted of clear, sunny days with a cool breeze, followed by cold nights around 35 degrees Fahrenheit.