Video: 'Byrd's First Antarctic Expedition 1928' (crew reaches South Pole at 38:44)

(Friday, November 29, 1929, 114 GMT) — Navy Lt. Cmdr. Richard E. Byrd, pilot Bernt Balchen, radio operator Harold June and photographer Ashley McKinney today became the first people to fly over the South Pole as they flew the Floyd Bennett to the South Pole and back to Little America, Antarctica, on the Ross Ice Shelf, south of the Bay of Whales, in 18 hours, 41 minutes.

The crew had difficulty gaining enough altitude, and they had to dump empty gas tanks, as well as their emergency supplies, in order to achieve the altitude of the Polar Plateau, but they were ultimately successful.