mark piesing

N-4 Down: The Hunt for the Arctic Airship Italia

“Gripping…. [A] book with much to enjoy and a good illustration of what human curiosity, determination and courage—and sometimes a healthy dollop of vanity—can achieve.” — The Wall Street Journal

In 1928, Italian airship designer General Umberto Nobile and a team of fourteen men set out in the airship Italia to pioneer flight over the North Pole. Their goal was to discover new lands in the Arctic Circle and to become the first airship to land men on the top of the world. 

Near the North Pole, the Italia hit a terrible storm and crashed on the ice. Six crew members were never seen again; the injured, including Nobile, took refuge on ice floes, unprepared for the wretched conditions and with little hope for survival. 

At the same time in Oslo, a gathering of famous Arctic explorers had assembled for a celebration of the first successful flight from Alaska to Norway. Hearing of the accident, the explorers, led by famed Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen organized the largest international polar rescue expedition in history. The impossible mission would take weeks, causing the deaths of many men, including Amundsen whose plane disappeared. 

Braiding together the gripping accounts of the survivors and their heroic rescuers, N-4 Down tells the unforgettable true story of what happened when the glamor and restless daring of the zeppelin age collided with the harsh reality of Earth’s extremes. 

Mark Piesing writes for the Guardian, FT, Economist and Wired, among other publications. He lives in Oxford, England. This is his first book.

Published by Custom House in August 2021.

More praise for N-4 Down:

“In compelling prose, Piesing draws us into the feverish efforts to conquer the Arctic by air.... Refreshingly well-written…. Piesing deserves credit for bringing this forgotten bit of aerospace history back to light." — Forbes

“Mark Piesing evocatively brings to life a lesser-known tale in the ill-fated history of polar exploration. Like the stories of Franklin and Shackleton, it combines triumph, disaster, heroism, hubris and mystery—but unlike them it features dashing aviators in airships and seaplanes. It is an epic tale that deserves to be far more widely known.” — Tom Standage, New York Times bestselling author of A History of The World in 6 Glasses

“A meticulously researched and utterly gripping account of adventure, airships and adversity, Mark Piesing's N-4 Down is a brilliant book. Packed with a cast of vivid characters, magnificent flying machines, political machinations and tales of survival against all imaginable odds, it depicts one of the most extraordinary stories of not just aviation and exploration, but the twentieth century as a whole. You will never forget General Nobile, the airship and the endless ice they faced.” — Michael Bhaskar, author of Human Frontiers: The Future of Big Ideas in an Age of Small Thinking

“N-4 Down is a gripping, detailed tale of exploration, betrayal and rescue. Mark Piesing has crafted a fascinating recounting of a liminal time when flying and polar expeditions were equally risky, so of course people tried to combine them. Think The Terror, but with airships.”  — Charles Arthur, author of Social Warming and Digital Wars, former technology editor at The Guardian