Scientists Discover Shackleton’s Lost Ship Endurance

In 1915, in the thick of the polar exploration craze, famed explorer Ernest Shackleton’s ship, Endurance, was crushed in pack ice and lost in the Weddell Sea, off the Antarctic coast. Thanks to Shackleton’s strong leadership and resourcefulness, the entire crew escaped the ordeal safely after being trapped in the ice for ten straight months. The pack ice shifted and swallowed the ship on November 24, 1915; the crew and their surviving sled dogs camped out on the ice for nearly two months before making a desperate trip in lifeboats to nearby (well, approximately 346 nautical miles away) Elephant Island.

From here, Shackleton prepared to make difficult decisions and ultimately settled on a do-or-die strategy: he and five selected crewmen would embark in an open lifeboat to South Georgia Island, the expedition’s original launch point more than a year previously. This trip was 720 nautical miles one-way, and Shackleton refused to pack any unnecessary supplies, knowing they’d be more valuable to the castaways past a certain point of no return. Miraculously, Shackleton and his crew reached South Georgia Island in just sixteen days and hiked 32 more difficult, mountainous miles overland to the closest whaling stations.

Shackleton reached the whaling station on May 20, 1916; by August 30, all the castaways on Elephant Island had been rescued alive and taken back to safety in Chile.

Flash-forward to March 2022, more than a century after Shackleton and his men first became trapped in the ice. This week, archaeologists on the Endurance22 expedition announced that they had finally discovered the wreck of the Endurance, more than 3 kilometers deep in the Weddell Sea. Serendipitously, the wreck was located on the 100th anniversary of Shackleton’s funeral – March 5.

This groundbreaking discovery was a triumph of maritime archaeology, with the ship remaining in beautiful condition. The frigid Antarctic waters prevented much decay or deterioration, with the name still evident on the ship’s stern.

Images courtesy of the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust

The expedition has lived in memory due to the allure of the polar regions and Shackleton’s heroism in saving his whole crew, and continued to be scientists’ white whale due to the incredibly difficult conditions of trawling the Weddell Sea. Though the wreck is considered a designated monument under the International Arctic Treaty and so no artifacts may be removed, the knowledge of its location and photographic evidence of the wreck still combine to be a phenomenal discovery.

Naturally, such exciting news dominated both traditional and digital media. The news first broke to a wider audience on March 9, just a few days after the discovery, and traffic surrounding the search terms “Endurance AND Shackleton” naturally skyrocketed, with more than 83.4K mentions on the 9th alone. Of a week-long window from March 7 through today, these terms were mentioned more than 104.4K times.

Top trends occur not only in English but also in Spanish, due to the proximity to South America, and French, emblematic of the international agreements surrounding Antarctica. The United Kingdom also provided a significant amount of traffic volume, with the BBC breaking the news in a comprehensive article as well as holding claim to Shackleton as a native son and prized explorer.

Many of these themes express awe and recognition of this amazing accomplishment, as well as frequent mentions of other Endurance crew members such as captain Frank Worsley, who played integral roles in the 1915 ordeal. According to Smithsonian Magazine, the wreck fell only four miles away from where Worsley had initially predicted it lay.

Experts from other industries also chimed in on the social landscape, including a fascinating thread in which various marine biologists sought to identify the polar marine animals seen in the photos:

While social traffic has dropped off again following the initial newsbreak on March 9, there’s no doubt this major discovery has altered both modern maritime archaeology as well as our historical knowledge of the event.

Original story on the SMLC Blog.