Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.
The Weddell Sea is part of the Southern Ocean and contains the Weddell Gyre. Its land boundaries are defined by the bay formed from the coasts of Coats Land and the Antarctic Peninsula. The easternmost point is Cape Norvegia at Princess Martha Coast, Queen Maud Land. To the east of Cape Norvegia is the King Haakon VII Sea. Much of the southern part of the sea is covered by a permanent, massive ice shelf field, the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf.
The Ross Ice Shelf is the largest ice shelf of Antarctica. It is several hundred metres thick. The nearly vertical ice front to the open sea is more than 600 kilometres (370 mi) long, and between 15 and 50 metres high above the water surface. Ninety percent of the floating ice, however, is below the water surface.
Grytviken was the largest whaling station on South Georgia, part of the British Overseas Territory of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands in the South Atlantic. The settlement, which is located at the head of King Edward Cove within the larger Cumberland East Bay, was considered the best harbour on South Georgia Island. It was founded on November 16, 1904, by Carl Anton Larsen of Sandefjord, Norway.
The voyage of the James Caird was a journey of 1,300 kilometres (800 mi) from Elephant Island in the South Shetland Islands through the Southern Ocean to South Georgia, undertaken by Sir Ernest Shackleton and five companions to obtain rescue for the main body of the stranded Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917. Polar historians regard the voyage of the crew in a 22.5-foot (6.9 m) lifeboat through the "Furious Fifties" as one of the greatest small-boat journeys ever completed.
The Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition of 1914–1917 is considered to be the last major expedition of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. Conceived by Sir Ernest Shackleton, the expedition was an attempt to make the first land crossing of the Antarctic continent. After Roald Amundsen's South Pole expedition in 1911, this crossing remained, in Shackleton's words, the "one great main object of Antarctic journeyings". Shackleton's expedition failed to accomplish this objective, but became recognized instead as an epic feat of endurance.
Endurance was the three-masted barquentine in which Sir Ernest Shackleton and a crew of 27 men and one cat sailed for the Antarctic on the 1914–1917 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. She was launched in 1912 from Sandefjord in Norway; three years later, she was crushed by pack ice and sank in the Weddell Sea off Antarctica. All of her crew survived.
The Ross Sea party was a component of Sir Ernest Shackleton's 1914–1917 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Its task was to lay a series of supply depots across the Great Ice Barrier from the Ross Sea to the Beardmore Glacier, along the polar route established by earlier Antarctic expeditions. The expedition's main party, under Shackleton, was to land near Vahsel Bay on the opposite coast of Antarctica, and to march across the continent via the South Pole to the Ross Sea. As the main party would be unable to carry sufficient fuel and supplies for the whole distance, their survival depended on the Ross Sea party setting up supply depots, which would cover the final quarter of their journey.
The Second German Antarctic Expedition of 1911–1913 was led by Wilhelm Filchner in the exploration ship Deutschland. Its principal objective was to determine whether the Antarctic continent comprised a single landmass rather than separated elements, and in particular whether the Weddell Sea and Ross Sea were connected by a strait. In addition, an extensive programme of scientific research was undertaken. The expedition failed to establish a land base, and the ship became beset in the Weddell Sea ice, drifting north for eight months before reaching open water. The expedition was marred by considerable disagreement and animosity among its participants, and broke up in disarray.
Mrs Chippy was a male ship's cat who accompanied Sir Ernest Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917.
The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition was an attempt to cross the Antarctic continent led by Ernest Shackleton. The personnel were divided into two groups: the Weddell Sea party consisting of the men who would attempt the crossing and their support, and the Ross Sea party whose job it was to lay stores on the far side of the Pole for the members of the Weddell Sea party who would make the crossing. Both arms of the expedition had a final complement of 28 men. The Weddell Sea party's ship Endurance was crushed in pack ice and the crossing attempt was never made. All the Weddell Sea party were rescued, but several members of the Ross Sea party perished after their support ship Aurora broke free from its mooring post and drifted away, leaving the shore party stranded.
New South Greenland, sometimes known as Morrell's Land, was an appearance of land recorded by the American captain Benjamin Morrell of the schooner Wasp in March 1823, during a sealing and exploration voyage in the Weddell Sea area of Antarctica. Morrell provided precise coordinates and a description of a coastline which he claimed to have sailed along for more than 300 miles (480 km). Because the Weddell Sea area was so little visited and hard to navigate due to ice conditions, the alleged land was never properly investigated before its existence was emphatically disproved during Antarctic expeditions in the early 20th century.
Lionel Greenstreet (1889–1979) was the first officer of the Endurance and a member of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917, for which he was awarded the Polar Medal. When he died on 13 January 1979, he was the last survivor of the Weddell Sea party within the expedition.
Julian A. Dowdeswell is a British glaciologist and a Professor of Physical Geography in the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge, and from 2002-2021 was the Director of the Scott Polar Research Institute.
Shackleton's Argonauts : A Saga of the Antarctic Ice-Pack (1948) is a children's information book by Australian photographer and explorer Frank Hurley. The book was also illustrated by Hurley, and won the Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers in 1948.
Alexander John Henry Kerr was an English marine engineer and wholesale newsagent. He is best known for his service in the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1916, for which he was awarded the Silver Polar Medal.
Lewis Raphael Rickinson was an English marine engineer. He is best known for his service in the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914–1916, for which he was awarded the Silver Polar Medal.
Iceberg A-68 was a giant tabular iceberg adrift in the South Atlantic, having calved from Antarctica's Larsen C ice shelf in July 2017. By 16 April 2021 no significant fragments remained.
South is a book by Ernest Shackleton describing the second expedition to Antarctica led by him, the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914 to 1917. It was published in London by William Heinemann in 1919.
Rampart Berg was an iceberg discovered by the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1915, estimated by Frank Worsley to have been 1150 feet tall, with a thousand feet of that below the sea. According to expedition photographer Frank Hurley, the berg’s prominence throughout the months in which they were stuck in the ice caused the members of the expedition “to look upon it as an old friend”.
