- 4 minutes ago
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00History hit is aboard an expedition to locate one of the world's most famous shipwrecks,
00:12Sir Ernest Shackleton's Endurance.
00:15Trapped and eventually crushed by the Antarctic ice in 1915, no attempt to locate her since
00:21has been successful.
00:24But what really happened on that ill-fated polar voyage just over a century ago?
00:30And why has it gone down as one of the greatest survival stories in history?
00:54By 1914, Sir Ernest Shackleton was a veteran of two major Antarctic expeditions, the Discovery
01:11Expedition of 1901-4 and the Nimrod Expedition of 1907-9.
01:18Although both missions had been hailed successors in the field of polar exploration, the big
01:24prize of being first to the South Pole would be claimed by the Norwegian Roald Amundsen in
01:301911.
01:32Determined to make his own mark, the wrestler Shackleton set his sights on a new challenge.
01:38He wanted to be the first across the length of the entire Antarctic continent.
01:44His proposed Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition would consist of two parties and two ships.
01:51Shackleton's own contingent would sail to the Weddell Sea and land a shore party at Varsal
01:57Bay.
01:59Six men would undertake the 1800-mile journey across Antarctica to the Ross Sea.
02:07Since they wouldn't be able to carry enough supplies for the entire journey, a second party
02:11would already have laid supply depots along the final leg of their proposed route, basing
02:17itself at McMurdo Sound on the opposite side of the continent.
02:23After completing the difficult task of securing funds from a number of wealthy backers, Shackleton
02:28purchased a sturdy 300-ton barkentine called Polaris, built in Norway and designed as an Arctic
02:36cruise ship for intrepid tourists.
02:40He changed her name to Endurance, reflecting his family motto, By Endurance We Conquer.
02:47A second ship, the Aurora, was bought for the Ross Sea Party.
02:52The departure of the expedition in August 1914 was not without controversy, coming as it did
02:59shortly after the outbreak of the First World War.
03:03It was on the instructions of the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, that Shackleton's
03:08team embarked, heading first for Buenos Aires, then the remote island of South Georgia, before
03:15finally departing for the Antarctic in early December.
03:21The morning was dull and overcast, with occasional gusts of snow and sleet, but hearts were light
03:27aboard the Endurance.
03:29The long days of preparation were over, and the adventure lay ahead.
03:35Just two days later, Shackleton was concerned by the sight of pack ice much further north
03:40than expected.
03:42Endurance would now need to weave her way through treacherous, fast-moving ice flows to reach
03:48Varsal Bay.
03:50On the 14th of December, the ice was thick enough to halt the ship for 24 hours.
03:56Three days later, the ship was halted again.
03:59I had been prepared for evil conditions in the Weddell Sea, but had hoped that in December
04:03and January at any rate, the pack would be loose, even if no open water was to be found.
04:09What we were actually encountering was a fairly dense pack of a very obstinate character.
04:16With the crew managing to free her on each occasion, for weeks Endurance worked its way through
04:21the pack, averaging less than 30 miles a day.
04:25Passing by Coatsland on the eastern coast of the Weddell Sea, Endurance was within 200 miles
04:31of Varsal Bay by the 15th of January.
04:35Three days later, after sheltering from a winter storm beside a large iceberg, Endurance would
04:40make her final run.
04:43Entering thick, soft ice on the 18th, unlike anything they had encountered previously, the
04:48ship became immobilised and found itself completely closed in by the following morning.
04:54Over the remainder of January and February, several attempts were made to free the ship,
05:01as cracks briefly appeared in the ice around Endurance.
05:05It proved backbreaking work and ultimately futile.
05:11Shackleton decided that the consumption of coal and manpower, not to mention the risk of damage
05:16to the ship, was too great.
05:19Endurance's boilers were extinguished, committing the ship to drift with the ice.
05:26Where will the vagrant winds and currents carry the ship during the long winter months that
05:29are ahead of us?
05:31We will go west, no doubt, but how far?
05:33And will it be possible to break out of the pack early in the spring, and reach Varsal Bay,
05:38or some other suitable landing place?
05:40These are momentous questions for us.
05:43Initially Endurance drifted south, coming within 60 miles of the planned landing spot.
05:49Before being carried 130 miles northwest, between March and May.
05:54The ship's usual routine was abandoned, as the crew settled in for the long Antarctic
05:59winter.
06:00Men and dogs took exercise on the ice, special occasions were celebrated aboard with extra rations,
06:07and Leonard Hussey, the meteorologist, kept up spirits with his banjo playing.
06:12Shackleton would have known that other ships, including the Deutschland of the 1912 Filchner
06:17expedition, had survived been trapped in the pack ice for many months, before eventually
06:22being released from its grip.
06:25But during July, after two months of continuous darkness, there were warning signs from the
06:30ice after another large storm.
06:34Vast slabs of broken ice were being crushed against each other by the driving force of Antarctic
06:39winds, creating huge pressure ridges between them.
06:44The ice is rafting up to a height of 10 or 15 feet in places.
06:48The opposing flows are moving against one another at the rate of about 200 yards per hour.
06:53The noise resembles the roar of heavy, distant surf.
06:57Standing on the stirring ice, one can imagine it is disturbed by the breathing and tossing
07:01of a mighty giant below.
07:04Endurance would survive her first brush with danger, but from late September, the ship faced
07:10unrelenting pressure from below.
07:12The arrival of spring and the return of sunlight appeared not to spell salvation for the crew.
07:19The behaviour of our ship in this ice has been magnificent, wrote Worsley.
07:23Since we have been beset, her staunchness and endurance have been almost past belief again
07:28and again.
07:29She has been nipped with a million-ton pressure and risen nobly, falling clear of the water
07:34out on the ice.
07:36She has been thrown to and fro like a shuttlecock a dozen times.
07:40She has been strained, her beams arched upwards by the fearful pressure.
07:44Her very sides opened and closed again as she was actually bent and curved along her length,
07:50groaning like a living thing.
07:52It will be sad if such a brave little craft should be finally crushed in the remorseless,
07:57slowly strangling grip of the Weddell pack after ten months of the bravest and most gallant
08:02fight ever put up by a ship.
08:05After a brief glimmer of hope in mid-October, with the ice retreating and endurance floating
08:10in water for the first time in nine months, danger returned with alarming suddenness.
08:16The returning ice immediately rolled her onto her port side at a list of 30 degrees.
08:22On the 24th of October, her sides were splintered as she jammed against a huge ice flow.
08:28Water from beneath the pack began pouring into the ship.
08:33When attempts to pump the water failed due to frozen and damaged equipment, Shackleton gave
08:37the order to abandon ship.
08:40He told the 27 crew to dump all but two pounds of their personal possessions, making an exception
08:47for Frank Hurley's photographs and film reels and Hussey's banjo.
08:52The so-called ocean camp was established on the ice and for the next month the crew attempted
08:58to salvage what supplies they could from the flooded ship, at great personal risk.
09:04Then on November 21st, the broken endurance slipped beneath the ice, not to be seen again
09:10for well over a century.
09:13This evening, as we were lying in our tents, we heard the boss call out, She's going, boys!
09:18We were out in a second and up on the lookout station, another point's advantage, and sure
09:22enough there was our poor ship, a mile and a half away, struggling in her death agony.
09:27She went down bows first, her stern raised in the air.
09:31She then gave one quick dive and the ice closed over her forever.
09:35It gave one a sickening sensation to see it, for, maskless and useless as she was, she seemed
09:40to be a link with the outer world.
09:44Without her, our destitution seemed more emphasised, our desolation more complete.
09:53But this was not the end of the story.
09:55What followed the loss of endurance was an incredible feat of survival.
10:01After aborted attempts to drag the ship's boat north in November, and again in December,
10:06the crew pitched their tents on the treacherous ice floes at the so-called Patience Camp.
10:13Supplies were running low, and so was morale.
10:16The crew subsisted almost entirely on seal meat, and the refusal of the ship's carpenter
10:21to work on one occasion would never be forgiven by Shackleton.
10:26The carpenter's cat, Mrs Chippy, was one of the weaker animals shot before the overland
10:31party set off.
10:32Sadly, none of the 69 original dogs, or their pups, would survive the journey.
10:39Over the next three months, the expedition's floating home was pushed further northwards by
10:44strong Antarctic winds, and by early April, they had sighted the bleak and uninhabited Elephant
10:51Island.
10:52The lifeboats were launched on April 9th, and after a harrowing few days at sea, the
10:57crew set foot on solid ground for the first time in 497 days.
11:04But Shackleton knew that rescue was not possible if they stayed put, and so on April 24th, Shackleton
11:10and five other men set sail in the James Caird, their sturdiest lifeboat, in an attempt to
11:16reach South Georgia.
11:18It was one of the most daring open boat journeys in history, 800 miles across the notoriously
11:24dangerous Southern Ocean.
11:27But two weeks later, with incredible navigation from Frank Worsley, they landed at King Harkon
11:33Bay.
11:35Finally, after a week of recuperation, Shackleton, Worsley and Tom Crean trekked for 36 straight
11:41hours over the mountains and glaciers of the island's uncharted interior, arriving at Stromnes
11:48whaling station on the 20th of May 1916.
11:52They had made it back to civilisation.
11:56It required four attempts to reach the rest of the crew on Elephant Island, but they were
12:01finally rescued by the Chilean steamer Yelcho at the end of August 1916.
12:07Although many had come close to death, all 28 men of the expedition survived.
12:13Hi everyone, Team History are currently in Antarctica.
12:22We're on an expedition to find Sir Ernest Shackleton's lost ship Endurance, which sank right here beneath
12:28this sea ice over 100 years ago.
12:30For the next two weeks, History Hits YouTube channel is being devoted to all things Antarctica
12:36and Shackleton.
12:37Make sure you subscribe.
Be the first to comment