The search for Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton’s lost Endurance ship has been called off, after extreme weather trapped an underwater vehicle in a sheet of frozen ice.
Severe weather closed in and the sea ice conditions led to the loss of the AUV7, a specialist submersible autonomous underwater vehicle, which was deployed to locate the wreck using HD still colour cameras.
The Weddell Sea Expedition team was on the final leg of the mission when the vehicle entered underneath a vast sheet of floating ice to take images of the legendary ship but contact was lost with the Expedition research vessel, the S.A. Agulhas II.
Despite efforts to recover the AUV7, the team decided to abandon the mission due to risks of becoming themselves trapped in the ice.
Any captured footage that may have been of Endurance on the seabed was lost.
The conditions we are facing are challenging. There is an ice floe moving in from the West and air temperatures have dropped to below -14 degree centigrade. It gives us a sense of the harsh, unforgiving time that Shackleton and his men endured out here.
— Weddell Sea Expedition 2019 (@WeddellSeaExped) February 13, 2019
The AUV7 had conducted what is believed to be the longest and deepest dedicated under ice survey ever, lasting over 30 hours.
Dr John Shears, polar geographer and expedition leader, said: “The Weddell Sea Expedition team are truly disappointed that after such a huge effort, and overcoming several major setbacks, we have not been able to find Endurance.
“We are, however, very proud of our other achievements over the past weeks in Antarctica.
“We have greatly surpassed our primary Expedition objective of undertaking pioneering scientific research at the Larsen C Ice Shelf.
Thank you all for your support for the Weddell Sea Expedition! We are all so pleased and proud we have got this far. Some curious little friends came to say hi today! #weddellseaexpedition2019 pic.twitter.com/luOqtVU2Ll
— Weddell Sea Expedition 2019 (@WeddellSeaExped) February 11, 2019
“We have also conducted an unprecedented educational outreach programme, allowing children from around the world to engage in real time with the expedition and our adventures from the outset.
“We will shortly begin our return leg to Cape Town, after an expedition which has been my great privilege and honour to lead.
“The Expedition team, and the officers and crew of the S.A. Agulhas II, have been simply outstanding.
“I would also like to thank The Flotilla Foundation, and all of our partners who have all played a key role in supporting this incredible expedition.”
Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship, Endurance, was crushed by ice and sank in 1915.
The search for Endurance was part of a ground-breaking scientific research programme in the waters around the Larsen C Ice Shelf and the A-68 Iceberg in Antarctica.
The international team of glaciologists, marine biologists and oceanographers involved in the Expedition have surveyed the seafloor and the rich and little-studied biological systems that lie beneath the ice infested sea.
Mensun Bound, director of exploration on the expedition, said: “As a team we are clearly disappointed not to have been successful in our mission to find Endurance.
We have reached the sinking site of the Endurance! The Agulhas II, led by Captain K. Bengu, assisted by F. Lighthelm and VL John Shears, has led us through heavy pack ice. Exploration Director, Mensun Bound, has said ‘we are the first people here since Shackleton and his men!’ pic.twitter.com/5REA0F7qv7
— Weddell Sea Expedition 2019 (@WeddellSeaExped) February 10, 2019
“Like Shackleton before us, who described the graveyard of Endurance as ‘the worst portion of the worst sea in the world’, our well laid plans were overcome by the rapidly moving ice, and what Shackleton called ‘the evil conditions of The Weddell Sea’.
“We are pleased to have brought the story of Shackleton and Endurance to new audiences, and to the next generation, who will be entrusted with the essential safeguarding of our polar regions, and our planet more broadly.
“We hope our adventure will have engaged young people about the pioneering spirit, courage and fortitude of those who sailed with Endurance to Antarctica.
“We pay tribute to the navigational skills of Frank Worsley, the captain of the Endurance, whose detailed records were invaluable in our reaching the area where she was lost.”
Shackleton’s attempt to cross Antarctica began in 1914.
After the vessel became trapped in ice for 10 months and then sank, the explorer and his crew survived for six months before reaching uninhabited Elephant Island.
These two maps show our route through the sea ice, and Agulhas II’s position, in relation to the drift of Shackleton’s expedition and the sinking of the ‘Endurance’. pic.twitter.com/GFwActykqi
— Weddell Sea Expedition 2019 (@WeddellSeaExped) February 10, 2019
Shackleton and five other men then set off to seek help at a whaling station on the island of South Georgia.
After three unsuccessful attempts, Shackleton finally rescued his men in August 1916.
The Weddell Sea Expedition team says it may attempt the mission again.
