Polar explorer's sunken ship found

An international team has made polar history by discovering Endurance, the ship that took British explorer Ernest Shackleton on a mission to the Antarctic, where disaster struck in 1915 and the vessel foundered in the Weddell Sea.

After enduring weeks on board an icebreaker in subzero temperatures, the modern-day team of explorers, scientists, and technicians that found Endurance captured footage of the wreckage at a depth of 3,008 meters by using a remotely operated underwater search vehicle.

Mensun Bound, director of the exploration on the Endurance22 Expedition, called it a "monumental discovery" and a "milestone in polar history".

Shackleton's aborted attempt to cross the Antarctic has become the stuff of legend, and made Endurance one of the most famous wrecks of modern times.

The 28-man crew on board the fateful 1914-16 mission spent 19 months marooned in the Antarctic after Endurance became trapped. It eventually sank after being crushed by an ice floe on Nov 21, 1915.

Miraculously, everyone survived, after the crew navigated to the remote Elephant Island in lifeboats and Shackleton and five others pushed on, through the Southern Ocean, to South Georgia before returning with a rescue party.

"We have made polar history with the discovery of Endurance, and successfully completed the world's most challenging shipwreck search," said John Shears, leader of the expedition that located the ship on March 5, the 100th anniversary of Shackleton's funeral.

The expedition involved more than 60 experts from a dozen countries, coordinated by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust.

Failed attempts

While the captain of Endurance, Frank Worsley, had left detailed recordings of the location of the wreck, previous attempts to find the ship had failed, mostly due to harsh conditions and ice coverage in the area.

Shears and his team arrived in the Weddell Sea aboard the South African icebreaker Agulhas II, and combed the depths for two weeks using underwater drones called Sabertooths. Eventually, the team struck gold, locating Endurance around 6.5 kilometers from Worsley's coordinates.

Experts knew there was every chance the ship would be in good condition, since it sits in frigid waters and is far too deep for passing waves, ships, or icebergs to inflict damage.

The first video footage sent up from a Sabertooth confirmed this.

"This is, by far, the finest wooden shipwreck I have ever seen," said Bound. "It is upright, well proud of the seabed, intact, and in a brilliant state of preservation."

The wreck is a protected historic monument under the Antarctic Treaty and will not be disturbed in any way; only filmed and surveyed.

While he never reached the South Pole, Shackleton is regarded as one of the most iconic figures from the so-called heroic age of Antarctic exploration, a period between the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Shackleton established several records on his various missions in the area. The ill-fated Endurance expedition was among his most ambitious, with the aim of traversing the whole Antarctic continent via the South Pole.

In 1922 he embarked on what would be his final voyage, with the objective of mapping around 3,200 kilometers of the Antarctic coastline. Shackleton died of a heart attack close to the journey's beginning, just after sailing into South Georgia, and he was buried there at his wife's request.