After more than 100 years hidden in the icy waters of Antarctica, Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship Endurance has been revealed in extraordinary 3D detail. The vessel, which sank in 1915, lies 3,000m down at the bottom of the Weddell Sea. A digital scan made from 25,000 high resolution images was captured when the ship was found in 2022. The model reveals how the ship was crushed by the ice – the masts toppled and parts of the deck in tatters – but the structure itself is largely intact. Pictured here is a flare gun that’s referenced in the journals the crew kept. and fired by Frank Hurley, the expedition’s photographer, as the ship that had been the crew’s home was lost to the ice.
The Irish explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton led the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expeditn, which set out to make the first land crossing of Antarctica. The mission was doomed when their ship Endurance became stuck in pack ice within weeks of setting off from South Georgia. Shackleton and his men were forced to travel for hundreds of miles over ice, land and sea to reach safety – miraculously all 27 of the crew survived. A documentary on The Endurance will premiere at the London Film Festival on October 12. It will be released in cinemas on October 14.
