I’m sure you’ve seen this: they finally discovered the wreck of Shackleton’s ship Endurance this week, 107 years after it went down and four miles from its last recorded location (hence the time it took to find it).
I hoped to link to a definitive article with lots of good pictures, but it’s honestly more interesting to do a Google Images search of “endurance ship” because it turns up so many great pictures of her before she sank.
This video of the wreck itself is amazing. She went down in water so cold that wood-eating beasties can’t survive, hence the astonishing state of preservation.
I’d also like to link to his Britannica entry because it has audio of him talking about his adventures, recorded in 1910. Early audio recordings are so spooky.
Lumme a good creepy shipwreck. Have a great weekend, everyone!
Posted: March 11th, 2022 under archaeology.
Comments: 4
Comments
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: March 12, 2022, 1:00 am
I’m pretty sure Putin sent that ice to trap Endurance.
He’s got the ability to go back in time to do all manner of evil.
As for the ship, I doubt asshats like the Titanic raiders will be able to go collect souvenirs, at least until Gerbil Warming clears the ice. Then it will be a race to see who wrecks the wreck first, the human scavengers or the hungry sea beasties.
Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: March 12, 2022, 1:45 pm
It’s amazing that they found the ship; I have a bit of a fascination with the British expeditions to the South Pole at the turn of the last century. I grew up just far enough north to have a small appreciation of what it’s like to be out in -20° weather for hours at a time and I’ve even slept in a tent in those conditions. I cannot image doing it for days, and then months, and then years at a time….while hungry as hell….and I could never keep up my spirits when the smart money is giving high odds that you will never get home alive.
I have a bit of a private joke that no one gets; when I leave a party I often say:
“I am just going outside and may be some time.”
I long for the day that someone recognizes it as Captain Oates.
Those explorers were such quietly brave men. Of course, they were British, but even then they were amazing examples of what makes Britain great. I would very much need a man like Shackleton to lead me through it, or like Scott to make me quietly accept that I was not going to get through it. I am not made of such stern stuff.
But enough of that: I am glad they found the Endurance but they found something even more important (from my point of view anyhow) a few years ago:
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/shackletons-whiskey
Comment from Deborah HH
Time: March 12, 2022, 6:54 pm
Imagine people all over the world, searching the photos for the things they know something about: shipbuilders, rope makers, sailors and their first cousins—the knot lovers,(like JavaSon). Chain makers and Typographers, sailmakers, and the deep-water marine zoologists. To name a few.
Comment from durnedyankee
Time: March 12, 2022, 10:07 pm
I’ve always been leery of wrecks because I can’t help thinking of the people who went down with them.
The Endurance went down on her lonesome, unless I misunderstand of course.
Making it perfect for the “time travel” thing of everything they left behind essentially in place notwithstanding being a bit rattled about when she filled with water and sank unless she did it on an even keel.
But SomeVeg – yeah, Endurance certainly lent her name to her crew. As the line from the song goes – “we may have good men, but we’ve never had better.”
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