The Endurance shipwreck was photographed at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, east of the Antarctic Peninsula. The photo shows the stern (back) of the ship.
Credit: © Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust/National Geographic

In a testament to its name, the legendary Endurance is in one piece after sinking off the coast of Antarctica 107 years ago. On March 5, 2022, a search expedition organized by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust discovered the shipwreck of the Endurance. It was at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, east of the Antarctic Peninsula in the Southern Ocean, about 4 miles (6 kilometers) from its last position as recorded by its captain. The ship’s hull (body) was largely intact. Under the international Antarctic Treaty, the ship was protected as a historic site and monument and left undisturbed.

The expedition which took off at the beginning of World War I (1914-1918) was led by Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton. Shackleton was a British explorer who made four journeys to Antarctica. In 1909, he came within 97 nautical miles (about 110 miles or 180 kilometers) of the south geographic pole, sometimes called simply the South Pole. Shackleton measured in nautical miles, because he wanted to reach a point within 100 miles of the pole. It was the farthest point south any expedition had reached. Shackleton also is known for a heroic rescue mission that he undertook in 1915-1916.

Shackleton was born on Feb. 15, 1874, in Kilkea, County Kildare, Ireland, then part of the United Kingdom. His family moved to London, England, when he was a child. Shackleton was educated at Dulwich College in London. He joined the British merchant marine when he was 16 years old and served for about 10 years.

From 1901 to 1903, Shackleton served on an Antarctic expedition led by the British explorer Robert Falcon Scott. Shackleton was part of a small party that trekked across the Ross Ice Shelf. The group reached a point about 530 miles (850 kilometers) from the south geographic pole. It was the farthest south that anyone had gone. After returning to the United Kingdom, Shackleton worked as a journalist and as secretary of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society while raising funds for his own expedition. In 1906, he ran unsuccessfully for Parliament.

From 1907 to 1909, Shackleton led his British Antarctic Expedition. Shackleton and three of his men traveled overland from Ross Island toward the south geographic pole. On Jan. 9, 1909, they reached a latitude of 88 degrees 23 minutes, more than 400 miles (600 kilometers) closer to the pole than Scott’s expedition had gotten. Another small party traveled north from Ross Island and came close to reaching the south magnetic pole. Members of the expedition also made the first ascent of Mount Erebus, on Ross Island, in 1908, as well as the first motion pictures of Antarctica. Shackleton returned to England a hero and was knighted.

Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914-1917 did not accomplish its goal of crossing the continent from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea. However, it became one of history’s great stories of survival. Shackleton’s ship, the Endurance, became trapped in ice in the Weddell Sea near the coast of Antarctica in January 1915. It drifted north for about 10 months before it finally was crushed by the ice and sank on Nov. 21, 1915. The crew had abandoned the ship in late October, and they camped on floating ice for several months. In April 1916, they traveled in small boats to desolate Elephant Island, off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Leaving 22 men on Elephant Island, Shackleton and five companions then made a daring open-boat journey of 800 miles (1,300 kilometers). They sailed northeast and reached the island of South Georgia in 17 days. Shackleton and two men trekked across the island’s snowy mountains for 36 hours to get help at a whaling station. It took until August 1916 to reach the 22 men stranded on Elephant Island, but the entire expedition of 28 men was rescued.

Shackleton served with British forces in Russia near the end of World War I. He set out once more for Antarctica in September 1921. However, he died of a heart attack on his ship in Grytviken Harbour, South Georgia, on Jan. 5, 1922. Shackleton wrote about his adventures in the books The Heart of the Antarctic (1909) and South (1919).

A diver swims over the two-masted schooner Walter B. Allen, which sank in Lake Michigan 1880.
Credit: Tamara Thomsen, Wisconsin Historical Society

Off the lakeshore in Wisconsin, dozens of ships lie under the surface. In October 2015, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced a new national marine sanctuary. In June 2021, the NOAA officially designated the Wisconsin Shipwreck Coast National Marine Sanctuary in Lake Michigan. Marine sanctuaries are protected waters, habitats, and archeological sites. In this case, NOAA’s sanctuary protects archeological, cultural, historic, and prehistoric artifacts, along with all historic shipwreck sites that served an important role in maritime heritage. The NOAA and the state of Wisconsin are co-managing the sanctuary.

The area is 726 square nautical miles (962 square miles or 2,492 square kilometers) along the coasts of Manitowoc, Port Washington, Sheboygan, and Two Rivers. The sanctuary protects 36 known shipwrecks. Of those, 21 are in the National Register of Historic Places. Because of Lake Michigan’s cold temperature and lack of salt, these shipwrecks are preserved with more integrity than usual, and some remain mostly intact. Researchers believe there are up to 59 shipwrecks in the sanctuary. Wisconsin spent three decades preserving historic maritime sites against human and natural activities. The sanctuary provides opportunities for archeological preservation, research, and education.

The shipwrecks have historical significance. They include the two oldest known shipwrecks in Wisconsin. From the 1800’s through the 1900’s, the Great Lakes were used to ship such goods as coal, grain, and manufactured goods. Hundreds of thousands of settlers used the lakes to move to the Midwest and West of the United States. Midwestern cities, farms, and industries grew as a result.

October 30, 2019

With Halloween tomorrow, World Book takes a peek at the “spooky” Skeleton Coast of Namibia, a country in southwestern Africa. The Skeleton Coast is the western boundary of the northern Namibian part of the Namib Desert. The forbidding area has massive sand dunes and a somewhat otherworldly appearance, but the dunes are not littered with human skeletons. Rather, the area received its name because of the large number of shipwrecks that have occurred there. Many “ship skeletons,” then, lie partially buried in the deep sands of the Skeleton Coast.

The skeletal remains of shipwrecks haunt the Skeleton Coast of Namibia. Credit: © Lukas Bischoff Photograph/Shutterstock

The Skeleton Coast can be particularly hazardous for ocean navigation. The coastline is pounded by heavy surf and its many shallow, rocky outcrops are often shrouded in dense fog. Ships get ensnared in these outcrops, or run aground on sand bars that form, disappear, and reform beneath the waters. Hundreds of shipwrecks dot the landscape, but not all the skeletons are of the naval variety. Large whale bones are often found among the dunes, as are the occasional remains of sailors or diamond miners who met their end among the desolation of the Skeleton Coast.

Diamonds were discovered along the Skeleton Coast in 1904, and the precious crystals are still mined on the beaches. Abandoned diamond settlements add to the area’s eerie Halloween allure, and such ghost towns as Kolmanskop and Elizabeth Bay are alternately covered and revealed by shifting sands.

The Namib Desert’s Skeleton Coast has an unforgiving climate. Some local people call it “the land God made in anger.” Credit: © Radek Borovka, Shutterstock

The Skeleton Coast has a harsh climate. Mists and fog are frequent, but little rain falls. It receives less than 3/4 inch (2 centimeters) of rain a year. Despite this, the protected Skeleton Coast Park is home to a number of animals, including elephants, jackals, springbok, and zebras.

Click to view larger image
Namibia. Credit: WORLD BOOK map

The Namib Desert is the oldest desert in the world. It lies along southern Africa’s west coast, mainly within Namibia. The desert covers more than 31,200 square miles (80,900 square kilometers). It extends from the Orange River in the south to Angola in the north. The Atlantic Ocean is the western limit. The steep slopes known as the Namibian escarpment make up the eastern edge. The desert has some of the highest sand dunes in the world. Some of them rise to more than 1,300 feet (400 meters).

November 10, 2015

Forty years ago today, the ore freighter SS Edmund Fitzgerald broke apart and sank in heavy waves during an abrupt, unseasonable wintry storm on Lake Superior. Heading from Superior, Wisconsin, to a steel mill near Detroit, the ship—the largest ever lost on the Great Lakes—went down in Canadian waters, about 17 miles (27 kilometers) from Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin. All 29 crew members died. None of their bodies were ever recovered.

The Split Rock Lighthouse at Two Harbors, Minnesota, is lit every November 10 to commemorate the sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald. Credit: Anita Ritenour (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

The sinking begat disbelief and morbid fascination: how could such a huge, modern ship founder in a storm on a freshwater lake, mere minutes from a safe harbor? Had the ship, as some suspected, been damaged during a shoal grounding earlier in the voyage? Had freak, towering rogue waves exploited some structural failure, and had crew failed to properly secure cargo hatches? Investigators’ theories of the sinking failed to build to a concrete conclusion, and maritime enthusiasts continue to debate the causes of the famous wreck to this day. Its wreckage rests on the lake bed—broken almost exactly in half—in about 530 feet (162 meters) of water.

The sinking shocked residents of Great Lakes shipping towns and drew attention from around the world. Writers penned numerous tributes to the lost crew. The most famous among such tributes was the haunting “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” by the Canadian folk-pop singer/songwriter Gordon Lightfoot. In 1976, the song topped the Canadian pop charts and peaked at number two in the United States. Its lyrics included the following lines:

The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy.
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty,
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the “Gales of November” came early.

Back in Time article

• Special report: Deep into the Past: Deep-Water Archaeology

September 30, 2015

An international team of scientists reported this week on new discoveries recovered from the Antikythera shipwreck, a mysterious 2,100-year-old Roman-era wreck that also contains the world’s oldest-known computer. The scientists displayed more than 50 items recovered from the ship in recent months, including an ivory flute, fine glassware, ceramic amphorae (wine jugs), and a bronze armrest. The artifacts provide a rare glimpse into the material wealth of the most elite members of society in ancient Rome and the surprising technological sophistication of the ancient world.

Archaeologists excavating the famous ancient Greek shipwreck that yielded the Antikythera Mechanism have recovered more than 50 items, including an intact amphora; a large lead salvage ring, two lead anchor stocks (possibly indicating the ship’s bow), fragments of lead hull sheathing, and a small and finely formed lagynos (or table jug). (Credit: Brett Seymour, EUA/ARGO/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute)

In 1900, sponge divers first discovered the ancient shipwreck beneath about 180 feet (55 meters) of water near Antikythera, an island off the southern coast of Greece. One of the most fascinating artifacts (objects made by human skill or work, especially tools or weapons) recovered in 1900 is known as the Antikythera Mechanism. The mechanism has 30 hand-cut bronze gears, dials, clock-like hands, and a wooden and bronze casing inscribed with ancient Greek writing. Scientists tried for decades to understand its purpose. In 2006, using computed tomography (CT) imaging, scientists made out faded inscriptions and reconstructed the mechanism. The reconstruction showed that it was an accurate mechanical astronomical computer that could predict the position of the sun and planets. It was also able to forecast lunar and solar eclipses. The finding showed that ancient technology was much more advanced than scientists had previously imagined.

Beginning in 2014, an international team of archaeologists renewed exploration of the Antikythera shipwreck for the first time in 40 years. Dozens of marble statues had been recovered from the shipwreck in the past, but scientists knew that many valuable artifacts remained. The shipwreck is scattered over an area 100 feet (30 meters) in diameter. Using modern methods developed for underwater archaeology, scientists investigated the shipwreck, recovered artifacts, and tried to reconstruct the ship’s history. Robotic submersibles (undersea research vessels) mapped the wreckage in great detail, and metal detectors located objects beneath the sandy seafloor.

Researchers think the Antikythera ship sank in a storm around 65 B.C., while transporting treasure from Greece to Rome. The treasure may have been taken as booty during a military campaign in Greece by Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix. Unlike other ancient shipwrecks, which often provide artifacts from common daily life, this ship held treasures that represent the finest artwork and luxury goods available only to the wealthiest members of ancient society.