Navigation and History of Science: The scurvy-free Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition, the Shackleton´s deed

Abstract

A year after Scott's death, Shackleton organized the Endurance Expedition, but nothing foresaw that it would overcome Scott's glorious failure. With the help of the British government and various influential personalities, the idea took shape. With the first money, Shackleton bought a wooden schooner, with three sticks, 48 m length and about 300 tons, named Polaris. By its construction (pine, oak, ocote, with plates of about 80 cm), he thought that it would resist the ice and renamed it Endurance (incidentally, among sailors, usually quite superstitious, it is said that changing the name of a ship brings bad luck). Shackleton wanted to start his way by land in the Weddell Sea and he felt that an auxiliary ship would be necessary to be anchored at the previous base (Cape Royds) in the Ross Sea. Thus, he bought the Aurora, a boat to hunt seals which has been built in 1876.

Keywords

• Ernest Shackleton
• South Pole
• Antarctica
• Endurance expedition
• scurvy
• denutrition
• dehydration