A daring expedition to the bottom of the ocean has revealed the shipwrecks of Britain’s greatest explorers as they have never been seen before.
Researchers descended more than 1,000 feet (305 metres) beneath the Labrador Sea to find the remains of Quest, the ship where Ernest Shackleton died in 1922.
From the safety of their submersible craft, scientists from the Royal Canadian Geographic Society (RCGS) became the first people in over 60 years to lay eyes on the ship.
Then, less than a week later, the crew set out once again to find the remains of the Terra Nova, the ship that carried Robert Falcon Scott on his final expedition to the Antarctic.
These two ships represent the pinnacle of the so-called ‘Heroic Age’ of polar expeditions, when daring explorers risked their lives for fame and glory.
Now this new generation of explorers has not only visited their wrecks in person, but has used the latest technology to preserve them for the future.
Using underwater imaging technology, the scientists have created the first-ever full-sized scans of the two iconic ships.
These ‘digital twins’ capture Scott and Shackleton’s ships just as they are today, before they are inevitably reduced to rubble by the waves.
A daring expedition to the bottom of the ocean has revealed the wreck of Ernest Shackleton’s last ship (pictured) in never-before-seen detail
An expedition to find the two ships began in early July with funding from the RCGS, setting out from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts on the research vessel ‘Atlantis’.
First, the team travelled to Canada’s Labrador Sea, where the wreck of Quest had been discovered in 2024.
Ernest Shackleton is best known for his 1914 Antarctic expedition, during which his ship, Endurance, became trapped in the ice.
Over months, Shackleton led his crew over the ice floes to Elephant Island, off the east coast of Antarctica, and managed to save everyone on board.
In 1922, Shackleton chartered the sealing vessel Quest in preparation for another Antarctic expedition, but died inside his cabin after suffering a massive heart attack.
Quest was then sold to a Norwegian family and spent the next 40 years sealing in Arctic waters before being crushed by the ice and sinking in 1962.
Using the submersible craft Alvin, which was also the first crewed vessel to reach the Titanic, the crew descended beneath the waves to find the ship in the murky waters below.
Expedition leader and RCGS CEO John Geiger said: ‘At first, there was a lot of darkness, but suddenly the bow emerges as you are going towards it. It’s incredible.’
Researchers descended to the bottom of the Labrador Sea, becoming the first people to ever visit the wreck of Quest, the ship on which Ernest Shackleton died in 1922
Mr Geiger said that seeing the ship was a ‘moving experience’, adding: ‘To see Shackleton’s ship, and to think that Shackleton was standing on that deck a century ago.’
While most of the ship was in good condition, their discovery also revealed the wear and tear that 60 years beneath the waves has already taken on the legendary craft.
In particular, large fishing nets had become trapped on Quest, causing ‘a lot of damage’.
‘The nets are a sad story, limiting our ability to look at the wreck,’ says Mr Geiger.
‘I think we have to take responsibility for what we are doing to our oceans, that’s a huge issue.’
But the crew weren’t satisfied to visit just one wreck from the Heroic Age and soon set off northwards towards Greenland and the final resting place of the Terra Nova.
The Terra Nova was the ship that took Scott of the Antarctic and his crew on their ill-fated final voyage to the South Pole.
Setting out in 1910, Scott finally reached the South Pole on January 17, 1912, only to find that the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen had beaten him there by a month.
Researchers set out in July to find the wrecks of two Heroic Age exploration vessels, Robert Falcon Scott’s Terra Nova (left) and Ernest Shackleton’s Quest (right)
Ernest Shackleton’s ship Quest was discovered in 2024 using sonar imaging, revealing its final resting place 1,000 feet (305 metres) beneath the Labrador Sea
In addition to recording videos, the researchers also used cutting-edge technology to create full-sized 3D scans of the ships to preserve them for future generations
On the return journey, Scott and all four members of the expedition party died, and the Terra Nova carried the sad news back home.
Like Quest, Terra Nova was purchased by her former owners and went back to work in the Newfoundland seal fishery before sinking in 1943.
Once again using their submersible, Alvin, the researchers were able to dive to Terra Nova and reveal the first images of the wreck.
In addition to taking photos, the crew also used a combination of high-definition 5.2K video and underwater imaging technology to create 3D models of the wrecks.
Dwight Coleman, Co-Chief Scientist from WHOI for the expedition, says: ‘This type of 3D modelling has only existed in ocean science for the last couple of years and it’s giving us entirely new ways to explore these historic wrecks and make them real for the public.’
Sir Ernest Shackleton: Famed Anglo-Irish Antarctic adventurer
Sir Ernest Shackleton during the 1908 expedition to Antarctica
Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three expeditions to the frozen continent.
He was at the heart of a period in history that later came to be known as the ‘Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration’.
Born in Ireland, Shackleton moved to London with his family when he was 10 and first experienced polar climates as an officer on Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s Discovery expedition of 1901–1904.
He was sent home early from that expedition after work experiencing poor health that had been ascribed to scurvy. New studies suggest he had beriberi.
During the Nimrod expedition of 1907–1909, Shackleton and his companions created a new recorded of farthest south latitude at 88 degrees south.
Disaster struck his next expedition, the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, 1914–1917, when the ship, the Endurance, became trapped in pack ice.
The crew were able to escape by launching lifeboats and reaching nearby islands, travelling through stormy oceans for 830 miles.
He returned to the Antarctic for one final time in 1921 with the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition, but died of a heart attack on January 5, 1922, while his ship was moored in South Georgia.
While Shackleton is best known for his exploration, his legacy is also one of enabling a considerable amount of scientific research.
His expeditions helped produce comprehensive scientific and geographical surveys — among which were the first surveys of Antarctica’s interior and the effective location of the Magnetic South Pole.
‘Shackleton is an iconic figure of Antarctic history with the most incredible legacy of courage and endeavour,’ noted the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust’s CEO, Camilla Nichol.
‘But we sometimes overlook the contribution his expeditions made to science.
‘To this day Antarctica is an essential barometer for climate change at the heart of climate science.
‘We preserve Shackleton’s legacy to inspire the next generation of pioneering scientists and explorers.’
