Wreck of ship on which famed explorer Ernest Shackleton died found on ocean floor off Canada

The wreckage of the ship in which famous explorer Ernest Shackleton died more than a century ago has been found at the bottom of the ocean off the coast of Canada, according to a report. press release from the Royal Canadian Geographical Society.

Shackleton was a legendary explorer who sailed to the ends of the Earth, including four trips to Antarctica. During a remarkable expedition in 1915, his iconic ship Endurance became trapped by sea ice. The ship sank, but Shackleton and his entire crew survived the episode. The Endurance’s sinking was finally found in 2022.

Seven years later, in 1922, Shackleton would die aboard the Quest, a Norwegian ship, during another expedition to the polar region. Shackleton’s death from a heart attack at age 47 ended what historians consider the “Heroic Age of Polar Exploration”, the RCGS said.

After Shackleton’s death, the Quest was acquired by a Norwegian company and continued to fly important expeditions, including the British Arctic Air Route Expedition of 1930, the RCGS said. The ship was also used in Arctic rescues and was even part of the Royal Canadian Navy during the Second World War.

In 1962, while being used as a hunting vessel, Quest was damaged by ice off the coast of Newfoundland and sank. The crew survived, the RCGS said, but the ship landed on the seabed more than 1,200 feet deep.

The wreckage was found just a kilometer and a half away from the ship’s last reported position, but it took sonar equipment and an international team of experts to find the location, the RCGS said. The “Shackleton Quest Expedition” team included participants from Canada, Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States. Research director David Mearns said he and lead researcher Antoine Normandin cross-referenced historical records and maps with historical data to determine where currents and weather conditions may have taken the ship.

Just five days after the expedition began, the site was found, with historians, divers and oceanographers working together to confirm the wreck’s identity.

“In the pantheon of polar ships, Quest is definitely an icon,” Mearns told BBC News

On Sunday, it was confirmed that the wreck was the Quest, the RCGS said.

“Meet Search is one of the final chapters in the extraordinary story of Sir Ernest Shackleton,” expedition leader John Geiger, CEO of RCGS, said in the press release. “Shackleton was known for his courage and brilliance as a leader in crisis. The tragic irony is that his death was the only one that occurred on any of the ships under his direct command.”

The ship remains intact, Mearns said, and the sonar images “exactly match the known dimensions and structural features of this special ship.”

This year marks the 150th anniversary of Shackleton’s birth. His granddaughter, Alexandra Shackleton, was a patron of the expedition and said finding the wreck during such a memorable anniversary made its discovery even more significant.

“My grandfather, Sir Ernest Shackleton, bought Search with the intention of leading a Canadian expedition to the Arctic,” she said. “It is perhaps appropriate that the ship ended its historic service in Canadian waters. I have been waiting for this day for a long time and I am grateful to all those who made this incredible discovery.”