{O/C} In our last story tonight, a group of explorers have ventured upon their quest to figure out where precisely the Antarctic Pioneer, Ernest Shackleton's shipwreck is located.
{SOT}
Ernest Shackleton's Endurance didn't have an ensign, but that wasn't a problem because his ship, albeit shipwrecked, has long taken pride of place in the history of Antarctic exploration.
Following an 11-day voyage aboard a South African icebreaker, the Endurance22 expedition began looking for the shipwreck last week. With the help of underwater drones, cameras, sonar and lasers, the team has been scanning 100 square miles of the glacial Weddell Sea's seafloor in the quest to discover where exactly the remnants of the 144-foot wooden ship are.
Images and data are sent to the ship explorers are on via fibre-optic cable.
Endurance was shipwrecked in 1915 after being crushed in ice.
Technical glitches notwithstanding, team members are using the submersibles to carry out several dives every day.
Mensun Bound, the expedition's director of exploration, said given the flat seafloor, identifying any wreckage in a second should be a cinch.
Witnessing the utterly thick ice on the Weddell Sea near the South Pole first-hand truly speaks volumes. But the leader of the expedition said the team lucked out, provided the ship was able to manoeuvre through the ice en route to the search site.
The shipwreck is believed to be pretty intact as the shipwreck has been in icy waters free of marine organisms.
Equally encouraging is that the ice at the search area is so thin, the team has been making good progress covering the search area.
Thick ice eventuated in the demise of Endurance. Yet, in the teeth of insurmountable and formidable difficulties, Shackleton managed to journey 800 miles in a tiny boat to South Georgia island.
Sure enough, he was welcomed with open arms back in Britain.
The icebreaker of this expedition, financed at more than 10 million USD by an anonymous donor, has about a week's time left before it must be headed back to Cape Town.
Not only does this expedition aim at finding the remnants of Endurance, researchers also long to study the impact of climate change on the Weddell Sea's thick and numbing ice.
If the remains of this ship are found, they will be presented as a fascinating collection of museum exhibits and education materials that once helped pioneer avid explorers' second nature: Exploring every nook and cranny of the South Pole.
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