Welcome to the 2007/8 HMS Endurance Tracking Project.
HMS Endurance is the Royal Navy’s sole Ice Patrol Ship. Flexible, capable and unique, she deploys each year in the autumn from her base port of Portsmouth in Hampshire, to the cold and ice of the Antarctica austral summer where she carries out her operational duties for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the British Antarctic Survey and the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office.
A commercially built icebreaker she was in chartered as HMS Polar Circle in November 1991, before being purchased by the Royal Navy and she was re-commissioned as HMS Endurance in 1992 – the second Royal Navy ship to bear the name. She certainly lives up to her name with a range of 24,600 nautical miles at 12 knots on a fuel tank capacity of 1,200 cubic metres. She makes 50 tonnes of fresh water per day and can store 270 days worth of dry and frozen provisions. Her colour scheme of a bright red hull and white superstructure makes her stand out against the ice and sea and explains her nickname of `The Red Plum’.
Vital elements of the Endurance capability package are two Lynx Mk III helicopters and seven boats, including two specialist nine-ton survey motorboats that are capable of detached operations for inshore hydrographic work.
In addition to seamanship, engineering and logistics, the Ship’s Company’s (Navyspeak for `crew’) skillset includes some the Navy’s rarer specialisations - the diving team is led by a specialist diver, there is a six strong Royal Marines detachment trained in cold weather survival, a team of Survey Recorders and a professional Naval photographer with facilities for still and video work.
Through this website, you can track the passage of HMS Endurance as she tackles her journey from the UK to the cold of the frozen south, and `home’ again. Factfiles will be provided about various aspects of the journey - from eco-systems and wildlife at locations along the route - to explanations of how HMS Endurance supports the work of organisations such as British Antarctic Survey to deliver the science that will inform our future understanding of Antarctica.
Shackleton and Endurance
HMS Endurance’s motto is “Fortitudine Vincimus" ~ 'By Endurance We Conquer' This motto originates from that of the great Antarctic explorer, Sir Ernest Shackleton who made history in his ship, 'Endurance' during his Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1914-15.
Ernest Shackleton has been called “The greatest leader that ever came on God’s earth, bar none” yet he failed to reach nearly every goal he ever set, and, he never led a group larger than twenty-eight. But once you know the story of Sir Ernest Shackleton and his incredible Antarctic expedition of 1914 – 16, you will learn of man who had the most extraordinary leadership qualities and brilliant survival strategy and wonder why the tale has not become part of every school-age child’s reading.
Sir Ernest set out on an independent voyage to make what was considered the last great expedition left now that the South Pole had finally been reached: a crossing of the Antarctic on foot. He wanted to travel from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea via the South Pole, a distance of 3,300 km. It was an incredibly ambitious idea.
Endurance, a three-masted steam ship, named after the Shackleton family motto Fortitudine Vincimus, “By Endurance We Conquer”, set sail in August 1914 and slowly made its way to the Antarctic Circle, where it ploughed through miles and miles of ice-encrusted waters. Unluckily for Sir Ernest the ice had come early that year and Endurance became trapped in the ice of the Weddell Sea, just one day’s sail from its destination in Vahsel Bay on the Antarctic coast.
Whenever it seemed that the situation couldn’t possibly get worse for the men on Endurance, it did. The pack ice dragged the ship north-west in a cold frozen world for ten months. Then, the men had to watch in horror as the Endurance was crushed and they were forced to camp on ice.
When the weather was its most atrocious, the men endured temperatures that were so low they could hear water freeze and they slept in tents so flimsy they could see the moon through them. But Shackleton ensured his men’s survival by leading them across the ice until they took to their three small lifeboats and made their way to Elephant Island, in the South Shetland Islands – the first land they had set foot on for 20 months. Everyone was shattered and exhausted but they were still a long way from safety as no one knew they were there and therefore stood no chance of being rescued.
In the end, Shackleton decided to look for help by taking five of his men and sailing to South Georgia in the remote South Atlantic, where there was a whaling station, but there were some problems:
- They only had a small lifeboat to make their voyage in.
- To reach South Georgia it meant sailing across one of the world’s most dangerous oceans.
- South Georgia was over 1,300 km away from Elephant Island.
Shackleton decided this journey was their only hope for survival. The voyage in the James Caird took 16 days and they faced appalling weather conditions as the men worked round the clock, working the sails, steering and pumping out water.
Eventually, by some miracle they made their destination of South Georgia. But instead of landing on the north coast (at the whaling station), they were forced to land on a small beach on the south coast. Because this part of the island was completely uninhabited, they still had to cross the island to get to the whaling station and so Shackleton took his two fittest men, Worsley and Crean and crossed a nearly impassable frozen mountain range to reach civilization: a whaling station. Immediately, Shackleton turned around and led an effort to reach the men left behind on Elephant Island. Remarkably everyone survived.
Early polar exploration is full of unforgettable stories of the demise of men who didn’t have the good fortune to be under the leadership of a man such as Shackleton or “The Boss”, as his men called him. Even the Ross Sea party, the other half of Shackleton’s Endurance expedition lost three men: two to an accident and one to scurvy.
This is how the adventure is said to have begun with an advertisement in the London papers:
Men wanted for Hazardous Journey, small wages, bitter
cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger,
safe return journey doubtful.
Honour and recognition in case of success.
Would you have volunteered for this journey? Amazingly, thousands did and while Ernest Shackleton’s expedition failed to reach its goal of reaching the South Pole, Ernest Shackleton is remembered today for his extraordinary leadership skills, determination and ability to motivate people in the face of adversity:-.
“When disaster strikes and all hope is gone, get down on your knees and pray for Shackleton”
Sir Edmund Hilary – the first person to successfully reach the top of Mount Everest
Uniquely, this project contains the only historical information available on what happened to Ernest Shackleton’s crew once they were rescued from Antarctica.
Aims of the Project
The aims of this project are to increase everyone’s knowledge of the environment as a whole and show how the Royal Navy contributes to a better world, shaping our lives beyond their traditional military capabilities.
The project contains information such as the current track of HMS Endurance’s deployment (including maps); information on her work in Antarctica; the locations visited on route, as well as a diary from the Ship, photographs, and Key Stage 1, 2 and 3 Science, Geography and Citizenship supporting material.
Geographical region: Antarctica, South Africa, West Africa, South Atlantic, Southern Ocean, UK.
World History period: Ancient History, 18th Century, 19th Century, 20th Century, 21st Century.
Geography, Science and Citizenship Key Stage 1-3 supporting material.
Educational support
Anchor Bear – Key Stage 1
With HMS Endurance as part of the Ship’s Company this deployment is Anchor Bear.
Anchor is the Ship’s mascot and he is an experienced bear, with lots of global travels under his belt. Anchor Bear’s adventures on HMS Endurance form part of our National Curriculum supporting material for Key Stage 1 through a photographic diary of his travels and supporting worksheets.
At the centre of the Citizenship curriculum at Key Stage 1 are children’s ideas and feelings about how they relate to their environment, both within their own communities and in the wider world. Young children need to identify and respect similarities and differences between people. They also need to understand that people and other living things have needs, and that we all have responsibilities to meet them.
These aims of Citizenship and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) strongly overlap and complement the Geography curriculum at Key Stage 1. Teachers might like to encourage their classes to have their own teddy bear to take on the role of Anchor Bear or a child to role play the part of Anchor Bear.
Our aim is to teach children about the Earth, its surface, the way it changes and try our best to make it interesting, well presented and very close to being funny – so children actually enjoy using our Key Stage 1 information.
Factfiles - Key Stage 2 and 3
Within the content of the website’s factfiles is information to support sections of the Key Stage 2 and 3 Geography, Science and Citizenship curriculum.
We aim to provide material that allows pupils to investigate a variety of people, places and environments. By starting to make links between different places in the world, pupils can enhance their understanding of their everyday lives and develop an appreciation of their responsibilities to other people and to the environment through geographical knowledge and real world issues.
Every deployment, HMS Endurance chooses a number of charities to increase public awareness of and raise funds for, and this deployment is no exception.
For their 2007/8 deployment, HMS Endurance is delighted to support Harvest Help.
Harvest Help provides practical support to poor, rural communities in Zambia, Malawi, Ghana and Togo through their local partnership organisations. Most families in rural Africa struggle to grow enough food because of poor soils, unreliable rains, scarcity of good seeds, and the skills needed to get the best out of their land.
Harvest Help’s projects:
- help families grow enough food so that they can eat three meals a day all year round. Harvest Help do this by promoting sustainable farming methods like composting, irrigation, good quality seeds, and encouraging a diverse range of crops.
- support people to find ways to earn a living to pay for life’s necessities such as medicine, cooking oil, and school uniforms. This includes training people in basic business skills and improving access to savings and loans.
- support local organisations to ensure that good work continues beyond Harvest Help’s involvement. To achieve this Harvest Help provide training and advice.
In 2006, Harvest Help’s programme was assisting 26,000 families – 145,000 people. By 2010, Harvest Help aims to expand to improve the livelihoods of at least 35,000 families a year – 195,000.
Harvest Help’s vision is a rural Africa free from poverty where families enjoy better lives.
Through a financial donation there are many ways you can help Harvest Help with their projects:
A gift of £8 will buy 15 trees. Trees mean so much to people in rural Africa. They improve the soil allowing families to grow more food and provide fruit, which can be eaten or sold. Training communities to grow new trees means they have a ready source of wood for cooking so they don’t cut down existing trees and ruin the environment.
A gift of £20 funds a theatre group’s tour of five villages, reaching 1,000 people, to get over vital health messages about diseases like HIV through drama performances.
A gift of £50 will provide 300 young fish and training in fish farming so a community group can start their own business. Fish can be eaten by villagers, giving them important nutrients, and remaining stocks can be sold at market to make some much needed money.
3-4 Old Bakery Row,
Wellington,
Telford,
TF1 1PS
Registered charity no 298830
Information about HMS Endurance’s other charities that they will be supporting during their 2007/8 deployment will available shortly.