[HN Gopher] Ernest Shackleton's Last Ship, Quest, Discovered Off...
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Ernest Shackleton's Last Ship, Quest, Discovered Off the Coast of
Canada
Author : pseudolus
Score : 91 points
Date : 2024-06-15 10:20 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| throwaway81523 wrote:
| Shackleton was a famous south polar explorer who led three
| successful expeditions to Antarctica. On his fourth expedition,
| he died of a heart attack in his cabin while the ship was at
| anchor. This was in 1922. The ship itself stayed in service for
| various purposes until in 1962, it sank off the coast of Canada
| (the crew all survived). Now the wreck has been found, which is
| cool. But for those of us who only half remembered the Shackleton
| story, no it wasn't like Shackleton himself was aboard the ship
| when it sank. Shackleton had already been deceased for 40 years
| at that time.
| pico303 wrote:
| Was he ever successful? I'm pretty sure he never succeeded in a
| single attempt at anything, but I could be wrong.
| tejtm wrote:
| He tried to keep his crew alive ... so there is that.
| duggan wrote:
| And was remarkably successful at it -- the entire crew of
| the _Endurance_ came back alive.
| noufalibrahim wrote:
| Yup. As opposed to the voyage of the karluk where the
| leader simply abandoned his crew to die and the captain
| of the ship heroically saved half of them. It's a tragic
| story. I read it a little after I read Endurance and was
| struck by the contrast.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_voyage_of_the_Karluk
| monero-xmr wrote:
| I founded 6 businesses that were more / less failures and
| lucky number 7 paid off. But if I had founded 20 failures and
| retired I wouldn't have cared in terms of whether my life was
| a failure or not. Some people just live to try, win or lose.
| If you aren't trying then it's an auto-fail.
| steveBK123 wrote:
| I saw a recent quote that sort of fits this view - "The
| opposite of success isn't failure, it's mediocrity"
| fifilura wrote:
| Apart from the Endurance mission which i think can be put in
| the same category as Apollo 13.
|
| He also reached farthest south at 88,23 a few years before
| Amundsen/Scott, and many of the paths he took served as an
| inspiration for Amundsen.
| mlsu wrote:
| I suppose not. His expeditions to the Antarctic failed their
| objectives. His business ventures were never successful. And
| he died in debt.
|
| BUT. He successfully sailed one of the greatest and most
| perilous ocean journeys ever in recorded history, and rescued
| every member of his 28-man crew from certain death.
|
| Funny in a cruel way. The world basically forgot about the
| voyage of the James Caird shortly after he returned home,
| since WWI had broken out during his time in Antarctica. He
| wasn't adequately recognized in his lifetime. I think he was
| one of humanity's finest.
| EdwardDiego wrote:
| He repeatedly refused to monetise his name or experiences -
| he did lecture tours across Europe and the US and refused
| to charge money.
|
| Much to his wife's dismay.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Kind sad sad how we have the tendency to equal success
| with wealth. There are way more ways to be successful
| than money, or fame (and hey Shackleton is one of the big
| four arctic / antarctic explorers, so fame-wise he did
| good).
|
| And he achieved imoressive things in his life.
| AlecSchueler wrote:
| I would agree with you today but at that time his wife
| and family would have been reliant on his income in a way
| that isn't true now. If you consider her and his
| responsibility to her then this attitude becomes quite
| selfish. Keep in mind he accepted this responsibility
| when taking on the marriage.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Doesn't make him a failure so, does it?
|
| And considering how little social.places like the US
| have, wel... Are you sure things a different today?
| AlecSchueler wrote:
| I wouldn't outright call him a failure, no, and I wasn't
| doing that. But I do believe it's healthy for us today to
| examine ways that women were disadvantaged in the past if
| we want to fight against such things in the future.
|
| If his wife was dismayed by his unwillingness to fulfil
| his promises then we could in fact say he was a failure
| in that way. Whether you choose to look at it that way or
| not is of course up to you. At the end of the day he took
| on the responsibility of supporting other people in a
| material sense and then chose to prioritise his own good
| feelings over that support. The issue is of course
| systemic at the core, in that she was limited in her
| choices, but he understood this when agreeing to marry.
|
| I agree with you that things in the US are not as good
| today as they could be in ensuring that people can live
| independently, but the freedom of women to support
| themselves is certainly much improved in the last 100
| years. I also have to say that the US is not the whole
| world and Shakleton and his family were in fact normally
| based in British territories where the modern welfare
| system is significantly more developed.
| fifilura wrote:
| "I suppose not"
|
| I guess the same can be said about Fridtjof Nansen,
| arguably the greatest polar explorer of all. And a great
| man in most other respects.
|
| But alas, he never crossed the north east passage and never
| reached the north pole.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fridtjof_Nansen
|
| I am bringing it up as an example because it is such a
| strange thing to say. He succeeded in so many other ways.
|
| I'll also add a quote from Schackleton in a letter to his
| wife regarding turning back from furthest south with the
| pole 100 miles away.
|
| "Better a live donkey than a dead lion."
| x1ph0z wrote:
| > He successfully sailed one of the greatest and most
| perilous ocean journeys ever in recorded history, and
| rescued every member of his 28-man crew from certain death
|
| It's incredible feat of human survival. For all 28 men to
| survive the ordeal, is nothing short of fantastic. For
| months they were camped on floating sea ice, and then to
| tack on a 800 mile journey through open, stormy sea in a
| battered whaling boat, and finally a trek through the
| interior of a mountainous island to reach a whaling port
| and rescue, is incredible to say the least. I'd highly
| encourage people to read his own memoir of it.
| lr1970 wrote:
| > For months they were camped on floating sea ice, and
| then to tack on a 800 mile journey through open, stormy
| sea in a battered whaling boat,
|
| Minor but important correction: it was a life boat, much
| smaller than a whaling boat.
| EdwardDiego wrote:
| You should read his biography by Fiennes.
|
| He held the Farthest South record, that is, got the closest
| to the South Pole, until Amundsen.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farthest_South
|
| Robert Falcon Scott loathed him for it.
|
| Scott's last expedition used the route up the Beardmore
| Glacier through the Transantarctic Mountains that Shackleton
| pioneered.
|
| He succeeded even if he didn't reach the Pole.
| due-rr wrote:
| According to this ted talk[1] he wasn't. He led dangerously
| unprepared missions and ignored locals advice. Roald Admudsen
| was more successful and did it without the drama.
|
| [1]: https://youtu.be/b0Z9IpTVfUg
| fifilura wrote:
| Pretty much everyone during this period was an amateur
| compared to Amundsen.
|
| Including the previously mentioned Nansen. Nansen was a
| generation earlier though, and among other things built the
| ship Amundsen used.
|
| Amundsen made something difficult look easy. Everyone else
| made the difficult look - difficult. And survived.
|
| Except for Scott who died.
|
| There is an analogy there with software projects by the
| way, except for maybe the dying part replaced with general
| failure.
| hef19898 wrote:
| This business professor, selling his books on leadership in
| a Ted x (!) talk lost me when he called Amundson
| "forgotten". Like hell, no, Amundson is not at all
| forgotten. And Shackleton is famous for saving everyone on
| his doomed Endurance expedition under extreme
| circumstances.
|
| Only measuring leadership, as im the Ted x(!) talk, with
| achievement of a stated, and up to then impossible, goals
| and ignoring a leader who saves everyone from death is at
| best short sighted, at worst ignorant. Did I mention the
| guy in the talk is a business professor with a book on
| leadership?
| telesilla wrote:
| Compared to others who led their team to death, yes. Looking
| at you, Captain Robert Falcon Scott.
| jethkl wrote:
| Martin Gutmann's recent talk (
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0Z9IpTVfUg ) supports your
| point. While Shackleton is celebrated for overcoming
| disaster, Admunsen reached the south pole by avoiding
| disaster in the first place. Yet despite Admunsen being more
| effective, he is not celebrated to the same degree (at least
| in the US) as Shackleton.
| fifilura wrote:
| "he is not celebrated to the same degree (at least in the
| US) as Shackleton."
|
| As a Scandinavian I am pretty surprised by this, and I did
| not know. But I guess drama sells in the US :)
| bruce511 wrote:
| This was the the age of exploration. Doing things first just
| because.
|
| Shackleton may not have made the pole (a somewhat everyday
| accomplishment now). What he -did- do though will, I suggest
| never be repeated.
|
| He (and 5 of his crew) crossed the southern ocean, from Elephant
| Island to South Georgia in an open life boat. A distance of
| 1500km in 16 days. Nothing comes close to this. Then, on arrival,
| he crosses South Georgia on foot with woeful equipment. This leg
| alone is a rare feat even today - usually done by well equipped
| special forces of planned expeditions.
|
| His ocean crossing though stands alone. Nobody is lining up to
| repeat it - its almost certainly suicide.
|
| The book of the expedition is public domain on kindle, and we'll
| worth a read. For the short version see
| https://nzaht.org/encourage/inspiring-explorers/crossing-sou...
| UncleSlacky wrote:
| There's a great documentary about what became of his cabin on the
| ship:
|
| https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26470327
| leobg wrote:
| It's on YouTube: https://youtu.be/d4ytGT8O9vI
| fifilura wrote:
| And Amundsens cabin and his ship can be seen in Oslo.
|
| https://frammuseum.no/
|
| Highly worth the visit (together with everything else in
| beautiful Norway, Disclaimer I am Swedish)
| alxmng wrote:
| I enjoyed "Endurance" by Alfred Lansing, and would recommend it
| if anyone wants to read a riveting and mostly accurate account of
| Shackleton's famous voyage.
| noufalibrahim wrote:
| +1. The audiobook is one of the best narrated ones I've heard
| too.
| roskelld wrote:
| I recommend this book to anyone that will give me a few moments
| of their ear. It's such an incredible story that if it weren't
| true I wouldn't believe it could be.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| Dupe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40659003
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