Wreckage of last ship belonging to famed Irish explorer found off coast of Canada

STREET. JOHN’S, Newfoundland — The remains of the last ship belonging to Sir Ernest Shackleton, a famous Irish-born British Antarctic explorer, have been found off the coast of Labrador in Canada, 62 years after he disappeared. The wreck was found by an international team led by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society.

The Quest was found using sonar scanners Sunday night, sitting on its keel under 390 meters (1,280 feet) of icy, choppy water, the society said. Her towering mast lies broken next to her, probably broken when the ship was sucked into the depths after she hit the ice on May 5, 1962.

Shackleton’s death aboard the ship in 1922 marked the end of what historians consider the “heroic era” of Antarctic exploration. The explorer led three British expeditions to Antarctica and was in the early stages of a fourth when he died. He was 47 years old.

The discovery of the Quest was “deeply moving,” John Geiger, leader of the Shackleton Quest expedition, said Wednesday. “It’s just a great story. “It links Canada to the most famous polar explorer of all.”

Geiger called it a very historically important ship.

The Norwegian-built ship, used for research and sealing in the Arctic after Shackleton’s death, appears to be in “incredible condition,” although it was damaged when it crashed to the sea floor, Geiger said.

Now that he has been found, the next step will be to send remotely operated vehicles to capture images of his remains.

In 2022, researchers discovered another Shackleton wreck. The Endurance was found in 10,000 feet (about 3,000 meters) of frozen water, a century after it was swallowed by the Antarctic ice.

A team of marine archaeologists, engineers and other scientists used an icebreaking ship and underwater drones to locate the wreck at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, near the Antarctic Peninsula.

The Endurance22 expedition embarked from Cape Town, South Africa, in early February on a ship capable of breaking through 3-foot (1 meter) thick ice.

The team, which included more than 100 researchers and crew members, deployed underwater drones that combed the seabed for two weeks in the area where the ship was recorded to have sunk in 1915.

Shackleton never achieved his ambition of becoming the first person to cross Antarctica via the South Pole. In fact, he never set foot on the continent during the failed Endurance expedition, although he did visit Antarctica during previous trips.