Antarctica Exploration Timeline

Dumont d’Urville discovered Adelie Land south of Australia and claimed it for France.

The Norwegian Carsten Borchgrevink lead an expedition from Britain which explored the coast of Victoria Land south of New Zealand. Borchgrevink and 10 men wintered over at Cape Adare. These were the first men to intentionally spend the winter in Antarctica.

Ernest Shackleton led the British Antarctic Expedition to Antarctica and established a winter-over hut at Cape Royds on Ross Island. Shackleton and three companions attempted to reach the South Pole but were forced to turn back 97 miles short of their goal due to a shortage of food and low temperatures.

Captain Scott returned to Ross Island on his ship the Terra Nova with the stated objective of being first to reach the South Pole. Scott and four companions reached 90 degrees South on January 17, 1912, over a month after Amundsen. Bitterly disappointed, the party turned back towards Ross Island only to perish during the journey weakened by starvation, scurvy, and deteriorating weather conditions.

With the prize of the South Pole claimed by Amundsen, Shackleton returned to Antarctica to attempt the first ever crossing of the continent. His ship the Endurance was crushed by sea ice in the Weddell Sea so Shackleton and his crew were forced to sail to Elephant Island in three small open boats. Incredibly Shackleton and five companions then sailed over 700 miles in 15 days in a small boat to South Georgia Island where, after crossing glacier clad mountains, they reached a whaling station. From there a rescue boat finally reached Elephant Island on the fourth attempt and rescued all hand safely.

Commander Richard E. Byrd established his Little America base camp on the Ross Ice Shelf at the Bay of Whales. He brought three airplanes and he flew one of them, a Ford tri-motor, on the first airplane flight to the South Pole and back on November 29, 1929. It took Byrd 18 hours to fly the same 1,600 miles that had taken Amundsen 99 days by dog sled in 1911. Congress promoted Byrd to Rear Admiral.

Lincoln Ellsworth flew his Lockheed Gamma monoplane the Polar Star from Dundee Island at the tip of the Palmer Peninsula across the Antarctic continent to the Ross Ice Shelf. The plane ran out of fuel and landed near Byrd’s Little America camp. Due to a faulty radio Ellsworth and his pilot could not communicate their predicament to the outside world so they were declared missing. They were stranded at Little America for two months before being discovered and rescued.

After WWII Admiral Byrd led Operation Highjump to Antarctica. This was a huge expedition of 4,700 men, 13 ships (including an aircraft carrier), 19 airplanes, and a large contingent of scientists. Vast stretches of unexplored land from the Antarctic Peninsula to the Ross Ice Shelf to Wilkes Land south of Australia were mapped and the expedition returned with a large quantity of meteorological and scientific data.

12 nations cooperated in the International Geophysical Year (IGY) to establish 55 scientific stations in Antarctica. Extensive scientific research was carried out and this proved to be the genesis for the upcoming Antarctic Treaty ratified in 1961.

The Antarctic Treaty, signed by the 12 nations participating in the IGY, went into force in 1961. The Treaty preserves Antarctica for peaceful scientific study, sets aside all territorial claims, bars nuclear materials (weapons, power stations etc.), and prohibits military activity except in the support of science (ships, planes etc.). Since its inception a total of 53 nations have signed the treaty.

Will Steger led the first non-mechanized crossing of Antarctica using sled dogs. The 220 day journey covered 3,741 miles from the Antarctic Peninsula to the South Pole to the Russian Mirnyy station.