Terra Nova (ship)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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| Career |  |
|---|---|
| Built: | Alexander Stephen & Sons Ltd. Dundee, Scotland |
| Launched: | 1884 |
| Fate: | Sunk off Greenland, 13 September 1943 |
| General Characteristics | |
| Displacement: | 744 tons |
| Length: | 187 ft (57 m) |
| Beam: | 31.4 ft (9.6 m) |
| Draught: | 19 ft (5.8 m) |
| Type: | Barque 1 funnel, 3 masts |
| Hull: | Wood |
| Propulsion: | Compound Steam Engine 140 bhp, 1 screw |
| Speed: | — |
| Range: | Limited by water and provisions |
| Complement: | 65 |
The Terra Nova (Latin for Newfoundland) was built in 1884 for the Dundee whaling and sealing fleet. She worked for 10 years in the annual seal fishery in the Labrador Sea proving her worth for many years before she was called upon for expedition work.
Terra Nova was ideally suited to the polar regions. Her first work in the cause of science was as a relief ship for the Jackson-Harmsworth Arctic Expedition of 1894-1897. In 1903, she sailed in company with fellow Dundee whaler Morning to assist in freeing from McMurdo Sound the National Antarctic Expedition's Discovery, under Commander Robert Falcon Scott.
In 1909, she was purchased from Bowring Brothers Limited for the British Antarctic Expedition, known also as the Terra Nova Expedition. Reinforced from bow to stern with seven feet of oak to protect against the Antarctic ice pack, she sailed from England in June 1910 under overall command of now Captain Scott, who described her as "a wonderfully fine ice ship.... As she bumped the floes with mighty shocks, crushing and grinding a way through some, twisting and turning to avoid others, she seemed like a living thing fighting a great fight."
Although the twenty-four officers and scientific staff made valuable observations in biology, geology, glaciology, meteorology, and geophysics along the coast of Victoria Land and on the Ross Ice Shelf, Scott's last expedition is best remembered for the death of Scott and four companions. After wintering at Cape Evans, on Ross Island, Scott, Henry Bowers, Edgar Evans, Lawrence Oates, and Edward Wilson set out on a race to be the first men at the South Pole. Starting with tractors and Mongolian ponies, the final 800 miles had to be covered by man-hauling alone. Reaching the South Pole on January 17, 1912, they found that Roald Amundsen's expedition (based on Fram) had beaten them by thirty-three days. Worse was to come, as all five men died on the return journey unable to reach their nearby depot due to the weather. Spurred by national pride, Edwardian propagandists romanticized the expedition and made Scott's leadership and Oates' sacrifice heroic qualities.
After returning from the Antarctic in 1913, Terra Nova was purchased by her former owners and resumed work in the Newfoundland seal fishery. Her end came on 13 September 1943, when she foundered off Greenland; her crew were saved by a United States Coast Guard cutter.
