‘If you are following our travel blogs on this website you will know we have just returned from a voyage through the North West Passage tracing the footsteps of Sir John Franklin on board Ocean Endeavour
Sailing with Adventure Canada talk centred around his route and the loss of his two ships and the finding of HMS Erebus just two years ago.
Imagine our surprise when we discovered that while we were sailing down the coast of King William Island, divers working for the Arctic Research Foundation found the wreckage of HMS Terror
Franklin set out with 128 men on two ships in 1845 trying to navigate the Northwest Passage, the shortcut to Asia through the icy Arctic seas north of Canada. His ships became trapped in ice and their crews never made it home.
The wreck of Erebus was discovered in 2014 but the whereabouts of Terror continued to baffle researchers until now
Adrian Schimnowski the leader of the expedition searching for the ship found her some 60 miles south of where experts had believed she had been crushed by ice. He has described the find as the perfect time capsule, adding
“This vessel looks like it was buttoned down tight for winter and it sank. There were even plates and cans still on its shelves. Even the windows are still intact. If you could lift this boat out of the water, and pump the water out, it would probably float.”