A weekly digest of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-
Antarctic Expedition of 1914-1917, as told by @EShackleton on
Twitter. Follow on Twitter: @EShackleton The story thus far: The
surface of the ice is proving impassable, with pressure ridges
up to two stories high, and soft snow causing men sink in up to
their waists. Shackleton has come to a decision to make camp on
the nearest flat, sturdy floe of ice, and allow the drift of the
pack to carry them north and closer to land in the northwest.
Teams go back to the ship daily to salvage what they can from
the wreckage. Hurley insists his heavy, glass-plate negatives
must be retrieved, and despite the extra weight that would
entail, Shackleton agrees. Without the images there would only
be their words to prove what happened, and words are not enough.
Problem: the negatives have been stored in a refrigerator which
is somewhere in a crushed cabin in the wreckage, itself under
several feet of icy slush, and if anyone is going to try to
rescue them, they are go