Falklands heritage trust takes Endurance replica on first UK tour
The 3D printed model of the Endurance wreck, produced by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust from data captured during the Endurance22 expedition, will go on display at Discovery Point in Dundee
A 3D scale model of the wreck of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Endurance will go on public display in Scotland for the first time on April 30 at Discovery Point in Dundee. It marks the first stop on a planned United Kingdom tour organized by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust (FMHT), the Falklands-based foundation that led the expedition which located the ship’s remains in 2022.
The replica was produced from a digital twin of the wreck, built using more than 25,000 high-resolution images along with laser and sonar data captured during the Endurance22 expedition. The model is, according to the FMHT, a scientifically precise representation of the wreck as it lies on the floor of the Weddell Sea, at a depth of more than 3,000 meters, where it remains one of the best-preserved shipwrecks ever found.
The so-called ‘unreachable’ Endurance was situated in one of the most remote and hostile spots on the planet, a place that Shackleton himself called the worst portion of the worst sea on earth, said Mensun Bound, FMHT’s Director of Exploration and Founding Trustee. Yet today, we can stand in a museum and look at it in extraordinary detail. This model is not an interpretation; it is a faithful, data-driven representation of the wreck exactly as it lies on the seabed.
Photos: FMHT
The wreck of the Endurance is protected under the Antarctic Treaty and a strict conservation plan that prohibits any physical intervention. For that reason, the Endurance22 team relied on pioneering non-invasive techniques to document it without disturbance.
The exhibition will remain at Discovery Point until November 2026. The museum, managed by the Dundee Heritage Trust, is home to the RRS Discovery, Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s Antarctic exploration vessel, making it one of the United Kingdom’s most important centers for polar and maritime history.
The unveiling will feature a talk by Bound, offering a behind-the-scenes look at Shackleton’s original expedition and the modern mission that finally found the ship more than a century after it sank in 1915.
It allows people to connect, in a very real way, with both Shackleton’s story and the moment of discovery in 2022. That, for me, is the real power of this project, Bound added.
