Challenger Expedition
Charles Wyville Thomson and the Royal Society of London obtained the corvette Challenger from the Royal Navy for a 3-year expedition of scientific discovery. Although much of the world was well charted, this extended only to the coastlines and to very shallow depths - largely depths significant to the safe navigation of ships. There was a widely-held consensus that the oceans were in parts very deep, but almost nothing was known of the make up of the deep oceans, the submarine landscape, nor the life contained within the deep ocean. Challenger was equipped to measure much of this, being loaded with specimen jars, chemical apparatus, trawls and dredges, thermometers and water sampling bottles, sounding leads and devices to collect sediment from the sea bed. Great lengths of rope were provided to allow the sounding of deep oceans, and of Italian hemp alone she carried a total length of 181 miles (291 km).
Nares was given command of the Challenger Expedition, a recognition of his experience in this field, but also of his scientific approach to surveying and exploration. His work with William Carpenter in Shearwater had been a key factor in the choice of commanding officer. His officers were all naval surveyors, and the team of civilian scientists, led by Charles Wyville Thomson.
Challenger spent a year in the Atlantic and after turning east in early 1874 she turned south in the Indian Ocean, visiting the Prince Edward, Kerguelen, and Heard islands. She reached as far south as 66°40' S 78°22' E before reaching the ice pack. In the process she became the first steam vessel to cross the Antarctic Circle.
Not all similar expeditions had been so successful, and in particular the easy relations between the scientific gentlemen and the naval officers was a testament to the sure leadership of George Nares. It was therefore a measure of his success as the commander of a scientific expedition that he was recalled in November 1874 to lead a similar but more arduous expedition at the opposite end of the earth.
Read more about this topic: George Nares
Famous quotes containing the word expedition:
“Writing a novel is not merely going on a shopping expedition across the border to an unreal land: it is hours and years spent in the factories, the streets, the cathedrals of the imagination.”
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