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Introduction

Polar exploration is the process of exploration of the polar regions of Earth – the Arctic region and Antarctica – particularly with the goal of reaching the North Pole and South Pole, respectively. Historically, this was accomplished by explorers making often arduous travels on foot or by sled in these regions, known as a polar expedition. More recently, exploration has been accomplished with technology, particularly with satellite imagery.

From 600 BC to 300 BC, Greek philosophers theorized that the planet was a Spherical Earth with North and South polar regions. By 150 AD, Ptolemy published Geographia, which notes a hypothetical Terra Australis Incognita. However, due to harsh weather conditions, the poles themselves would not be reached for centuries after that. When they finally were reached, the achievement was realized only a few years apart. (Full article...)

Selected general articles

Image 1
A 2006 satellite composite image of Antarctica

The Antarctic Treaty and related agreements, collectively known as the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS), regulate international relations with respect to Antarctica, Earth's only continent without a native human population. It was the first arms control agreement established during the Cold War, designating the continent as a scientific preserve, establishing freedom of scientific investigation, and banning military activity; for the purposes of the treaty system, Antarctica is defined as all the land and ice shelves south of 60°S latitude. Since September 2004, the Antarctic Treaty Secretariat, which implements the treaty system, is headquartered in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The main treaty was opened for signature on 1 December 1959, and officially entered into force on 23 June 1961. The original signatories were the 12 countries active in Antarctica during the International Geophysical Year (IGY) of 1957–58: Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Chile, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These countries had established over 55 Antarctic research stations for the IGY, and the subsequent promulgation of the treaty was seen as a diplomatic expression of the operational and scientific cooperation that had been achieved. As of 2024^[update], the treaty has 58 parties. (Full article...)
Image 2
Stamps commemorating the 1956 Soviet Antarctic bases

The First Soviet Antarctic Expedition was led by Mikhail Somov; his scientific deputy was V. G. Kort [ru]. The expedition lasted from 30 November 1955 to 1957 and involved 127 expedition members and 75 crew members.

Three diesel-electric ships were used to transport the expedition. They were RV Ob (flagship; captain I. A. Man [ru]), RV Lena (captain A. I. Vetrov) and the refrigerator ship No. 7 (captain M. A. Tsygankov). The final ship was used only for transporting perishables. Ob and Lena were icebreakers 130m long and displacing 12,600 tons. (Full article...)
Image 3
Karluk caught in ice, August 1913

The last voyage of the Karluk, flagship of the Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913–16, ended with the loss of the ship in the Arctic seas, and the subsequent deaths of nearly half her complement of 25.

In August 1913, Karluk, a brigantine formerly used as a whaler, became trapped in the ice while sailing to a rendezvous point at Herschel Island. After a long drift across the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, in January 1914 the ship was crushed and sunk. In the ensuing months, the crew and expedition staff struggled to survive, first on the ice and later on the shores of Wrangel Island. In all, eleven men died before rescue. (Full article...)
Image 4

Arctowski in Washington, March, 1940

Henryk Arctowski (15 July 1871 – 21 February 1958; Polish pronunciation: [ˈxɛnrɨk art͡sˈtɔfskʲi]), born Henryk Artzt, was a Polish scientist and explorer.

Living in exile for a large part of his life, Arctowski was educated in Belgium and France. He was one of the first humans to winter in Antarctica, as part of the Belgian Antarctic Expedition, and became an internationally renowned meteorologist, also working for over 10 years in the United States. Arctowski was instrumental in restoring Polish independence after the First World War, after which he returned to Poland, where he continued a prolific academic career, having even declined an offer to become Minister of Education. At the time World War II broke out, Arctowski and his wife were in America, and they were unable to return; he spent the final part of his career working as a researcher at the Smithsonian until his retirement, and died in 1958 in Bethesda, Maryland. (Full article...)
Image 5

Portrait by an unknown artist

Faddey Faddeyevich Bellingshausen or Fabian Gottlieb Benjamin von Bellingshausen (20 September [O.S. 9 September] 1778 – 25 January [O.S. 13 January] 1852) was a Russian cartographer, explorer, and naval officer of Baltic German descent, who attained the rank of admiral. He participated in the first Russian circumnavigation of the globe, and subsequently became a leader of another circumnavigation expedition that discovered the continent of Antarctica. Like Otto von Kotzebue and Adam Johann von Krusenstern, Bellingshausen belonged to the cohort of prominent Baltic German navigators who helped Russia launch its naval expeditions.

Bellingshausen was born in the Estonian island of Saaremaa (Ösel), in the eponymous family. He started his service in the Russian Baltic Fleet, and after distinguishing himself joined the first Russian circumnavigation of the Earth in 1803–1806, serving on the merchant ship Nadezhda under the captaincy of Adam Johann von Krusenstern. After the journey, he published a collection of maps of the newly explored areas and islands of the Pacific Ocean. Subsequently, he commanded several ships of the Baltic and Black Sea Fleets. (Full article...)
Image 6

Finn Ronne (December 20, 1899 – January 12, 1980) was a Norwegian-born U.S. citizen and Antarctic explorer. (Full article...)
Image 7

Byrd in 1928

Richard Evelyn Byrd Jr. (October 25, 1888 – March 11, 1957), was an American naval officer, and pioneering aviator, polar explorer, and organizer of polar logistics. Aircraft flights in which he served as a navigator and expedition leader crossed the Atlantic Ocean, a segment of the Arctic Ocean, and a segment of the Antarctic Plateau. He is also known for discovering Mount Sidley, the largest dormant volcano in Antarctica.

Byrd claimed to be the first to reach both the North and South Poles by air. However, there is some controversy as to whether or not Byrd was actually the first person to reach the North Pole. It is generally believed that the distance Byrd claimed to fly was longer than the possible fuel range of his airplane. (Full article...)
Image 8
Willoughby in a posthumous portrait

Sir Hugh Willoughby (fl. 1544; died 1554) was an English soldier and an early Arctic voyager. He served in the court of Henry VIII and fought in the Scottish campaign where he was knighted for his valour. In 1553, he was selected by a company of London merchants to lead a fleet of three vessels in search of a Northeast Passage.

Willoughby and the crews of two ships died on the voyage while the third vessel Edward Bonaventure, under the command of Richard Chancellor, who went on to open a successful, long-lasting trading arrangement with Russia. (Full article...)
Image 9

Shirshov in 1946

Pyotr Petrovich Shirshov (Russian: Пётр Петрович Ширшов; 25 December [O.S. 12 December] 1905 – 17 February 1953) was a Soviet oceanographer, hydrobiologist, polar explorer, statesman, academician (1939), the first minister of Ministry of Maritime Fleet of the USSR and Hero of the Soviet Union (1938).

Pyotr Shirshov graduated from the Odessa Public Education Institute in 1929. In 1929–1932, he was a researcher at the Botanical Garden of the Soviet Academy of Sciences. In 1932–1936, Pyotr Shirshov was employed as a researcher at the All-Union Arctic Institute. He participated in numerous Arctic expeditions, including the ones on icebreakers Sibiryakov (1932) and Chelyuskin and a drifting ice station North Pole-1 (1937-1938). In 1942–1948, Pyotr Shirshov was People's Commissar of the Maritime Fleet, later minister of Ministry of Maritime Fleet of the USSR. In 1946–1953, he headed the Institute of Oceanology of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, which he had established himself. In 1946–1950, Pyotr Shirshov chaired the Pacific Ocean Science Committee. (Full article...)
Image 10
Weddell in 1828
James Weddell (24 August 1787 – 9 September 1834) was a British sailor, navigator and seal hunter who in February 1823 sailed to latitude of 74° 15′ S—a record 7.69 degrees or 532 statute miles south of the Antarctic Circle—and into a region of the Southern Ocean that later became known as the Weddell Sea. (Full article...)
Image 11

Tannatt William Edgeworth David, 1898

Sir Tannatt William Edgeworth David (28 January 1858 – 28 August 1934) was a Welsh Australian geologist and Antarctic explorer. A household name in his lifetime, David's most significant achievements were discovering the major Hunter Valley coalfield in New South Wales and leading the first expedition to reach the South Magnetic Pole. He also served with distinction in World War I. (Full article...)
Image 12

Amundsen c. 1923

Roald Engelbregt Gravning Amundsen (UK: /ˈɑːmʊndsən/, US: /-məns-/; Norwegian: [ˈrùːɑɫ ˈɑ̂mʉnsən] ; 16 July 1872 – c. 18 June 1928) was a Norwegian explorer of polar regions. He was a key figure of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.

Born in Borge, Østfold, Norway, Amundsen began his career as a polar explorer as first mate on Adrien de Gerlache's Belgian Antarctic Expedition of 1897–1899. From 1903 to 1906, he led the first expedition to successfully traverse the Northwest Passage on the sloop Gjøa. In 1909, Amundsen began planning for a South Pole expedition. He left Norway in June 1910 on the ship Fram and reached Antarctica in January 1911. His party established a camp at the Bay of Whales and a series of supply depots on the Barrier (now known as the Ross Ice Shelf) before setting out for the pole in October. The party of five, led by Amundsen, became the first to reach the South Pole on 14 December 1911. (Full article...)
Image 13

Edward Adrian Wilson (23 July 1872 – 29 March 1912) was an English polar explorer, ornithologist, natural historian, physician and artist. (Full article...)
Image 14

1828 portrait by Thomas Phillips

Sir John Franklin (16 April 1786 – 11 June 1847) was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer and colonial administrator. After serving in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812, he led two expeditions into the Canadian Arctic and through the islands of the Arctic Archipelago, during the Coppermine expedition of 1819 and the Mackenzie River expedition of 1825, and served as Lieutenant-Governor of Van Diemen's Land from 1837 to 1843. During his third and final expedition, an attempt to traverse the Northwest Passage in 1845, Franklin's ships became icebound off King William Island in what is now Nunavut, where he died in June 1847. The icebound ships were abandoned ten months later, and the entire crew died from causes such as starvation, hypothermia, and scurvy. (Full article...)
Image 15
St. Nicholas Cossack Cathedral, the main church of the Siberian Cossack Host

Siberian Cossacks were Cossacks who settled in the Siberian region of Russia from the end of the 16th century, following Yermak Timofeyevich's conquest of Siberia. In early periods, practically the whole Russian population in Siberia, especially the serving-men, were called Cossacks, but only in the loose sense of being neither land-owners nor peasants. Most of these people came from northwest Russia and had little connection to the Don Cossacks or Zaporozhian Cossacks. (Full article...)
Image 16
Joris Carolus (c. 1566–c. 1636) was a Dutch cartographer and explorer who was employed by the Noordsche Compagnie and the Dutch East India Company. (Full article...)
Image 17

Georgy Filippovich Baydukov (Russian: Гео́ргий Фили́ппович Байдуко́в; May 13 [O.S. May 26] 1907 – 28 December 1994) was a Soviet test pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union (1936), writer and hunter. (Full article...)
Image 18

Wiese c. 1930

Vladimir Yulyevich Wiese (Russian: Владимир Юльевич Визе; 5 March 1886 – 19 February 1954) was a Russian scientist of German descent who devoted his life to the study of the Arctic ice pack. His name is associated with the Scientific Prediction of Ice Conditions theory. Wiese was a member of the Soviet Arctic Institute and an authority on polar oceanography. He was also the founder of the Geographico-hydrological School of Oceanography. (Full article...)
Image 19

Papanin in 1950

Ivan Dmitriyevich Papanin (Russian: Иван Дмитриевич Папанин; 26 November [O.S. 14 November] 1894 – 30 January 1986) was a Soviet polar explorer, scientist, Counter Admiral, and twice Hero of the Soviet Union, who was awarded nine Orders of Lenin. (Full article...)
Image 20
Joseph Billings (c.1758 – 1806) was an English navigator, hydrographer and explorer who spent the most of his career in Russian service. From 1790 to 1794 he commanded a marine expedition that searched for a Northeast Passage and explored the coasts of Alaska and Siberia. Between 1797 and 1798 he conducted a hydrographic survey of the Black Sea. (Full article...)
Image 21
Nikifor Begichev

Nikifor Alekseevich Begichev (Bigichev) (Russian: Никифор Алексеевич Бегичев (Бигичев); February 7 (N.S. February 19), 1874 – May 18, 1927) was a Soviet seaman and polar explorer. He was twice awarded gold medals by the Russian Academy of Sciences (Full article...)
Image 22
A portrait of Dmitry Ovtsyn by N. V. Pinegin

Dmitry Leontiyevich Ovtsyn (Russian: Дмитрий Леонтьевич Овцын) (unknown - after 1757) was a Russian hydrographer and Arctic explorer. The Ovtsyn family is one of the oldest Russian noble families, originating from the descendants of Rurik, the Murom princes. (Full article...)
$Image 23 Arktika in 1980 Arktika (Russian: А́рктика, IPA: [ˈarktʲɪkə]; literally: Arctic) is a retired nuclear-powered icebreaker of the Soviet (now Russian) Arktika class. In service from 1975 to 2008, she was the first surface ship to reach the North Pole, a feat achieved on August 17, 1977, during an expedition dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the October Revolution. The Arktika is a double-hulled icebreaker; the outer hull is 48 millimetres (1.9 in) thick, the inner 25 millimetres (0.98 in) thick, with the space in between utilized for water ballasting. At the strongest point, the cast steel prow is 50 centimetres (20 in)) thick and bow-shaped to aid in icebreaking, the curve applying greater dynamic force to fracture the ice than a straight bow would. The maximum ice thickness it can break through is approximately 2.8 metres (9 ft 2 in). Arktika also has an air bubbling system (ABS) which delivers 24 m3/s of steam from jets 9 metres (30 ft) below the surface to further aid in the breakup of ice. (Full article...)$

Image 23

Arktika in 1980

Arktika (Russian: А́рктика, IPA: [ˈarktʲɪkə]; literally: Arctic) is a retired nuclear-powered icebreaker of the Soviet (now Russian) Arktika class. In service from 1975 to 2008, she was the first surface ship to reach the North Pole, a feat achieved on August 17, 1977, during an expedition dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the October Revolution.

The Arktika is a double-hulled icebreaker; the outer hull is 48 millimetres (1.9 in) thick, the inner 25 millimetres (0.98 in) thick, with the space in between utilized for water ballasting. At the strongest point, the cast steel prow is 50 centimetres (20 in)) thick and bow-shaped to aid in icebreaking, the curve applying greater dynamic force to fracture the ice than a straight bow would. The maximum ice thickness it can break through is approximately 2.8 metres (9 ft 2 in). Arktika also has an air bubbling system (ABS) which delivers 24 m³/s of steam from jets 9 metres (30 ft) below the surface to further aid in the breakup of ice. (Full article...)
Image 24
Boris Andreyevich Vilkitsky

Boris Andreyevich Vilkitsky (Russian: Бори́с Андре́евич Вильки́цкий) (22 March (3 April N.S.) 1885, Pulkovo – 6 March 1961) was a Russian hydrographer and surveyor. He was the son of Andrey Ippolitovich Vilkitsky. (Full article...)
Image 25
Robert Bylot (fl. 1610–1616) was an English explorer who made four voyages to the Arctic. He was uneducated and from a working-class background, but was able to rise to rank of master in the English Royal Navy. (Full article...)