Conquest of the South Pole

At the beginning of the 20th century, the South Pole was one of the last great geographical goals still unreached. The Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and the British officer Robert Falcon Scott prepared separate expeditions to reach it. Amundsen's team sailed aboard the Fram and established a base at the Bay of Whales, using skis and sled dogs to travel across the Antarctic ice.

After careful planning and several supply depots, five men set out for the Pole in October 1911. Amundsen's expedition reached the geographic South Pole on 14 December 1911, and the team returned safely to its base. Scott's expedition, aboard the Terra Nova, followed a different strategy.

It combined motor sledges, ponies and dogs, while members of the team also hauled some equipment themselves. Scott and four companions reached the Pole on 17 January 1912, more than a month after Amundsen. They found the Norwegian flag and realized that Amundsen had arrived first.

The return journey became disastrous as the men faced extreme cold, exhaustion and shortages of supplies. Scott and his four companions died before reaching their main coastal base. The race to the South Pole became a landmark in the history of exploration, while the expeditions also provided valuable observations about Antarctica's geography, climate and environment.