the-BA : Penguins for dinner

More than 90 years ago Ernest Shackleton began an expedition to lead 28 men across the 2000-mile Antarctic continent. Their adventure into the unknown was cut short when the ship, Endurance, became stuck in the ice. They waited 11 months for the ship to break free. But the ice got thicker, the boat was crushed and the men were stranded. They spent a grueling five months floating on an iceberg. Rations were low so they had to make the most of their bleak surroundings. They killed seals, penguins and sea lions – along with the expedition’s 68 husky dogs – for food and fuel. All 28 men survived.

Have you ever wondered how you’d survive if you were stuck in the Antarctic? What would you eat?

You might like to …

• find out about the sorts of rations Shackleton would have taken with him; find out how this compares to modern day explorers
• find out about and test different foodstuffs to work out their nutritional values; try to develop your own ‘survival pack’ (think about things like size and weight, and how easy the food is to prepare, whether or not it will ‘go off’)
• work out how much food each person on your expedition would need to survive (find out if it differs depending on size, weight, age, gender, etc.)
• find out what was used for cooking/heating fuel; carry out tests to work out the heat energy provided by different fuels
• find out what food and energy different animals (penguins, for example) could provide.

Further links:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/shackleton/

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