Erebus and Terror

HMS Erebus and HMS Terror were Royal Navy bomb vessels strengthened for polar service, famous as the ships of Sir John Franklin’s lost expedition of 1845 to find the Northwest Passage. Both became trapped in ice off King William Island; the entire complement of 129 men died, the worst disaster in British polar exploration. The wrecks were found in 2014 (Erebus) and 2016 (Terror) and are now a protected Canadian national historic site, jointly managed with Inuit, whose oral history guided the searches.