Captain Bob Bartlett and crew

Time stranded: 6 to 8 months

Distance traveled: 700 to 800 miles

Terrain types: Sea, Arctic

Deaths: 11

Situation ended: Walked to safety

Location: Wrangel islands, Alaska

The story of Captain Bob Bartlett truly is an amazing example of endurance. He was the Captain of a ship called the Karluk, which in 1914 was heading towards a rendezvous point at Herschel Island after a long trip across the Beaufort and Chukchi seas.

The ship ran into thick ice along the way and was dragged many miles along with the flow of the massive ice sheets. After a few days the ship was crushed between 2 giant sheets and a huge gap appeared in the hull, rapidly filling it with water.

The crew of 25 abandoned the ship and took all the supplies they could carry and headed to Wrangel island which was only about 80 miles away. The crew made it to the island safely, but most of them were to weak or ill to go any further. The crew spent the next few months trying to gather their strength and waited for help, but due to the condition of the sea’s it didn’t look like any was coming.

The supplies they managed to save from the ship were quickly running out, so Captain bob Bartlett and a single Inuit hunter named Kataktovik who was part of the crew, decided to try and make it to Alaska where they could arrange a rescue party.

The pair walked almost 700 miles across the frozen sea to a station in Alaska where after several months of being stranded on the ice and Wrangel Island, finally made it to safety. Captain Bob Bartlett soon launched a rescue mission to recover his stranded crew members on Wrangel island, but since they were trapped there for so long 11 out of the 23 of them died. Captain Bob Bartlett received the highest award from the Royal Geographical Society for his bravery and leadership.