.jpg) Pourquoi-Pas, the ship which served Dr Charcot on his last expedition in the Antarctic; now belonging to theMuseum d'Histoire Naturelle | |
| History | |
|---|---|
 France | |
| Name | Pourquoi-Pas |
| Builder | François Gautier,Saint Malo |
| Laid down | 1907 |
| Launched | 1908 |
| Fate | Wrecked on 16 September 1936 |
| General characteristics | |
| Displacement | 445 tonnes |
| Length | 40 m |
| Beam | 9.2 m |
| Draught | 4.3 m |
| Propulsion |
|
| Speed | 7.5 knots |
| Capacity | 5 scientists |
| Complement | 35 men |
Pourquoi-Pas (fromFrenchpourquoi pas? 'why not?',pronounced[puʁ.kwapa]) was the fourth ship built forJean-Baptiste Charcot, which completed the second Charcot expedition of the Antarctic regions from 1908 to 1910. Charcot died aboard when the ship was wrecked on 16 September 1936 off the coast ofIceland. Of the forty men on board, only one survived.
In 1907,Jean-Baptiste Charcot launched a new Antarctic expedition and began work on a new ship,Pourquoi-Pas (IV), a three-mastedbarque designed for polar exploration, equipped with a motor and containing three laboratories and a library. It was built atSaint-Malo to plans by Francois Gautier in his shipyard.
From 1908 to 1910, Charcot set out inPourquoi-Pas, wintering atPetermann Island, on his secondAntarctic polar expedition. He returned to France in 1910 laden with scientific discoveries; he had finished the mapping ofAlexander Island and discovered a new island,Charcot Land.
In 1912,Pourquoi-Pas became the French Navy's firstschool ship. From 1918 to 1925, Charcot tookPourquoi-Pas on various scientific missions in the North Atlantic, the English Channel, the Mediterranean and theFaroe Islands, mainly to study underwaterlithology andgeology by means of drag nets, to whose material and use Charcot made major improvements.
From 1925 onwards, limited by age, Charcot lost command of the ship (though he remained on board as head of the expedition) for her many voyages around the Arctic glaciers. In 1926, Charcot andPourquoi-Pas explored the eastern coast ofGreenland and brought back many fossils and samples of insects and flora.
In 1928,Pourquoi-Pas set out to investigate the disappearance of the large FrenchseaplaneLatham 47 with the Norwegian explorerRoald Amundsen on board, which had itself been looking for the Italian generalUmberto Nobile, who had set out to cross the North Pole in the dirigibleItalia and not been heard from since.
In 1934, Charcot andPourquoi-Pas set up an ethnographic mission in Greenland headed byPaul-Émile Victor, who spent a year inAngmagssalik living amid theEskimo population. In 1935, Charcot andPourquoi-Pas returned there to look for Victor and his three companions (Gessain, Pérez et Matter) and began the mapping of these regions. On 16 September that year, the ship managed to reach a small port to escape acyclone which ravaged the coasts of Iceland.
In September 1936, returning from the mission to Greenland to deliver scientific material to Victor's mission (which had just traversed theice sheets in 50 days) and after carrying out a survey mission,Pourquoi-Pas stopped atReykjavík to re-provision with fuel on 13 September. They set out forSaint-Malo two days later, on 15 September, but on 16 September the ship was caught in a violent cyclonic storm and lost on the reefs ofÁlftanes atMýrar. 23 of the crew were lost in the wreck and 17 survivors died before rescue came, leaving only one survivor, Eugène Gonidec, master steersman.Jean-Baptiste Charcot was one of the dead, aged 69.Pourquoi Pas Point andPourquoi Pas Island in Antarctica were later named after it.
Ship type: barque
Expeditions:
Oceanographic equipment: trawling and drag nets, screws, sounding equipment, water bottles and thermometers
