Amundsen had planned to become the first to reach the North Pole, but changed his target to the South Pole after he learned of the now-disputed claim by rival American explorers that they had already reached it. Keeping his new plan secret, even from his crew, his ship departed Norway on 9 August. He only revealed their destination a month later, shortly before they left their final port on the island of Madeira.
Amundsen’s ship arrived in an Antarctic inlet known as the Bay of Whales on 14 January 1911, where the crew established a base that they called Framheim. They spent the next three months preparing depots across the Ross Ice Shelf, prior to the onset of Antarctic winter.
As soon as the sun returned at the end of August, Amundsen attempted to reach the pole but was forced to turn back due to the harsh conditions. A second attempt that began in mid-October was much more successful, seeing them arrive at the pole almost 2 months later.
Amundsen’s team arrived five weeks ahead of British explorer Robert Falcon Scott’s Terra Nova Expedition, and successfully made it back to their basecamp whereas Scott and his team famously did not. On hearing the news of Scott’s fate, Amundsen remarked that it was ‘horrible, horrible.’
As well as being the first expedition leader to reach the South Pole, Amundsen is also the first person to be universally recognised for reaching the North Pole as a result of his 1926 air expedition, making him the first person to reach both poles.
