The case record
What was reported?
The Franklin expedition’s two ships and 129 men were lost during an Arctic search for the Northwest Passage. Archaeology and Inuit knowledge have resolved the ships’ locations while leaving parts of the final retreat uncertain.
HMS Erebus and HMS Terror became trapped in ice. A surviving written note records deaths and abandonment in 1848. Inuit testimony preserved encounters and wreck information long before Western searchers accepted its significance; this knowledge helped guide modern discoveries.
Range covers departure through documented abandonment, not an assertion that every death occurred by 1848. Broad region omits protected wreck coordinates.
- Reported date
- 1845–1848; wrecks located 2014 and 2016
- Witnesses
- Historical records, investigators and observers; see case-specific account · Not reliably reducible to a single count
- Investigation
- Historical and research accounts reviewed from: Parks Canada
Evidence in the record
Erebus was located in 2014 and Terror in 2016. Recovered artifacts, human remains and the expedition note illuminate equipment, health and movements. Parks Canada and Inuit partners jointly steward the sites and recovered heritage.
Competing explanations
Official and research context
Parks Canada documents the wreck discoveries and continuing archaeology with Inuit partners; the ships’ locations are known, but the final retreat remains incomplete.
Conventional explanations
Ice entrapment, exposure, food shortages and disease explain the disaster’s setting. The relative contribution of particular illnesses or contaminants varies between individuals and remains debated. No single cause accounts neatly for every stage.
Arguments that remain contested
The timing of later movements, occupancy of the ships and the experiences of individual survivors remain incompletely known.
Locations & timeline
Coordinates are representative. Area and route labels do not imply exact paths or object positions.
- Primary reference location
King William Island region
Range covers departure through documented abandonment, not an assertion that every death occurred by 1848. Broad region omits protected wreck coordinates.
Representative case location · Approximate area radius: 200 km
68.700°, -98.000° · point · Regional reference only; not survey-grade
Record notes
Map coordinates are representative and do not establish an exact incident position.
Case-specific sources researched 8 September 2026. Evidence, alternatives, dates and representative geography reviewed.
Original dataset status: partially-explained