The Wreck of the Natone

The HMAS Wyatt Earp is the only commissioned Royal Australian Navy vessel to ever visit Antarctica. She was built in Norway and launched as the Fanefjord in 1919. In the 1930’s she was purchased by the American polar explorer Lincoln Ellsworth who renamed her the Wyatt Earp, after the wild west’s toughest and deadliest gunslinger. Ellsworth made 4 expeditions to the Antarctic, and in 1939 he sold her to the Australian Government. After several name changes and roles, she became the HMAS Wyatt Earp and carried Australia’s first expedition to Antarctica after WW2 for the newly established ANARE (Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions). On board was Phil Law, Chief Scientist who later became the director of the Antarctic Division. Judged by the Division as not suitable for future polar operations, she was sold to commercial operators, and finally wrecked in a storm off the coast of Queensland. In the ANARE Club’s latest video presentation, commercial diver Kevin Phillips, who has salvage rights to the wreck, tells his story of retrieving artefacts from the remains of the Natone – formally the HMAS Wyatt Earp.