Farthest North 1948. On , a US Navy submarine, also named , was the first to sail under the ice pack to reach the North Pole. On , the became the first submarine to surface at the North Pole. In 1968, British explorer Sir Wally Herbert became the first person to indubitably reach the Pole on foot, having sledged from Alaska. His expedition was supported by air drops. Farthest North Farthest North describes the most northerly latitude reached by explorers before the conquest of the North Pole rendered the expression obsolete. The Arctic polar regions are much more accessible than those of
South Pole Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition set out with the goal of crossing Antarctica via the South Pole, but his ship, the "Endurance", was frozen in pack ice and sank 11 months later. The overland journey was never made. US Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd, with the assistance of his first pilot Bernt Balchen, became the first person to fly over the South Pole on November 29, 1929. It was not until 31 October 1956 that humans once again set foot at the South Pole, when a party led by Admiral George J. Dufek of the US Navy landed there in an R4D-5L Skytrain