With the expedition's main goal abandoned, "Polaris" turned south for home. In Smith Sound, west of the Humboldt Glacier, she ran aground on a shallow iceberg and could not be freed. On the night of October 15, with an iceberg threatening the ship, Schuman reported that water was coming in and the pumps could not keep up. Budington ordered cargo to be thrown onto the ice to buoy the ship. Men began throwing goods overboard, as Tyson put it, "with no care taken as to how or where these things were thrown." Much of the jettisoned cargo was lost.