Budington's decision to beach "Polaris" is equally controversial. He said that he "believed the propeller was smashed and the rudder broke". The official report of the expedition states that the vessel should have been abandoned because "there was only coal enough to keep the fires alive for a few days." However, the same report states that the propeller and rudder were in fact discovered to be intact after the ship was run aground, and the ship's boiler and sails were available. Even if she ran out of coal, the ship was perfectly able to travel under sail alone. In defense of Budington's decision, when low tide exposed the ship's hull, the men found that the stem had completely broken away at the six-foot mark, taking iron sheeting and planking with it. Budington wrote in his journal that he "called the officer's attention to it,