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Final pole explorer to join trek

A policy researcher has beaten nearly 3,000 applicants to join a bid to complete Sir Ernest Shackleton's failed South Pole trek.

Andrew Ledger, 23, from Dronfield, Derbyshire, was chosen to join five descendants of the pioneering explorer and his crew for the journey.

Three of the team will set off on 29 October on the same 900-mile, 80-day route as the 1908-09 Nimrod expedition.

Mr Ledger and the others will join them 97 miles (156km) from the South Pole.

Shackleton was forced to turn back on 9 January 1909 in the face of howling icy blizzards and dwindling rations.

Mr Ledger applied for the place after finding an article about the expedition when he made an internet search for "dangerous jobs".

He insisted his application though was "a quest for something interesting, as opposed to a cry for help".

Read entire article at BBC