10,000 feet below the icy surface of antarctica's weddel sea, researchers and deep sea robots have discovered one of the 20th century's most famous ships. >> people said we'd never be able to find this shipwreck. but they did. they persisted. >> reporter: this is the first image of explorer's ernest shackleton ship "endurance" since it was crushed by ice and sank 107 years ago. frozen in time, the three-masted wooden ship is largely preserved, its bolts shiny, even dinner plates, these white circles remain. >> i never dreamed that we'd see the gold lettering of "endurance" with the polar star there on the stern. >> reporter: historian dan snow has been documenting the expedition that found it. why was this discovery so significant? >> it's the best-preserved shipwreck of the era of wooden sailing vessels that we have anywhere in the world. i takes us back to one of the greatest stories in history. >> reporter: in 1914, shackleton set sail for antarctica, attempting to be the