Tin pestScott, the renowned polar explorer, prepared meticulously for his expedition to the South Pole. He planned for Antarctica’s icy silence, hurricane-force winds, and bone-deep cold. He considered the challenges of crossing a frozen continent where no human foot had yet trodden. But despite that careful planning, everyone in the expedition perished. They were felled by a threat polar explorers hadn’t expected — the “tin pest.”
How did this happen?
There is no fuel in Antarctica, so Scott stocked up on liquid fuel. He poured it into tin cans and sealed them with the utmost care.
“We sealed them with the best tin!” the craftsmen said, smiling. “The can might burst, but the seam will hold!”
But it was the seam that failed. All the seals broke in the brutal cold, the fuel leaked out, and the expedition members found themselves trapped in Antarctica’s icy grip.
It turned out that tin is sensitive to extreme cold. At temperatures below 13 degrees Fahrenheit, white crystalline tin turns gray and crumbles into a fine powder. That’s exactly what happened to Scott’s expedition: the tin in the cans degraded, the seals failed, and the fuel was lost.
