A TEAM of Naval adventurers embarking on the journey of a lifetime in the footsteps of Sir Ernest Shackleton will have their health monitored by a Glasgow navy surgeon.

Departing in mid January, 11 Service participants from the Royal Navy and Royal Marines will undertake a six week expedition to the Antarctic and South Georgia – a century after Shackleton’s extraordinary recovery from the Weddell Sea.

The aim of Exercise Antarctic Endurance (AE16) is to inspire a new generation of sailors and marines to seek adventure but will also provide the Navy and Ministry of Defence with research into team dynamics and leadership.

And Royal Navy Surgeon Lieutenant Commander Donald Angus, from Glasgow, is also in charge of ensuring the health of the other team members.

The 30-year-old, is a keen sailor having represented the UK in international competitions in the past.

He said: “I’m going into this expedition having already learned technical skills such as how to move safely around a glacier and basic mountaineering skills like roping together to reduce the chances of injury.

"I’ve also learned that I really enjoy this.

“Personally I look forward to being somewhat out of my comfort zone, seeing a part of the world I’d be unlikely to otherwise and experiencing the weather and sea-states that I’ve grown up hearing about in sailing fokelore.

"I don’t think a wave as big as a block of flats, or sea so frothed by the wind there’s no real surface, can be properly imagined without having experienced it.”

The journey will begin and end in the Falklands having travelled through the Weddell Sea, landed on the east coast of the Antarctic Peninsula, and Elephant Island, before sending a team overland from King Haakon Bay to Stromness, in South Georgia – the same route travelled by Shackleton and his companions 100 years ago.

Along with research into team dynamics and leadership; data will also be collected on climate, environment and hydrography on behalf of British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge and Plymouth Universities and the UK Hydrographic Office.

The 11 Service participants are made up of qualified and experienced sailors and mountaineers, with six of them in the first five years of their careers.