A set of skis belonging to a naval surgeon aboard Captain Robert Scott's ship Terra Nova have been returned to New Zealand's Antarctic Heritage Trust.
Tuesday is the centenary of the ship's return to Lyttelton from the Antarctic after Scott and four companions had perished on their way back from the South Pole.
The trust's executive director, Nigel Watson, says surgeon Edward Atkinson led the party that found the bodies.
Mr Watson says the wooden skis, clearly etched with Atkinson's initials, were retrieved from a pile of abandoned equipment at Scott's Cape Evans hut in 1948 by an American navy helicopter pilot.
He says the skis - a poignant link to Scott's last expedition - will be returned to Antarctica.