May 10, 2008
Shipwreck Central - Scheduled System Downtime
We will be performing some scheduled maintenance on the Shipwreck Central server at 6:00 AM (AST) May 11. The site will not be available for approximately 1 hour.
Thanks,
SWC
Posted by livedive at 06:24 PM
December 13, 2007
GHOSTSHIPS OF THE GREAT LAKES - PART 4
Ghostship of the Great Lakes part 4
When New York's most prominent shipyard, Bidwell and Banta, launched the Niagara in 1846, the vessel was one of the largest, fastest, and most luxurious steamboats the world had ever seen. Seeing the much-heralded Niagara for the first time, one reporter wrote that "we had been lead to anticipate a most magnificent boat, but the reality far exceeded our anticipations."
Posted by victoria at 12:46 PM
December 10, 2007
Ghostship of the Great Lakes Part 3
Ghostship of the Great Lakes Part 3
Mike and Warren prep for a deep dive in Lake Erie that requires commercial dive gear, including a dive helmet.
Posted by victoria at 01:19 PM
December 07, 2007
December 7th 1941 - Pearl Harbor
At 6:00 a.m. on December 7th six Japanese carriers launched a first wave of 181 planes composed of torpedo bombers, dive-bombers, horizontal bombers and fighters on Pearl Harbour. Caught off guard by the subsequent waves of attack within the first 10 minutes the USS Arizona had been hit twice. The devastating explosion that resulted ripped through the forward part of the ship igniting brutal fires that burned for two days; debris showered down on Ford Island and the surrounding area. The Arizona had been struck down taking with her 1103 lives, over half the casualties of that infamous day.
The Japanese attacked military airfields at the same time they hit the fleet anchored in Pearl Harbor. Overall, twenty-one ships of the U.S. Pacific Fleet were sunk or damaged, aircraft losses were 188 destroyed and 159 damaged, American dead numbered 2,403. That figure included 68 civilians, and there were 1,178 military and civilian wounded.
Battleship Row
USS Arizona Memorial
For more information find the USS Arizona and USS Oklahoma on the map.
Posted by victoria at 09:43 AM
GHOSTSHIPS OF THE GREAT LAKES - PART 2
Ghostship of the Great Lakes Part 2
Mike and the dive team continue the search with a helmet dive on an unidentified wreck.
Survivors of the Niagara disaster estimated that only 20 minutes elapsed between the outbreak of the fire and the total abandonment of the ship. Since the passengers and crew had little time to collect their belongings, the Niagara took an abundance of cultural artifacts down with it when it sank. In about 50 feet of water, the remains of the Niagara settled to the bottom of Lake Michigan about one mile off shore. Memories of the disaster persisted and were occasionally revisited in newspapers and by maritime buffs, but deeper knowledge of the Niagara and Great Lakes palace steamers faded.
Posted by victoria at 09:35 AM
December 06, 2007
Halifax Explosion Remembered
On December 6, 1917, in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the largest man-made explosion until the first atomic bomb occurred.
At 8:45 in the morning a French ammunition ship, the Mont Blanc and the Norwegian cargo ship Imo collided in the narrows of Halifax harbour. Vapors from vats of benzol, which were wrongly stored on the deck of the Mont Blanc, were set afire by sparks from the collision. The Mont Blanc was shipping large quantities of munitions to Europe as part of the war effort. She was carrying over 2700 tons of explosives, such as TNT, guncotton, and picric acid. The fire engulfed the Mont Blanc and the crew quickly abandoned ship upon the Captain's orders. They rowed to safety in two rowboats and reached safety on the Dartmouth shore as the burning ship continued to drift toward the busy port of Halifax.
At 9:04:35, with firefighters on the scene and school children gathering to watch, a massive explosion ensued. More than 2.5 km2 of Halifax was leveled and windows were shattered as far as Truro, Nova Scotia, 100 kilometres away. An anchor from the Mont Blanc was found five kilometres from the harbour. The disaster resulted in approximately 1635 deaths (approx. 1000 died instantaneously from the blast), nine thousand injured and approximately 30 million dollars in damage. 325 acres of city was destroyed. 1500 people became homeless as a result of the devastation. The following day a blizzard hit the city, crippling recovery efforts.
If not for the efforts of neighboring Provinces, the Boston Red Cross and the Massachusetts Public Safety Committee the devastation would have escalated further. Each year, Nova Scotia donates a giant evergreen to the people of Boston as a thank you for their assistance following the Halifax Explosion.
Click Here To view rare film footage shot in the aftermath of the 1917 Halifax Explosion. Six minutes of black-and-white moving images, attributed to professional cameraman W.G. MacLaughlan, document in eerie silence and jerky movements the waste and devastation of a city destroyed, and the efforts that went into rebuilding it.
For more information on the Halifax Explosion find the Mont Blanc on the map.
Every Christmas since 1917, Nova Scotia has donated a large Christmas tree to the City of Boston in thanks and remembrance for the help the Boston Red Cross and the Massachusetts Public Safety Committee provided in the time of major need. The tree is Boston's premier Christmas tree and is lit in the Boston Common throughout the holiday season.
Posted by victoria at 09:41 AM
December 05, 2007
GHOSTSHIPS OF THE GREAT LAKES - PART 1
PLAY GHOSTSHIPS OF THE GREAT LAKES PART ONE
For more than a century, the ship and its contents laid undisturbed, frozen in time. However, with the invention and popularization of scuba gear during the 1950s and 1960s, this suddenly changed. In the mid-1960s, divers discovered the remains of the Niagara. For more than two decades, treasure hunters and salvagers thoroughly stripped artifacts and fittings from what was probably Wisconsin's greatest treasure trove of nineteenth century cultural artifacts. Rumors tell of entire crates of unbroken china and other artifacts being hauled off to the garages of Wisconsin and Illinois. Unfortunately, the knowledge that could have been gained by studying those artifacts is lost forever.
The structure of the wreck itself suffered additional damage by looters. One of the Niagara's two great paddlewheels, 30 feet in diameter, survived upright and largely intact into the 1980s, until a diver toppled it in a search for artifacts. Today, fragments of the wheel lie on the port side of the hull, directly abeam the engine assembly.
Despite the unfortunate pillage, the wreck of the Niagara remains a rich source of information about mid-nineteenth century shipbuilding technology and maritime culture. In 1993, the Wisconsin Historical Society began archaeological and historical research on the Niagara, one of the few examples of sidewheel steamers still in existence.
Check back tomorrow for part 2 of Ghostships of the Great Lakes and go to the Shipwreck Map > to learn more about the Niagara now!
Posted by victoria at 10:23 AM
November 29, 2007
Clive Cussler's -The Chase - The Limited Edition Prints!!!
Maurizio Manzieri is a professional artist living in Turin, Italy. Since 1994 he has been collaborating with leading publishers and magazines such as Mondadori, Editrice Nord, Rizzoli, Longanesi, TEA, Fanucci, Dario Flaccovio Editore, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction (USA), Interzone (UK). His artwork has appeared in many international exhibits and renowned annuals including Spectrum, The Best in Fantastic Contemporary Art. Among the most prestigious awards conquered in the fantastic field there are: the Italia Award and the Europe Award - both as Best Illustrator -and the Chesley Award for Best Unpublished Monochrome Artwork.
YOU CAN PRE-ORDER NOW!
PRINTS SHIPMENT WILL BEGIN IN A FEW DAYS!!!
THE CHASE novel will be on sale on November 6th! I've just received the following note from the Penguin Art Department:
" Maurizio, we will send finish printed samples of THE CHASE soon. They just came in. Looks terrific."
As you can imagine, I look forward to my copy of the book, yet at the moment we have to compensate our thirst only with the artistic output. My Studio is practically ready to ship the brand-new production and the quickest Collectors will be able to grab one copy well before the volume hits the shops.
Take a glance at the revamped Cussler Store! It keeps slowly expanding while my collaborations go on! If you click on the images, you will be teleported straight away to the Prints page. Message to the buyers: please free to inquire about anything, from the packaging to the methods of shipments even though I'm pleased to assure you that each one of the Deluxe Prints will reach your door safe and sound!
(click on the below images if you wish to be teleported to the Store)
Price: EURO 45,00
Price: EURO 45,00
Each print comes numbered and hand signed on high quality Archival Matte Paper. Thanks to the special Ultrachrome pigment inks - water and smudge resistant -,each illustration delivers superb color expression and long lasting light fastness up to 75 years.The Artworks are shipped worldwide by Prioritaire Registered Post.
Posted by victoria at 01:34 PM
November 27, 2007
Winners of Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1
The Four Grand prize winners of Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1 signed by Mike and Warren Fletcher are:
Nicholas Piscitelli
Philadelphia, PA
Nicole Austin
Seymour, Australia
Douglas Armstrong
Exeter, ON
Vic Sauve
Sudbury, Ont
Your DVD sets are on the way!
Don't forget you can still buy Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1 in the Shipwreck Central online shop.
Check back soon for exclusive clips from Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 2
Posted by victoria at 10:02 AM
November 11, 2007
November 11th
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
— John McCrae
Lest we forget.
Posted by victoria at 10:38 AM
November 06, 2007
WIN Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1
Please take some time this week to check out the clips in the feature video player from our dive off Juno Beach - one of the episodes included in this DVD set.
Sure you can easily buy your own copy of Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1 on DVD but these 4 sets are the only ones signed by both Mike and Warren Fletcher!
How can you win?
Click on the launch entry link below and fill out the form, include your Name, age, address, telephone number, email address and correctly answer the question then hit submit.
Once you have the correct answer you can enter once a day until the contest closes on November 20th.
Four Grand prize winners of Clive Cussler's The Sea Hunters: Set 1 signed by Mike and Warren Fletcher will be drawn from all correct entries received before the contest deadline
Good Luck!
Check back for the winners!
Posted by victoria at 02:23 PM
November 05, 2007
DOXA BOOK WINNERS
Thanks to everyone who entered! Check back this week for a new contest!
Grand Prize Winners of the book DOXA SUB FORTY YEARS 1947- 2007 and an Orange Jenny logo ball cap are:
- John Cameron - Oxnard, Ca
- Glenn Douglas - Westminster, CO
The winners of an Orange Jenny Logo ball cap are:
- Michael Keels - Mount Pearl, Newfoundland
- Len Sussman - North Hills, CA
- Troy Vail - Loves Park, IL
- James Higbie - Humble, TX
- Christine Willaeys - Langton, Ontario
- Warren Bush - Peterborough, Ontario
- Karen Bradfield - Victoria, Australia
- Jamie Smith - Malahat, BC
Kudos to everyone who got the answer correct - for those who may have missed it the answer is:
Serial number 001/1000 is dedicated to Dr. Clive Cussler, famous US author well known for his popular Dirk Pitt® action-adventure novels, founder and chairman of the National Underwater & Marine Agency NUMA.
Serial number 001/3000 of the orange face DOXA SUB 600T Professional was sent to Dr. Clive Cussler in November 2003. Clive Cussler also received serial number 001/1000 of the SUB 300T Seahunter re-edition and 001/1000 of the SUB 300T Professional in May 2002
Posted by victoria at 10:49 AM
October 17, 2007
WIN THE DOXA BOOK
Hello DOXA fans
Every one at Shipwreck Central loves DOXA they make the best dive watches in the world and they have always been generous to both Shipwreck Central and the Sea Hunters. But we are not their only fan.
Dr. Peter Millar has just published a stunning book chronicling 40 years of DOXA.
There are only 1000 copies of this book in print and the two we have to give away are the only ones signed by both the author and Mike Fletcher, who wrote a forward for the book.
In addition to the book we will include an Orange Jenny logo ball cap in the grand prize pack and we will also give away 8 more ball caps as secondary prizes.
How can you win?
Click on the launch entry link below and fill out the form, include your Name, age, address, telephone number, email address and correctly answer the question then hit submit.
Once you have the correct answer you can enter once a day until the contest closes on October 31th.
Two Grand prize winner of a DOXA SUB FORTY YEARS 1947- 2007 and Orange Jenny logo ball cap will be drawn from all correct entries received before the contest deadline
Eight second prize winners of an Orange DOXA Jenny Logo baseball cap will be drawn from the remaining correct entries
Check back for the winners!
Posted by victoria at 10:27 AM
October 04, 2007
U-Boat diver's body is recovered
The body of a 45-year-old diver who died at the site of a sunken German U-boat has been recovered.
Michael Hanrahan, (extreme right) a father of four from Dublin, died during a dive at the submarine, 16 miles off Malin Head on the County Donegal coast on Tuesday.
Paul Lewis, another member of the dive team, said he tried to save Mr Hanrahan's life.
"Out of the blue, Mick just fell back onto the wreck and I think he had some sort of a seizure," Mr Lewis said.
"Instantly I went to his aid, but it was of no help to him."
The dive team was filming the U-boat while assessing the chances of recovering it.
Mr Hanrahan's body was recovered by fellow members of his diving club in Dublin.
Paul Moore, from BBC Radio Ulster's Your Place and Mine, spent Tuesday with the divers at Malin Head, for a feature he was doing for the programme.
"It was just such a huge shock, because they were just so excited about it and they seemed to know just what they were doing," Mr Moore said.
"It's just such a tragedy for the family."
He said later he was looking at photographs he had taken of the divers.
"I was looking at these photographs and realising that one of these divers was still there, had had this accident and was now dead," he said.
Derry City councillor Shaun Gallagher paid tribute to Mr Hanrahan.
"He was a gentle giant and a lovely man - we're just devastated," he said.
The dive team leaving for the U-boat site on Tuesday
It is the second fatal diving incident off the north-west coast in the last two months.
At the end of July, Paul Jackson, a police officer from Humberside, had been looking at wrecks off Tory Island but failed to resurface.
The U-boat, which did not see any war action, sank while being towed from Scotland to Londonderry to be scrapped.
Derry City Council plans to raise U-778 and house it in a museum. The boat is lying in about 70 metres of water.
It is estimated there are about 150 such boats lying off Malin Head, all vivid reminders of the Battle of the Atlantic during World War II.
The council said that "because of the depth of the waters involved, the procedure was expected to be highly technical".
Posted by victoria at 09:31 AM
July 26, 2007
The Search for Shipwrecks
By Katy Wheeler
Explorer and scuba diving enthusiast Ken Barella is taking to the seas with his boat Nautilus to research old shipwrecks
The diving support boat has been a labour of love for the 55-year-old who has spent the last five years restoring the 16.5-tonne vessel.
Now he hopes the boat will help him explore, identify and research the shipwrecks hidden beneath the surface of the North Sea,
Ken, from Roker, said: "The boat had been on the quayside since the early 1990s and would have probably been scrapped due to its neglected condition.
"I saw the potential to turn her into a nice boat through hard work, which others wouldn't have been prepared to take on. I couldn't have managed without the help and patience of my friends and family.
"I will be able to relax once sea trials are complete and any teething troubles have been ironed out."
The £25,000 boat was lifted into the Wear's half-tide basin on Friday night – a proud moment for Ken, the chief attendant at Sunderland Central Library.
Over the years he has meticulously carried out the major overhaul, which included shot-blasting and painting the hull, installing a new 210 horsepower engine, fitting out the foredeck saloon and renewing steering, gearbox and wiring.
He said: "It's extremely rewarding to discover an item which can lead to the positive identification of one of the many wrecks off the local coastline. "
Discovering a ship's name puts life and meaning into what is otherwise just a lump of metal."
Posted by victoria at 10:51 AM
Treasure Trove 'found by octopus'
An octopus with a porcelain plate stuck to its suckers has led to the discovery of a hoard of ancient pottery, South Korean scientists say.
A fisherman caught the octopus off South Korea's west coast in May. He said the animal appeared to be hiding under a plate.
Archaeologists searched the area and discovered a 12th Century wooden wreck buried in mudflats.
They said more than 500 pieces of porcelain had been recovered so far.
"These are the highest quality artefacts ever discovered in our seas," said Yun Yong-i, a Korean art history professor from Myongji University.
Moon Whan-suk, from the National Maritime Museum, expressed surprise that the tiny octopus - about the size of an orange - had managed to hold on to the plate.
He told Reuters news agency: "I can't believe how such a small octopus managed to cover its shell with such a large plate.
"I guess it meant for us to discover the artefacts."
The porcelain, found near Taean, south-west of the capital Seoul, is thought to date from the Goryeo dynasty, which ruled Korea from the 10th to the 14th Century.
Experts say the 7.7m-long (25ft) wreck could contain up to 2,000 further pieces, including ancient bowls, plates and other types of pottery.
Several shipwrecks laden with relics have already been found along the west coast of South Korea.
Posted by victoria at 10:48 AM
July 25, 2007
Diving the Andrea Doria
Due to the luxurious appointments and relatively good condition of the wreck, with the top of the wreck lying initially in only 160 feet (50 m) of water, Andrea Doria is a frequent target of treasure divers and is commonly referred to as the "Mount Everest of scuba diving."
The day after Andrea Doria sank, divers Peter Gimbel and Joseph Fox managed to locate the wreck of the ship, and published pictures of the wreck in TIME magazine. Gimbel later conducted a number of salvage operations on the ship, including salvaging the First Class Bank Safe in 1981. Despite speculation that passengers had deposited many valuables, the safe, opened on live television in 1984, yielded little other than American silver certificates and Italian bank notes. This disappointing outcome apparently confirmed other speculation that most Andrea Doria passengers, in anticipation of the ship's scheduled arrival in New York City the following morning, had already retrieved their valuables prior to the collision. The ship's bell was taken in the late 1980s, and the statue of Genoese Admiral Andrea Doria, for whom the ship was named, was removed from the first-class lounge, being cut off at the ankles to accomplish this. Examples of the ship's china have long been considered valuable mementos of diving the wreck. However, after years of removal of artifacts by divers, little of value is thought to remain.
As of 2007, years of ocean submersion have taken their toll. The wreck has aged and deteriorated extensively, with the hull now fractured and collapsed. The upper decks have slowly slid off the wreck to the seabed below. As a result of this transformation, a large debris field flows out from the hull of the liner. Once-popular access points frequented by divers, such as Gimbel's Hole, no longer exist. Divers call the Andrea Doria a "noisy" wreck as it emits various noises due to continual deterioration and the currents' moving broken metal around inside the hull. However, due to this decay new access areas are constantly opening up for future divers on the ever-changing wreck.
Deaths
Artifact recovery on the Andrea Doria has not been without additional loss of life. Fourteen scuba divers have lost their lives diving the wreck, and diving conditions at the wreck site are considered very treacherous. Strong currents and heavy sediment that can reduce visibility to zero pose as serious hazards to diving this site. Dr. Robert Ballard, who visited the site in a U.S. Navy submersible in 1995, reported that thick fishing nets draped the hull. An invisible web of thin fishing lines, which can easily snag scuba gear, provides more danger. Furthermore, the wreck is slowly collapsing; the top of the wreck is now at 190 feet (60 m), and many of the passageways have begun to collapse.
- 1985 — John Ormsby dies of being caught in wires and of drowning
- 1998 — Craig Sicola, Richard Roost and Vincent Napoliello all died diving on the Andrea Doria.
- 1999 — Christopher Murley died of an apparent heart attack preparing to dive.
- Also, in 1999, Charles J. McGurr died of a heart attack preparing to dive the Andrea Doria the second time in a day.
- 2002 — William Schmoldt died from decompression sickness.
- In 2006 researcher David Bright died from decompression sickness.
Posted by victoria at 10:08 AM
Andrea Doria
By Jack Kelly
Fifty one years ago today, on July 25, 1956, two large passenger liners off Massachusetts were steaming toward each other through the night at a combined speed of 40 knots. In spite of ample room to maneuver, in spite of the radar that let them spot each other from a distance, and in spite of clear rules intended to avoid collisions, the Stockholm crashed into the Andrea Doria and ripped the luxurious ship open amidships. It was to be the last great drama of the age of transatlantic passenger liners.
The reason for the accident 50 miles south of Nantucket would be debated down the years. For the time being, a much more pressing issue loomed. The Andrea Doria was listing alarmingly to starboard, and seawater was pouring in. The enormous ship was in danger of sinking. Its 1,660 passengers and crew were in imminent peril.
The Andrea Doria had put to sea in 1951 from Genoa to accommodate the booming postwar demand for ocean travel. Almost 700 feet long, she ship could cruise at a brisk 23 knots and was noted for her luxurious appointments. The Italian Line had spent a million dollars on art and decoration, the food and service were superb, and even third-class passengers enjoyed an on-deck swimming pool. Many observers considered the Doria the most beautiful ocean liner ever launched.
The Stockholm, which had left New York that afternoon, was a more modest ship, 525 feet long and capable of carrying 570 passengers. She was fitted with a reinforced icebreaker prow to handle northern winter waters.
Several factors contributed to the collision. The International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea stipulated that ships in fog “go at a moderate speed.” The Andrea Doria’s captain, Piero Calamai, was steaming ahead at nearly 22 knots through dense fog in order to keep to his schedule. At that speed, it would take the vessel three miles to stop. Those same rules dictated that when ships were meeting nearly head-on “each shall alter her course to starboard” to avoid a collision—keep to the right. But the rule did not apply to ships that were likely to “pass clear of each other.”
Assuming the ships had plenty of room to pass on the left, Calamai veered slightly to port to allow more clearance. Johan-Ernst Carstens, the Stockholm third mate who was commanding the bridge, turned his ship to the right for the same reason, putting the two vessels on a collision course. When the Andrea Doria emerged from the fog, the crew saw the oncoming lights of the Stockholm. Carstens ordered a turn 20 degrees farther to the right, but failed to signal the maneuver with his ship’s whistle.
Aboard the Doria, Captain Calamai had seconds to make a decision. He chose wrong, sending his ship into a hard left turn. The 29,000-ton vessel skidded across the path of the Stockholm and received her ice-cutter bow at almost a 90-degree angle.
The ships rammed together just after 11:00 p.m. to the sound of sirens and bending steel. The Stockholm’s prow crashed 40 feet into the side of the Andrea Doria, through cabins filled with sleeping passengers. Forty-six of them were killed in the collision, along with five Swedish crewmen who slept in cabins in the bow of the Stockholm.
The ships hung together for a few seconds, then parted. Though her bow had been sheared off, the Stockholm was in no danger of sinking. But the Andrea Doria, with 500 tons of seawater rushing into her empty starboard fuel tanks, listed 20 degrees. Because she was leaning over so badly, her crew could not lower the port lifeboats. The Doria, like the Titanic 44 years earlier, now had lifeboats for only half its passengers.
Crewmen from the Stockholm began to ferry passengers from the stricken ship in their own motorized lifeboats. It was a slow process; Andrea Doria passengers were forced to negotiate steeply sloping decks and clamber down ropes or netting to reach the floating lifeboats. Some panicked and jumped. One man tossed his young daughter into a boat, fracturing her skull. She later died.
On board the Stockholm, a sailor discovered 14-year-old Linda Morgan entangled in the wreckage near the bow. He could not find her name on the ship’s passenger list. He was startled when she revealed that she was a passenger on the Andrea Doria. Linda, who became known at the “miracle girl,” had been thrown from her bed onto the other ship during the collision, which had killed her half-sister and stepfather.
A distress signal announcing “need of immediate assistance” quickly brought help, including the freighter Cape Ann and a Navy transport vessel. But by two o’clock almost a thousand people were still awaiting rescue on the Andrea Doria, which was listing even more steeply. At that point the passenger liner Ile de France arrived, having turned back from its own crossing to Europe. Its blazing lights produced “incredible joy” among those on the Andrea Doria and created a surreal scene reminiscent of a movie set.
By dawn all of the passengers and crew had abandoned the Andrea Doria. Captain Calamai had held out hope she could be towed to shallow water and saved, but he now knew that was impossible.
“There were exclamations of surprise and awe,” one survivor remembered, “as the Andrea Doria trembled and lurched to one side.” The great vessel rolled over and went down in 225 feet of water. Her captain telegraphed a terse message to his employers: “Doria sank 10:09—Calamai.”
A $30-million ship had been lost and 51 persons had died, but seamen had also pulled off the greatest peacetime rescue in history, saving more than 1,600 lives.
No final adjudication was ever made of who was to blame for the accident; the numerous lawsuits were settled out of court. New rules were put into place afterward, dictating certification of radar operators and requiring approaching ships to establish radio contact.
The Andrea Doria still rests on the sea floor. Because the ship lies well below the maximum safe scuba-diving depth, she has taken on the role of the Everest of diving. Hundreds of souvenir hunters have explored her wreck; a dozen have died trying.
The sinking of the Andrea Doria did not mark the end of the ocean liner. It simply sounded a melancholy note in the dirge of an industry already doomed. In 1958, two years after the collision, airlines began offering nonstop jet travel between the United States and Europe. The leisurely five-day crossing on a well-appointed passenger ship became a relic of a bygone era.
Posted by victoria at 10:06 AM
July 18, 2007
USS Truxtun to sail once again - Lanier Phillips update
Those of you familiar with our site probably know the story of Lanier Phillips. Growing up in fear in the Klan controlled State of Georgia; Phillips joined a segregated Navy as a teenager. One February night in 1942, his ship was wrecked off the coast of Newfoundland. When a local resident saved him from hypothermia, Phillips thought, "Here is a white man who wants me to live." The kindness he received from these white strangers as they nursed him through the night was a miracle that allowed him to recognize his future was worth fighting for. The love and hope he found in the community of St. Lawrence would continue to empower him throughout the course of his life.
His inspiring story was told in the documentary Dead Reckoning: The Lanier Phillips Story. Last month Lanier Philips was on hand as they christened the sixth USS Truxun, the ship Phillips was on the night of the wreck.
USS Truxtun (DDG-103) is a US Navy Arleigh Burke-class destroyer currently under construction. Her keel was laid down on April 11, 2005. DDG-103 suffered a major electrical fire during construction at NGSS Ingalls, Pascagoula, Mississippi May 20, 2006 engulfing two levels and causing damaged believed to be in the millions of dollars. She was christened on June 2, 2007 at NGSS Ingalls in Pascagoula Mississippi.
For more information on Lanier Philips you can order a copy of the documentary from our Shop. You can find the wreck of the Truxtun on our Shipwreck Map (including video) or you can watch a pieces on Lanier Phillips from the CBC.
"They that go down to the sea in ships;
That do business in great waters;
These see the works of the Lord, and His wonders in the deep."
Posted by victoria at 10:29 AM
July 16, 2007
Reading Shipwreck Ceramics
Old porcelains recovered from shipwrecks aren’t just pretty objects – they’re a window on the past.
By JOHNNI WONG
Ancient shipwrecks with Chinese, Thai and Vietnamese ceramics are important in that they can tell us how maritime trade in South-East Asia had an impact on kingdoms like Sirivijaya, Angkor, Ayutthaya and Malacca.
According to Bangkok-based South-East Asian Ceramics Museums director, Dr Roxanna Brown, the ceramics offer an insight into how the maritime trade enriched these centres of development.
Treasure from the sea: Dr Roxanna Brown with blue and white ceramic recovered from the Desaru wreck off Johor.
Based on the types of ceramics found, as well as excavation sites, a chronological order of trading activities, empire development, and even the building of temples like Angkor and Borobudur can be verified, said Dr Brown who will be delivering a lecture on Shipwreck Ceramics and the Fall of Malacca at the 31st annual general meeting of the South-East Asian Ceramics Society, West Malaysia Chapter on July 21 at Muzium Negara, Kuala Lumpur.
In her lecture, Dr Brown will make her case that Chinese ceramics dating to the Ming (1368-1644) and pre-Ming dynasties are important historical markers. In an e-mail interview, she cautioned collectors against buying ceramics that come from undocumented wrecks.
“History is destroyed if ceramics are looted and sold before there is a proper excavation and documentation of a shipwreck site. I hope participants to my lecture will see how trade ceramics are more than just pretty objects. I will show how they can be used to open new windows on old historical events.
“Since 1974, more than 150 shipwreck sites have been reported in South-East and East Asia. There are enough sites now that one can begin to mine them for new perspectives on historical questions.
“An average five to six new shipwreck sites seem to be discovered every year,” added Dr Brown.
However, looters, as well as unwitting buyers of such shipwreck artefacts, contribute to the destruction of historical evidence. The treasures are often smuggled out of territorial waters to be sold in private transactions for profit or to fund more such “expeditions”.
Dr Brown thinks bulk trade in Chinese ceramics started around AD800-850 with Srivijayan ships. The trade contributed immensely to the empire’s coffers, leading to temple construction activities.
“It is very difficult to escape the conclusion that the early shipping of Chinese ceramics was in Indonesian – NOT Chinese – hands. This situation persisted for perhaps 400 years, until the 13th century when written records indicate that Chinese ships sailed as far as India,” said Dr Brown.
The sudden increase in wealth being concentrated in Indonesia, contends Dr Brown, must have sent jitters to other places in South-East Asia.
Pretty but fake: Dr Brown holding up a fake antique she found in an antiques shop in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. — DR ROXANNA BROWN
“One imagines the timing for the beginnings of the bulk trade, the building of Borobudur, and the founding of an Angkorian dynasty are not a coincidence.”
Then Ming emperor, Hongwu (1328-1398), banned private overseas trade in Chinese ceramics at the beginning of his reign. The 50% drop in Chinese ceramics found in shipwreck cargoes dating from those years – discovered so far – must have been a reaction to the ban.
The surprise is that the amount of Chinese ceramics dropped even more dramatically at the end of the Yongle’s (1403-24) reign. This second drop in market share must have been a reaction to Zheng He’s voyages being suddenly curbed in 1424. One consequence from these shortages in Chinese trade ware was that South-East Asian manufacturers filled the void – the so-called Ming Gap.
Based on the percentage of Chinese, Thai (Siamese) and Vietnamese (Champa) ceramics found in shipwreck cargoes of the Ming era, Dr Brown can draw conclusions on the impact of China’s maritime trade policy on empires in South-East Asia.
“The end of Zheng He’s voyages had two major effects. First, the proportion of Chinese trade ceramics dropped to 1% and less during the middle 15th century. Second, this shortage was filled by massive cargoes of Thai classic celadon.
“Ayutthaya experienced a sudden windfall of amazing proportions as a result of this. After 1424, until about 1470, Thai ceramics made up some 95% of shipwreck cargoes. And not only did Thailand take over the production and export of ceramics, it seems it also became a shipping base.”
Although more and more shipwreck ceramics are becoming available in the market, fake ones have started appearing on the scene. Dr Brown enclosed a photograph of some which she had encountered, saying, “The antiques dealer said he went regularly to the seashore to ask fishermen if they had found ceramics. He said he only bought the best ones, and that they came from many different sites. Of course, he could not name a single site.
“A buyer should be able to look up the published finds from a shipwreck site. If there is nothing published, then the material is fake or has been looted, and he is wilfully participating in destroying history.”
Dr Brown describes herself as an art historian. Her studies began at the University of Singapore where she did her Master’s degree from 1971 to 1974 under William Willetts, the late founder of the South-East Asian Ceramics Society.
Asked what attracted her to this field, she said, “I’ve had fun using trade ceramics to help explain historical events like the beginnings of major temple-building in South-East Asia, the fall of the Angkor Empire, the Ming Gap, etc.”
And how did she end up in Bangkok?
“I visited Thailand several times during the Vietnam War. I was a freelance journalist in Vietnam 1968-1975, and did my degree at University of Singapore during that time. I moved to Bangkok full-time in 1980, but in 1982 I was badly injured in a traffic accident and spent 14 years in and out of hospital and mostly in a wheelchair.
“Finally technology caught up and I was able to have an artificial leg that fitted well enough that I was finally able to walk without pain,” she revealed.
The director of Bangkok’s South-East Asian Ceramics Museum said, “Our staff continuously keeps up to date on new finds and research of all kinds concerning Thai ceramics and the types of foreign ceramics found in Thailand.”
Posted by victoria at 10:01 AM
July 13, 2007
Cussler's Airplane Search Continues
BY JAMES PRICHARD
ASSOCIATED PRESS
GRAND RAPIDS — The quest to locate the Lake Michigan site where an airliner carrying 58 people went down decades ago could help uncover the cause of the mysterious crash, even if the wreckage itself never is found, says the woman leading the search.
“I feel very strongly that it’s not so much finding the wreckage that’s going to provide the answers. I think we’re getting the answers in the course of the search for the plane,” Valerie van Heest said Wednesday from her Holland home.
From late April through late May, the expert diver and her group, Michigan Shipwreck Research Associates, scoured a 23-square-mile area of the lake off South Haven but found no sign of the crash site of Northwest Airlines Flight 2501. They were helped by a three-member underwater-search team provided by author and shipwreck hunter Clive Cussler.
The flight, a DC-4 carrying 55 passengers and three crew members, originated in New York City and was ultimately bound for Seattle. It crashed into the lake late on June 23, 1950, killing all aboard in the nation’s deadliest airliner accident up to that time.
The crash happened during a raging thunderstorm but no cause could be determined.
While a Coast Guard cutter found debris in the water about 18 miles north-northwest of Benton Harbor, no one is certain exactly where the aircraft went down.
Van Heest hopes to pin down the site by finding at least one of the plane’s four engines on the lake’s bottom.
Her organization, with Cussler’s assistance, started searching for Flight 2501 in fall 2004. The team conducted additional searches in spring 2005, spring 2006 and again this past spring, and plans to return to southern Lake Michigan next year.
Van Heest, who has put her marketing and graphic design career on hold to focus on the search, has tracked down representatives of more than 30 families who lost loved ones in the crash and updates them on her efforts. She contacted each one to give them the bad news about the latest unsuccessful search.
Van Heest has obtained courtroom transcripts from a liability lawsuit that some of the victims’ relatives filed years ago against Northwest. So far, she has read about 300 of the 2,500 pages of transcribed testimony from witnesses and crash experts that she believes contains information that will be of great help during her next search.
“As much as I am distressed that it’s been four years and we haven’t found this, I’m almost looking forward to another year because I think in that year, I’ll learn more than I would learn if we’d found the wreck this year,” she said.
Posted by victoria at 03:58 PM
July 03, 2007
Lake Erie's 'holy grail' of Shipwrecks
Competing quests hunt the lake's most elusive shipwreck this summer.
By DEBORA VAN BRENK, SUN MEDIA
At least two dedicated quests for the "holy grail" of Lake Erie shipwrecks are set to take place this summer -- one originating in Port Dover and one in Ohio.
The Marquette & Bessemer No. 2 vanished in a winter gale on Dec. 7, 1909, somewhere between Conneaut, Ohio, and its Port Stanley destination.
Laden with 30 railcars full of coal, it had no gate at its stern and the roiling waves probably swamped it.
The ship has never been found.
Some claim -- late at night, if you strain to listen -- you can still hear its whistle.
Port Dover diver Rob Cromwell plans to head out onto the lake starting this week, in a search that will use side-scan sonar and a torpedo-like metal detector called a magnetometer.
"It's not a really valuable ship -- but it's the last big one that hasn't been found," he told The Free Press.
"This is the holy grail of shipwrecks now," says Ohio researcher David Frew, author of Long Gone, considered a definitive book on the Marquette & Bessemer No. 2.
Hundreds of other ships dot the floor of the shallowest Great Lake, but few have attracted the same attention as this coal-hauling ferry.
Perhaps that's because few other lost wrecks are 100 metres long.
"It's a football field long. It's enormous. Where is it?" asks Chris Gillcrist, executive director of the Great Lakes Historical Society, based in Vermilion, Ohio (www.inlandseas.org). "We are searching for it this summer."
Last month, his group announced it had found the long-lost General Anthony B. Wayne steamship that went down in 1850 about 12 kilometres from Vermilion.
Port Stanley historian Frank Prothero, who has written his own book on the Marquette & Bessemer No. 2, says it's a great story -- "a Port Stanley story" -- that has sparked the imaginations of mariners and historians.
Theories abound about the ship's whereabouts.
Ohio researcher Frew believes its captain turned her back toward Conneaut when he realized she wasn't going to find harbour in Port Stanley. He says some of the crew left the ship in a life raft near the Ontario shore and the rest stayed aboard until it sank.
Frew believes the boat is upside-down and mostly silted over. "I'm one of those that believes it was near enough to Conneaut that the captain's wife heard the whistle."
Gillcrist, of the Great Lakes Historical Society, also believes she's on the American side of Erie.
Port Dover diver Cromwell will search across from Long Point, on the Canadian side of the middle of the lake, where he believes the boat is lying on her side.
Prothero believes it's in deep water off Long Point.
He says a customs agent spotted her battling the 70-knot gale off Port Stanley on Dec. 7, 1909.
"She reportedly turned westward and was never seen again," Prothero says.
Maybe it headed for Erieau, a port with even less protection. More likely, her captain changed direction and made for the deeper waters of Long Point, where dozens of other ships had found shelter.
"From an historian's point of view, it's certainly the most mysterious of the shallow-lake shipwrecks," Prothero says.
"It's been called the Mount Everest of Great Lake shipwrecks."
Prothero is pleased the Ohio group is searching, but "I don't think their chances are much better than anybody else's."
Cromwell's theory of her location is based on wind direction, currents and drift rates. "The lake that night was like a big milkshake."
But finding it might take a while. "I think it's anybody's game right now," he says.
If found in Ohio waters, the wreck would become property of the state; and it would be Ontario's to manage if found on this side.
Finding the Marquette & Bessemer "is just a matter of time," Gillcrist says. "We hear the rumour about every two years it's been found by divers using it as their personal sanctuary" while keeping it secret. He doubts that.
Prothero is also skeptical:
"Divers are people who, when they are under the water, can't open their mouths. When they're out of the water, they can't shut them."
Meanwhile, the Marquette & Bessemer No. 2 is a ship of mystery.
Is it a ghost ship?
Seasoned mariners dismiss the idea, but some say they've heard its distinct whistle when no other boat is nearby.
What about the tale that one man jumped aboard the ship at the last minute, his pockets full of cash to buy a Port Stanley fish company?
Prothero has his doubts. For one thing, the purported $50,000 would have been enough to buy every boat in Port Stanley, never mind a single company. And the man couldn't have stashed the cash inside the ship safe, as the story goes -- because, Prothero points out, the ship didn't have one.
No, the biggest secret remains its resting place.
"History is about trying to find answers to the unknown," says Gillcrist.
"I think now the Marquette-Bessemer is one of the top five wrecks to be found on the Great Lakes."
THE MARQUETTE & BESSEMER NO. 2
- 335 feet (100 metres) long, steel ferry, with a cargo of 30 railroad hopper cars full of coal
- Left Conneaut, Ohio, Dec. 7, 1909, for Port Stanley
- Encountered a winter storm blowing 70 knots.
- Some accounts say a customs official saw her off the Port Stanley coast, headed west. Others say the captain's wife, in Conneaut, heard its whistle.
- A lifeboat with nine frozen bodies, and the ice-encrusted clothing of a 10th person, found three days later.
- Despite numerous ventures by sport divers and scientific searchers, the ship has never been found.
Posted by victoria at 01:14 PM
June 28, 2007
Shipwreck Central Antiques Roadshow
Hello Shipwreck Central Folks,
I have often urged our forum members who have questions or need help with research to ask for assistance on line because I know we have a lot of well informed contributors every week.
Now I have a question. Recently my father set me a document that has been in our family for many years. My grandfather gave it to my dad back in the 1940’s, unfortunately my father does not know anything of its history prior to that date.
My family has lived in New England, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, for nearly 400 years and have had involvement with maritime trade and shipping over that timeframe. The document might relate to early family activity or it might be a document that came to my grandfather by some other means.
The document is a Presidential decree asking safe passage for the Ship “Marcia”, a merchant vessel of 314 tons, carrying no guns and navigated with a crew of 12 men, Master and Commander being a Captain Stinson.
The decree is signed by President John Quincy Adams and by Secretary of State Henry Clay and Dated December 03, 1828.
It was counter signed by J. M. Swenton (the spelling is hard to read) in Bath Maine. The ship “Marcia” was a Maine Vessel.
Clay and Adams go back a long way in US politics and to see their signatures together on the same document reminds me that they were both “War Hawks” prior to and during the War of 1812 and both of them were signatures to the Treaty of Ghent, which officially ended that war on December 24, 1814. Now 14 years later we have their signatures again, this time on a decree demanding safe passage for a vessel owned by a citizen of the United States. If anyone out there has any information on this type of decree, on Capt. Stinson or the vessel “Marcia” I would be glad to hear from you. You can review a PDF of the Document by clicking the link.
Thanks for your help
John Davis
Please post comments and information in the related post in the Forum under Research and Information.
To view the full PDF of the document click here>
Posted by victoria at 10:44 AM
June 26, 2007
'Pirates' promo snares Odyssey
Secret work on the movie tie-in escalated its dispute with Spain.
By SCOTT BARANIK
Published June 26, 2007
When Volvo decided to bury the grand prize for its online treasure hunt at sea, it asked Odyssey Marine Exploration for help.
Odyssey was up to the task. The publicly traded Tampa company makes its living searching the world's oceans for shipwrecked treasure. Like Volvo, it already had a promotional deal with Disney to promote the third installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean series, which debuted in theaters last month.
Odyssey stuffed a treasure chest with $50,000 in gold coins, added the keys to a Volvo XC90 and then sank it somewhere in the western Mediterranean.
But plans for a triumphant return to the burial site last week never materialized. Thanks to a recent row with Spain over a shipwreck code-named "Black Swan, " Odyssey's ships could be seized if they leave Gibraltar's port. On Friday, Volvo said it would go ahead and cut the winner a $50,0000 check.
"Odyssey's been trying to find ways to get our treasure out of the bottom of the ocean," said Linda Gangeri, Volvo's U.S. advertising manager. "But they're at a stalemate right now."
Volvo's The Hunt contest drew roughly 50,000 contestants from around the world last month. The winner, a 23-year-old Russian woman, solved a series of 22 puzzles that appeared over several weeks. In addition to the $50,000 in "doubloons" -- South African Krugerrands, actually, according to the contest's fine print - she would receive up to $37,500 to compensate for taxes, a silver metallic Volvo worth $45,000 and a two-day trip on Odyssey's ship to retrieve the chest.
Under a nondisclosure agreement Odyssey signed, its role was to remain a secret until the very end of the contest. A shrewd contestant might track its ships' movements and figure out the treasure's location.
In an unrelated development, Odyssey announced in mid May that it had found 500,000 silver coins aboard a 17th-century merchant ship that wrecked in the Atlantic Ocean. An avalanche of global media attention boosted Odyssey's stock price by 80 percent in one day. It also made Volvo and Disney look very, very smart. But before long, the Black Swan's discovery would plague Volvo's contest, and vice-versa.
For months, Spanish authorities -- already suspicious of Odyssey due to battles over another shipwreck -- had been tracking Odyssey's ships near Gibraltar. When Odyssey announced its Black Swan find, Spanish officials believed it might have gotten the coins not from the Atlantic but a Spanish warship, the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, that sank near Gibraltar.
Odyssey officials wanted to tell the world that it was all a big misunderstanding -- that its unexplained activity near Gibraltar was part of the Volvo operation; Volvo told Spanish authorities as much in an affidavit.
But Odyssey's nondisclosure clause forced it to stay quiet. When Volvo finally disclosed the arrangement Friday, it said it hoped the information would help end Odyssey's battle with Spain.
"Without a real explanation of why we had deep-sea exploration equipment out there, it's easy to see how imaginations could run wild," Odyssey co-founder Greg Stemm said in a statement. The damage to its stock price has been very real. Odyssey's stock fell 6 percent Monday to close at $5.75 per share and is down 31 percent since the day after it announced the Black Swan find.
Gangeri said Volvo hasn't given up on getting Odyssey to recover the treasure chest. The company wants to fulfill its pledge to the contest winner. Besides, such promotions help counter the carmaker's "stodgy" image.
"The reason we went with Odyssey was we wanted an authentic experience," she said. "And boy, we got it."
Scott Barancik can be reached at barancik@sptimes.com or 727 893-8751.
Posted by victoria at 09:36 AM
June 22, 2007
157 year old shipwreck found in Lake Erie
VERMILION, Ohio – The wreckage of a steamship that sank in 1850 after its boilers exploded has been discovered at the bottom of Lake Erie.
Thomas Kowalczk, an amateur shipwreck prospector, used sonar on his boat to discover the General Anthony Wayne in 50 feet of water, about eight miles north of this northeast Ohio city, the Great Lakes Historical Society announced Wednesday.
The side-wheel steamship, named in honor of Revolutionary War hero Gen. “Mad” Anthony Wayne, sank in April 1850 while en route from the Toledo area to Buffalo, N.Y. Thirty-eight of the 93 passengers and crew on board died.
“I researched everything I could about it and knew the general area where the ship went down,” Kowalczk said. “I laid out a grid search pattern and starting hunting.”
Kowalczk saw an image of the wreckage on his sonar screen in September. He dived down in May and photographed the wreckage, which is in two sections.
Kowalczk and other members of the Cleveland Underwater Explorers plan to survey the wreck later this summer when underwater visibility improves.
The wreck belongs to the state and salvaging it is illegal, but divers can visit what is left of the ship after it is surveyed and the coordinates are disclosed, said Christopher Gillcrist, executive director of the historical society.
Posted by victoria at 02:59 PM
June 15, 2007
Curators Under the Sea
By ROBERT KURSON
Published: June 8, 2007
Chicago
LAST month, a Florida-based treasure-hunting company made perhaps the richest undersea score ever. It discovered, somewhere in the Atlantic, a Colonial-era shipwreck containing more than 500,000 silver coins and hundreds of gold coins. Total estimated value, according to one coin marketer: $500 million.
In days of yore, pirates would have swarmed to such a bounty, declaring the treasure their own. Today, it attracts a new breed of raiders who believe just as strongly that the treasure is rightfully theirs — and who get just as angry when things don’t go their way. They are the academics — professors, curators, historians and others who study, archive and preserve historical artifacts. Many of them despise the commercial treasure hunters for, as they see it, rampaging through shipwrecks with little regard for the delicate history at hand.
They claim that because the professional treasure hunter’s first priority is to sell what he finds, artifacts will be rushed from shipwreck to market without being carefully preserved or photographed and cataloged to record their historic value. They charge that even if the treasure hunter cared to preserve and catalog his discoveries, he couldn’t, because he is not properly trained to do such subtle and delicate work.
One professor recently summed up these arguments by saying, “If these guys went and planted a bunch of dynamite around the Sphinx, or tore up the floor of the Acropolis, they’d be in jail in a minute.”
The same case was made in 1991, when two recreational scuba divers discovered a World War II German U-boat — complete with its 56-man crew — that had sunk just off New Jersey. No military expert or historian had known of this wreck, its sailors or its story, and so it fell to these two ordinary men to embark on a six-year, fantastically dangerous quest to solve the mystery.
As it happened, there was no treasure aboard this U-boat, but academics made virtually the same accusation: the divers, they said, were going to trample history in their quest to put a name on the warship.
Nothing could have been further from the truth. Not for the divers who undertook huge risks to preserve the U-boat. And not for treasure hunters, who have even greater incentives to be careful with their finds.
The treasure hunter’s livelihood depends on keeping his discoveries in pristine condition. He knows that coins and gold and pottery must be handled with exquisite care in order to bring the highest possible price. He must use a surgeon’s touch with every artifact, because even that last lonely vase has value if it is deftly handled. The roughest and toughest of these treasure hunters have some of the gentlest hands in the world.
Do they know how to handle the rarities they find? The academics scoff at the idea. But many of the finest conservation labs, the most up-to-date equipment and the best-trained archaeologists can be found on just the kind of treasure hunting quest that discovered the recent Colonial-era wreck.
Odyssey Marine Exploration, the company that recovered the treasure, had two archaeologists supervise the effort, and it tested various processes for preserving the coins before choosing the one that was most effective. This preservation work continues. But even on smaller operations, it’s a good bet that a grizzled, lifelong salvage diver has better real-life, tight-squeeze shipwreck experience than an archaeologist who writes up guidelines for this work from his office near the student union.
It is true that not all treasure hunters photograph and document every square inch of the shipwrecks they discover. Most of them cannot fathom a reason to do so. Waves and storms have been throwing shipwrecks around for centuries, constantly shifting their contents. “I could take some pictures and make some notes,” they’ll tell you, “but that’ll only show what it looked like this afternoon. Tomorrow afternoon it will be different.” Some treasure hunters think the academics’ desire to catalog the location of every bent tin of beans is a bit excessive, though that’s not always the word they use.
The real bottom line is this: if treasure hunters didn’t do this kind of work, no one would. Without them and the people they work with — the divers, fishermen, tipsters and amateur historians — many of these wrecks would stay lost forever. Without the lure of a big and romantic payoff, no one would even look.
Academics don’t drag magnetometers and side-scan sonar equipment across the seas. They don’t risk their lives, as the U-boat divers did, by removing their air tanks and corkscrewing through a labyrinth. They are not infected by the need to search, not bound to feed their families by keeping history beautiful. The treasure hunter needs to look, and that is always the way things lost forever get found.
Robert Kurson is the author of “Shadow Divers” and, most recently, "Crashing Through: A True Story of Risk, Adventure and the Man Who Dared to See."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/08/opinion/08kurson.html#
Posted by victoria at 01:14 PM
Chinese shipwreck gives up treasure
Associated Press
BEIJING - Archaeologists have discovered a sunken ship laden with Ming Dynasty porcelain after being tipped off by local police who learned that fishing boats were carrying out illegal salvage operations off the south China coast, state media reported.
The ship, dubbed the South China Sea II, was probably built during the Ming Dynasty, which lasted from 1368 to 1644, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Wednesday, citing the Guangdong Archaeology Institute.
Archaeologists used GPS earlier this month to locate the approximately 59-foot ship, which is 66 feet below the surface of the South China Sea.
Police in Nanao County of Guangdong province have confiscated more than 130 pieces of the porcelain from three fishing boats, Xinhua said. One boat owner said divers he had hired for deep-sea fishing found the pieces by accident.
Authorities stepped up monitoring and told residents not to loot the ship. On June 1, two residents turned over 124 porcelain items to police, Xinhua said.
A preliminary study showed the ship may have sunk about 400 years ago after striking a reef, Xinhua quoted Wei Jun of the Guangdong Archaeology Institute as saying.
Posted by victoria at 10:28 AM
June 14, 2007
Ship gets heritage protection
Ben Doherty
June 14, 2007
THE SS Alert, the ill-fated cargo ship that met its demise more than 100 years ago off the Victorian coast, will be preserved and protected for evermore in its watery grave.
Yesterday, The Age revealed that after nearly two years of painstaking work combing the ocean floor, a group of volunteer marine archaeologists had found the Alert, sitting beneath 80 metres of water in Bass Strait off Cape Schanck.
Now, the Victorian Government has moved to preserve the Alert permanently, affording it the highest level of heritage protection.
Disturbing, damaging or removing items from historic shipwrecks, such as the Alert, can attract a prison sentence or fines of up to $10,000 for a person, and $50,000 for a company.
Planning Minister Justin Madden said the Alert was an important part of Victoria's extensive sea history.
"I would like to congratulate the Southern Ocean Exploration team, a committed group of volunteers, for this marvellous discovery, which is yet another wonderful contribution to our maritime heritage," he said.
The SS Alert sank the night of December 28, 1893, after being caught in a ferocious storm. The ship was ill-equipped for the open water (it had been built for placid Scottish lochs) and sank without a trace.
Fifteen people went down with the ship, and only the Alert's cook, Robert Ponting, survived, by clinging to a piece of cabin door for more than 16 hours.
Until this month, the exact location of the SS Alert was not known, until Southern Ocean Exploration, led by Mark Ryan, discovered it, still largely intact.
The exact location of the wreck has been passed on to Heritage Victoria, but it will not be released publicly. At 80 metres below the surface, it is too deep for most divers to reach anyway.
The Alert is officially in Commonwealth waters. Planning Minister Justin Madden said Heritage Victoria would write to the Federal Government to recommend it be made off limits to anyone without a heritage permit.
Posted by victoria at 10:26 AM
June 11, 2007
Divers Explore USS Narcissus' Watery Grave
By STEVE KORNACKI The Tampa Tribune
Published: Jun 10, 2007
EGMONT KEY - There is little sign of the horror U.S. Navy crewmembers experienced offshore of this island on Jan. 3, 1866, when the Union Civil War tugboat the USS Narcissus ran into a shoal during a storm and exploded.
All 29 perished and were never found. However, the remains of the 115-ton tug are nestled above and beneath the ever-churning sands northwest of Egmont Key.
The vessel's shattered steam engine boiler - which burst like a bomb when the cold Gulf waters hit it - is about three miles from shore, along with its A-frame engine, drive shaft, huge propeller, double walls and other parts now covered by barnacles, sponges, algae and worms.
The tugboat graveyard, home to feeding saltwater fish for the past 141 years, now has frequent visitors wearing dive tanks, masks and wet suits. Divers from The Florida Aquarium have been studying it since last summer when the downtown Tampa aquarium received grant money from the state's Bureau of Historic Preservation.
Mike Terrell, the aquarium's dive training coordinator, is supervising the project along with contracted St. Augustine archaeologist John W. "Billy" Morris. Terrell says The Florida Aquarium plans to replicate the wreckage for display in its 93,000-gallon Shark Bay exhibit. They also hope to have it declared an underwater archaeological preserve by the state.
"There is so little Civil War history in this state," Terrell said, "and now everyone will be able to see some of it without getting wet."
For now, the privilege of perusing the boat is only for the aquarium's staff and volunteer divers. On Wednesday, a group of six ventured out to check its wreckage and another sunken vessel within a mile of it.
As the 25-foot Miss Bee Gee research boat motored past Egmont Key, Morris squinted into the rushing wind and raised his voice, saying, "Egmont looked just like that when the Narcissus went down, only the waters were much rougher. The lighthouse was there, but the light was turned out."
Confederates had turned off the lighthouse's beacon to prevent its use by Union blockade purposes. Had the light provided better guidance into Tampa Bay, would the Narcissus have missed the shoal? We'll never know.
'Damn The Torpedoes!'
The 82-foot tug, named the Mary Cook until commissioned by the Navy, took part in the Battle of Mobile Bay, where Union Adm. David Farragut exclaimed, "Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!"
The Narcissus survived that naval operation and a blockade of New Orleans, but was sunk by a Confederate torpedo - the term then for exploding mines - in Mobile Bay on Dec. 7, 1864. It went down in 15 minutes but no lives were lost. The Narcissus was raised and taken to Pensacola for repairs. It finished out the war there before departing to New York on New Year's Day 1866 for decommissioning.
Two days later, the tug exploded in one of the worst U.S. Navy disasters up to that point. Morris, who specializes in underwater ship archaeology, said he was part of a Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research crew that discovered the Narcissus in 1992. When he returned last August, Morris was surprised to find how much more of the remains had become exposed.
"The hurricanes from a couple years ago had something to do with it," Morris said, "but it was left more exposed mostly by the recent dredgings in the area. That all moved away 10 feet of sand.
"I'm fascinated by how intact the engine is. The details of it are spectacular. It was an inverted single-cylinder engine, and it fell over the port side upon the explosion. When we found this much of it preserved, I suggested we replicate it."
Photographs and precise measurements have been taken to assure the fiberglass version of the Narcissus is just like the actual wreckage.
An Accurate Depiction
The undisturbed pieces of the tug were mapped by staff divers and 10 trained volunteers who averaged 11 dives each. Morris said the remains belong to the Navy, and no excavating is allowed.
"When you are down there, you are focused on the task at hand," Morris said. "But on the way back in the boat, it hits you what you've just seen and touched."
Morris has been to the wreckage more than 50 times. He became hooked on underwater archaeology as a teenager in Wilmington, N.C., when the USS Monitor, the storied Civil War ironclad, was discovered in 1973.
"I fell in love with it and have done lots of Civil War naval archaeology," he said.
"Billy knows so much about ship construction that it's crazy," Terrell said.
Each of the dozens of dives to the Narcissus led by Morris followed the same procedures and disciplines.
After ship captain and aquarium staff diver supervisor Jason Minnear dropped anchor at the global positioning system coordinates for the Narcissus, Morris did a back roll off the research boat and dived to locate it before calling for the rest.
Other divers, each with a predetermined role in that day's plotting, took to the water with tape measures, level lines, plumb bobs, compasses, pencils and a slate covered with a special plastic paper to record details.
"These are field trips that people pay to go out on with National Geographic," said Dan Rosenthal of Tampa, a trained aquarium diving volunteer. "This is the kind of thing you read about in magazines."
Their efforts eventually will bring the Narcissus to the public with the aquarium exhibit, which Terrell says should be realized by late 2008 or in 2009. He also hopes that the site becomes the 14th shipwreck site recognized by the state as an underwater archaeological preserve.
Terrell said, "It's not skeletons hanging on the ship's wheel, the vision of shipwrecks for most people. But you go down there or see photos of the ship, and you can be told a very dramatic, very engaging story."
Posted by victoria at 11:07 AM
June 07, 2007
NOAA Stellwagen Bank Sanctuary Shipwreck Paul Palmer Listed on National Register of Historic Places
June 5, 2007 — NOAA announced that the wreck of the coal schooner Paul Palmer, which rests on the seafloor within Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the nation’s official list of cultural resources worthy of preservation. (Click NOAA image for larger view of the coal schooner Paul Palmer is pictured in this early 20th century postcard as it unloads coal. Please credit “NOAA.”)
Paul Palmer’s historical, architectural and archaeological significance contributed to its listing. In compliance with President Bush's Preserve America Executive Order, NOAA is increasing efforts to inventory, preserve and protect historic resources in the agency's care, from shipwrecks to historic buildings.
“The schooner’s involvement in the coal trade connected it to Americans throughout the East Coast,” said Stellwagen Bank sanctuary superintendent Craig MacDonald. “Coal carried in schooners like the Paul Palmer powered the industrialization of the northeastern states, one of the greatest economic and social forces in American history.”
Built in Waldoboro, Maine, the five-masted, 276-foot schooner Paul Palmer was part of William F. Palmer’s “Great White Fleet,” which at its peak consisted of 15 schooners that carried bulk cargos throughout the East Coast, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean. During its 12-year career, the schooner Paul Palmer transported 280,000 tons of coal, as well as phosphate, railroad ties, ice, and sugar.
After unloading coal in Bangor, Paul Palmer departed Rockport, Maine, for Virginia on Friday, June 13, 1913. Sailing south, the schooner caught fire off Cape Cod. Several vessels responded to the stricken schooner, but were unable to extinguish the fire. The schooner’s crew abandoned ship and was picked up by a waiting fishing boat. The Paul Palmer burned to its waterline and then sank. The Paul Palmer was the only five-masted East Coast schooner to be lost to fire. (Click NOAA image for larger view of divers examining the Paul Palmer’s windlass, a mechanical device used to raise and lower the schooner’s anchors, which lies at the shipwreck’s bow. Click here for high resolution version. Please credit “NOAA.”)
The Paul Palmer was no stranger to fire. In 1907, the schooner sustained light damage when it was nearly caught in a conflagration that consumed Baltimore’s coal docks. The following year, a fire swept across East Boston’s docks, catching the schooner’s top rigging on fire. Tugs pulled Paul Palmer away from its dock and put out the fire before flames engulfed the schooner. The fire destroyed a quarter-mile stretch of the waterfront and caused $1.6 million in property damage.
Since NOAA’s discovery of the then-unknown shipwreck in 2000, the sanctuary has investigated the site with divers, remotely operated vehicles, and autonomous underwater vehicles capturing detailed video and still imagery to document the vessel’s construction and artifacts. This research led to the schooner’s identification in 2002. The Paul Palmer’s partially buried remains lie on the flat, sandy seafloor atop Stellwagen Bank.
The schooner’s location within Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary provides protection unavailable in other federal waters off Massachusetts. Sanctuary regulations prohibit moving, removing, or injuring, or any attempt to move, remove, or injure any sanctuary historical resource, including artifacts and pieces from shipwrecks. Anyone violating this regulation is subject to civil penalties.
Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary encompasses 842 square miles of ocean, stretching between Cape Ann and Cape Cod offshore of Massachusetts. Renowned for its scenic beauty and remarkable productivity, the sanctuary is renowned as a whale watching destination and supports a rich assortment of marine life, including marine mammals, seabirds, fishes and marine invertebrates. The sanctuary’s position astride the historic shipping routes and fishing grounds for Massachusetts’ oldest ports also make it a repository for shipwrecks representing several hundred years of maritime transportation.
NOAA's National Marine Sanctuary Program seeks to increase the public awareness of America's marine resources and maritime heritage by conducting scientific research, monitoring, exploration and educational programs. Today, the sanctuary program manages 13 national marine sanctuaries and one marine national monument that together encompass more than 150,000 square miles of America's ocean and Great Lakes natural and cultural resources.
NOAA, an agency of the U.S. Commerce Department, is celebrating 200 years of science and service to the nation. From the establishment of the Survey of the Coast in 1807 by Thomas Jefferson to the formation of the Weather Bureau and the Commission of Fish and Fisheries in the 1870s, much of America's scientific heritage is rooted in NOAA.
NOAA, an agency of the U.S. Commerce Department, is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of our nation’s coastal and marine resources. Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), NOAA is working with our federal partners and 60 countries to develop a global Earth observation network that is as integrated as the planet it observes, predicts and protects.
Posted by victoria at 03:43 PM
June 04, 2007
Research continues at supposed Blackbeard shipwreck
The Associated Press
June 4, 2007 8:01 am
Ten years and $2 million have yet to result in a "smoking blunderbuss" that proves a shipwreck off the coast of Beaufort belonged to the notorious pirate Blackbeard.
But researchers say they haven't found anything among the cannons, coins, anchors, and other artifacts that rules it out.
"Ten years of archaeological and historical research all say it's the Queen Anne's Revenge," said Lindley Butler, of Wentworth, the historian on the shipwreck project.
Some state officials stop short of confirming the oldest shipwreck ever found in North Carolina waters belonged to Blackbeard. They say it's best to remain cautious because the state's reputation is on the line.
"I ... won't let them," said Jeffrey Crow, a deputy secretary of the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources. "There's a slim possibility that it could be another shipwreck."
But even if it turns out not to be the French slave ship many believe Blackbeard captured in 1717 and renamed Queen Anne's Revenge before it ran aground off Atlantic Beach a year later, the decade of research and examination have been worth the effort, said Jerry Cashion, chairman of the N.C. Historical Commission.
"This is the most important maritime wreck in North Carolina regardless of what it is," Cashion said. " ... It's a treasure trove."
The French frigate measured about 100 feet long with three masts and a crew of 150 to 200. The shipwreck, discovered in late 1996, is within sight of Fort Macon State Park in 23 feet of water.
"What you see is the ballast stone pile, large anchors and stacks of cannons," Butler said of the 3-foot-high pile of artifacts that covers an area about 20 feet by 25 feet. "I have never seen anything like that."
Scientists believe the wreck of the Queen Anne's Revenge has laid buried under the shifting sands of Beaufort Inlet.
Florida-based Intersal, a private research firm, received a state permit in 1989 to search for the QAR, the Adventure – one of Blackbeard's smaller ships, and El Salvador, a Spanish treasure ship that sank in the area in 1750.
What's believed to be the QAR was discovered by an Intersal crew on Nov. 21, 1996.
The following March, state officials announced the find and said it "may be" Blackbeard's flagship.
Archaeologists thought it would take five to six years to recover all the artifacts when they began the process in 1997. But they say a lack of money has slowed the effort. The state has spent about $1.2 million on the project with another $600,000-plus coming from grants and other private sources. Further excavation and conservation will likely cost another $1.4 million.
"As high-profile as it is, it has been indifferently funded," said Charlie Ewen, an anthropology professor at East Carolina University.
Only about 15 percent of artifacts have been recovered to date, including jewelry, dishes and thousands of other items that are being preserved and studied at a lab at East Carolina University.
Blackbeard, whose real name was widely believed to be Edward Teach or Thatch, settled in Bath and received a governor's pardon. Some experts believe he grew bored with land life and returned to piracy.
Five months after the ship thought to be Queen Anne's Revenge sank in June 1718, Blackbeard was killed by volunteers from the Royal Navy.
Divers plan to return to the site – weather permitting – later this week to recover more artifacts and, they hope, eventually remove any doubt the ship belonged to the most fearsome and famous among pirates.
"We haven't found ... the smoking blunderbuss," Crow said. "It's like a crime-scene investigation, just like 'CSI,' just like 'Law & Order.' "
But they might find that indisputable link.
"We are not going to find a license plate on it that says Blackbeard," said Steve Claggett, the state archaeologist. "These guys didn't keep diaries."
Posted by victoria at 09:44 AM
June 02, 2007
Shipwreck Treasure Swimming In Controversy
Spain Files Claim In U.S. Federal Courts
POSTED: 9:07 am EDT June 1, 2007
TAMPA, Fla. -- The Spanish government has filed claims in U.S. federal court over a shipwreck that a Florida firm found laden with Colonial-era treasure, an attorney said Thursday.
If the vessel was Spanish or was removed from that country's waters, any treasure would belong to Spain, said James Goold, an attorney representing the government.
"It's a very well established principle under Spanish, U.S. and international law that a government such as the kingdom of Spain has not abandoned its sunken ships or sunken property, and that a company like Odyssey Marine Exploration may not conduct recovery operations without authorization by the government," he said.
"The kingdom of Spain has not authorized any such operations by Odyssey, and by these legal actions it will see the return of any Spanish property Odyssey has recovered," Goold said of the claims filed Wednesday.
Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc. CEO John Morris said in a statement Thursday that "such a move was anticipated by Odyssey and is considered normal in Admiralty cases."
The company has previously said Odyssey would notify all claimants once it conclusively determined the ship's identity. Odyssey said it was not found in Spanish territorial waters.
"If there is anything Spanish involved, they want to work with the Spanish government and be certain the Spanish government is completely satisfied with the result," said Allen Von Spiegelfeld, Odyssey's attorney in Tampa. "I don't think the rights of the Spanish government would have been threatened."
The company announced two weeks ago that it had discovered a shipwreck containing 500,000 gold and silver coins somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.
The Tampa-based company said the site was outside any country's territorial waters but would not give the exact location or name of the ship.
Odyssey has said that the ship was not in Spanish territorial waters and was not the HMS Sussex, a shipwreck that Odyssey recently got permission from the Spanish government to search for in the Strait of Gibraltar.
But Spain has called the new discovery suspicious and said the booty may have come from a wrecked Spanish galleon.
In Britain, the find generated press reports that Odyssey had salvaged the wreck of the long-sought British vessel Merchant Royal, which sank in bad weather off England in 1641. Odyssey has not confirmed or denied these reports.
Spain is using the U.S. law firm Covington & Burling, which has represented Spain over shipwreck cases before, including the recovery of material from two ships, Juno and La Galga, in a 2000 court case. The Spanish government won the case at that time.
Odyssey shares closed down 20 cents, about 3 percent, to $6.60 in volatile trading Thursday. They have traded in a 52-week range of $1.52 to $9.45.
Posted by victoria at 09:45 AM
June 01, 2007
Was it the first shipwreck in Kings County, Nova Scotia?
It’s late in 1760 and several shiploads of settlers out of New England have reached Kings County to take up Acadian land and are busy settling in. In December of that year, a brigantine arrives. Sailing up the Canard River for about two miles, the brigantine docks and unloads troops and provisions for the settlers of Horton and Cornwallis.
Once offloading is completed, the brig retraces its course back down the Canard River. Unfortunately, it’s low tide. The brig strikes a sandbar, topples over, is stranded, and eventually is demolished by the high tide.
James Martell records this event in his 1933 paper on early settlements around Minas Basin, citing government records as his source of information. While this may only have been a minor catastrophe, this could qualify as the first recorded shipwreck in Kings County waters. Unfortunately, Martell doesn’t give the name of the brigantine, but maybe one of you history buffs can come up with it.
You could call it a shipwreck record of sorts and it’s mentioned by David Fairbank White in his book Bitter Ocean, the Battle of the Atlantic, 1939-1945. White writes that a Canadian steamer built in Pictou was the final merchant ship to die in the last battle of the Atlantic. This was the Avondale Park. She almost made it to harbor, White says, going down on the last day of the war.
Here’s another shipwreck, one also in Kings County, involving a ship with an unusual name. Under the heading “A Marine Mishap,” the late Leon Barron found this record in the April 26, 1889, issue of the Wolfville Acadian:
“The schnr. Sparkling Billow, Capt. L. R. Morris, left this port (Wolfville) on Tuesday evening in ballast for Cornwallis and missed her course (and) ran upon the flats on the north side of the Cornwallis River.”
As a result, the 25-ton Sparkling Billow “tipped over and split in two from stem to stern, and now lies a wreck just north of this village.” The news story concludes by informing readers that the ship “has been stripped of her sails and rigging and abandoned.”
Posted by victoria at 09:47 AM
May 28, 2007
Cuban Underwater Archeology Attracts Experts
Havana, May 25 (Prensa Latina) Museologists from 12 countries noted the high value of Cuba's underwater archeology, due to its unprecedented capacity to preserve the submerged cultural and patrimonial wealth.
Cuban expert Alessandro Lopez gave a lecture on underwater archeology at the Fourth Ibero-American Meeting of Museums and Historic Centers, which opened on Tuesday in Havana and is being attended by 167 specialists from the region.
The frigate Arrow, from which 2,000 pieces of English chinaware were recovered, and the brigantine Ines de Soto, which carried 33,000 of the first coins minted in the Americas, both from the 16th century, are examples of the wealth resting in the Caribbean's sea bottoms.
"We have 1,341 references of shipwrecks documented by historians, but just 130 have been discovered over the past 20 years, said Lopez, who has more than three decades' experiences as an archeologist.
Adverse weather conditions and constant attacks by corsairs and pirates in the Caribbean, in addition to bad sailing conditions in the 16th century, contributed to a large number of shipwrecks off Cuban coasts.
Lopez noted Cuba's non-lucrative interest in archeology, backed by prominent personalities like French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau (1910-1997), who worked with Cuban scientists for several years.
Salvage operations carried out in the 1970s by the Cuban company CARISUB were recorded in photos, films and videos by renowned filmmakers such as Fernando Perez (Havana Suite) and Rogelio Paris (Caravan).
Posted by victoria at 12:09 PM
May 25, 2007
What are the rules when you discover Pirate Treasure?
Updated May 24, 2007
By Steve Morales
The name and location of the wreck salvaged by Odyssey Marine Exploration are carefully guarded secrets.(Jonathan Blair/Associated Press)
An American company makes off with an estimated $500 million in gold and silver coins from a mystery ship code-named "Black Swan."
The Spanish government cries foul, suggesting the Americans plundered the treasure from its sovereign waters.
All that's missing is the Jolly Roger, Sir Francis Drake (Johnny Depp?), or yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum.
And now the American firm says it may partner with Disney to put its deep-sea adventures onto the big screen.
Call it Pirates of the Somewhere in the Atlantic: The Curse of the Black Swan.
Well, that may be a stretch. But this story has some elements of a high seas corsair drama.
Whose gold?
It revolves around Tampa-based Odyssey Marine Exploration, an undersea salvage and exploration firm. On May 18, Odyssey revealed details of a staggering find : some 17 tonnes of silver coins along with gold coins and artifacts recovered from a ship somewhere in the Atlantic.
Odyssey won't reveal the name or location of its find. The firm cites security concerns, but the Spanish government wonders if it's because the booty was plucked from its waters, meaning Spain is due a big part of the proceeds.
The Spanish government has cause to be suspicious.
Odyssey recently concluded negotiations with Spain and Britain to explore HMS Sussex, a British treasure ship that sank near Gibraltar, in Spanish waters, in 1694. It's believed that the Sussex sank with nearly nine tonnes of gold coins. That treasure is estimated to be worth anywhere from $500 million to $4 billion US, project officials say.
Odyssey, however, does not have permission to remove any treasure from the shipwreck.
And "finders keepers" is not the law of the sea.
Determining ownership
There are laws that govern deep-sea treasure hunting and exploration, but it's difficult to tell which ones apply in this case, since Odyssey won't reveal any information about the ship.
An important question is who owns the wreck, since that can determine whether cases like this count as treasure hunting or salvage. Salvage means the "salvor" (Odyssey, in this case) returns the found goods to the original owner in return for some reward. Treasure hunting is different. William Moreira, president of the Canadian Maritime Law Association, says that's a critical distinction.
"Treasure hunting is not necessarily salvage, because salvage is the right to be compensated by the owner where the owner is known and you're in a position to return the property to him," he says. "It may be that that's the case here, but typically in treasure hunting cases, that's not so, just because the stuff's been lost for so long that no owner could come forward.
"If this is some galleon that sank in the 15th century, then I don't think it's salvage, I think it's beyond that into treasure hunting, because the true owner simply can't exist anymore."
Location, location, location
Another vital consideration in any treasure-hunting case is whether the find lies within a country's territorial waters, a concept set out in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Most countries have a limit of 12 nautical miles (approximately 22 kilometres) from their coastlines, and if Odyssey's treasure ship ventured inside that limit, the company could forfeit its claim to the booty. Moreira says that's a standard rule.
"Usually, for this kind of case, there's a law saying that [the find] is owned by the government, so if it's in territorial waters, the law of the sea convention comes in and … the state would decide who owns and what compensation [the finder] is entitled to."
But if Odyssey made its find in Spanish waters and didn't tell the Spanish, the company won't end up with much.
The 1989 International Convention on Salvage says the salvor "may be deprived of the whole or part of the payment due … if the salvor has been guilty of fraud or other dishonest conduct."
"Dishonest conduct" isn't clearly defined, but if Odyssey unilaterally salvaged treasure from a ship in Spanish waters without consulting Madrid, that definitely counts as fraud, and Odyssey would lose its big payday.
"If one commits fraud, that is dishonesty with intention to deceive, then you become disentitled to whatever you'd otherwise be able to get," Moreira says.
But if this find lies in international waters and there's no one to claim ownership, Odyssey is probably in the clear — for now.
UNCITRAL (United Nations Commission on International Trade Law) is currently at work creating an Underwater Cultural Heritage agreement that would protect shipwrecks based on their archeological value. But the high seas are loosely regulated until that treaty is signed, sealed and delivered.
"If that treaty is not yet in force and if [Black Swan] is in international waters, I expect it's fair game for whoever can find it," says Moreira. "If someone can't say 'I'm the true owner of this,' then the diver could well be able to put it in his pocket and walk away with it.
"That's the reason for UNCITRAL's work on this, because there's a legal vacuum right now and that's the reason they think they need this treaty to regulate what goes on out there."
Treasure's origin 'dubious,' Spain says
For its part, Odyssey denies that "Black Swan" is the Sussex or any other ship that Spain could have some claim to.
"We can confirm that the 'Black Swan' is not HMS Sussex, and that the 'Black Swan' was not found in waters anywhere near the shipwreck believed to be HMS Sussex. Beyond that, we cannot confirm the identity of the shipwreck because we are not certain ourselves," reads a statement on the company's website.
But regardless of the ship's identity, Odyssey expressed confidence that Spain has no claim to the wreck or the recovered treasure.
"There was no point at which any aspect of the 'Black Swan' operation was within the jurisdiction of Spanish authorities, and we will be pleased to provide proof of that fact to the Spanish government if requested officially."
Spanish authorities have not blatantly accused Odyssey of any skulduggery, but have voiced suspicion.
"At the very least, the origin of the treasure is dubious," Spanish Culture Ministry spokeswoman Susana Tello told the Associated Press.
The Spanish have also expressed a determined stance to fight for what's theirs, provided that it is theirs.
"We will exercise all of our jurisdiction and rights in the hypothetical event that the find is part of Spain's heritage," said Spanish Culture Minister Carmen Calvo.
Odyssey sounds no less determined to keep its find.
"We do believe that most shipwrecks that we recover, including the 'Black Swan,' will likely result in claims by other parties," reads the online statement. "Many will be spurious claims, but we anticipate that there might be some legitimate ones as well. In the case of the 'Black Swan, it is the opinion of our legal counsel that even if a claim is deemed to be legitimate by the courts, Odyssey should still receive title to a significant majority of the recovered goods."
But until Odyssey reveals more about its mystery ship, the ultimate fate of the recovered fortune remains uncertain.
Posted by victoria at 03:13 PM
May 24, 2007
Spain severs relations with US company over shipwreck treasure
Madrid (dpa) - Spain has broken relations with a US treasure-hunting company it had allowed to search for a sunken British warship in the Strait of Gibraltar over suspicions that it has illegally exported a coin treasure found in Spanish waters, the daily El Pais reported Thursday.
Florida-based Odyssey Marine Exploration says the treasure was found in international waters and imported legally into the United States.
Odyssey had been authorized to search for the British warship HMS Sussex, which sank in 1694. The Spanish government says the company did not have permission to extract any objects on board.
Instead, Odyssey announced the discovery of another shipwreck which contained more than 500,000 silver and gold coins. The treasure is estimated to be worth half a billion dollars (370 million euros).
Spain feels the company has not given sufficient information about the operation, and suspects the wreck could be Spanish or in Spanish waters, in which case Madrid could claim the treasure.
Odyssey says it does not yet know the nationality of the wreck.
The government was investigating all the movements of Odyssey's two vessels over the past 20 days, Culture Minister Carmen Calvo said. The ministry has also requested information from the United States and Britain about an alleged Odyssey flight from Gibraltar and its cargo.
Spain has cancelled the permission to Odyssey to search for the Sussex, and does not intend to cooperate with the company again, the report said.
The search for the Sussex was based on an agreement between the US company and the British government, which would have allowed Odyssey to keep a part of the treasure of gold coins believed to be on board.
An estimated 400 shipwrecks lie in the Strait of Gibraltar alone, and Spain is wary of treasure-hunters who could loot them for commercial purposes.
Odyssey accused Spain of contradictory behaviour, saying the Spanish authorities had not even contacted the company, nor sent Spanish archaeologists to watch over the search for the Sussex as had been agreed.
Posted by victoria at 10:10 AM
UN body adopts new shipwreck rules
Thursday, 24 May 2007 10:05
The International Maritime Organisation, the United Nations agency responsible for safety and security at sea, has adopted the first-ever set of international rules for the removal of shipwrecks.
The new rules provide strong powers to act, with no legal responsibility relating to the removal of wrecks or the goods carried.
They were agreed at a five-day meeting held in Nairobi, and represents the first sweeping set of rules of its kind and which each country will sign into law.
Ireland is a member of the organisation and up to now Government's around the world have faced complex legal difficulties ín dealing with vessels wrecked on their coastlines.
According to the IMO there are an estimated 1300 potentially hazardous shipwrecks on coastlines around the world, which have been abandoned by owners trying to avoid responsibility for removing them.
This does not include listed historic or protected wrecks but are more recent shipping casualties causing environmental pollution, or threatening the safe navigation of other shipping.
The Secretary-General of the IMO, Efthimios Mitropoulos, said coastal States had been pressing for strong international laws to deal with abandoned shipwrecks and the legal framework had now been provided.
Story from RTÉ News
Posted by victoria at 10:08 AM
May 23, 2007
Recovering Artifacts From 200-year-old Shipwreck, Deep In Gulf Of Mexico
A team of Texas A&M University researchers will soon be recovering artifacts from a 200-year-old shipwreck that lies more than 4,000 feet beneath the Gulf of Mexico, making it the deepest such recovery effort ever attempted in the gulf.
The $4.8 million project, funded by the Okeanos Gas Gathering Company, will begin today (May 22) says William Bryant, professor of oceanography, and Donny Hamilton, professor of anthropology at Texas A&M. Peter Hitchcock, a doctoral student and team leader of the project, says the vessel could be one of the most historically significant shipwrecks found in the gulf.
The recovery effort is named the "Mardi Gras Shipwreck Project" after a gas pipeline in the area. While the work has been an ongoing effort for the researchers over the past two years, the fieldwork phase of the project is just beginning as the team prepares to work southwest of the Louisiana coast where the Mississippi River flows into the gulf.
Ten researchers from Texas A&M and its Department of Oceanography and Center for Maritime Archaeology will participate in the effort, as well as members of the Minerals Management Service, a division of the Department of the Interior. The group anticipates the fieldwork to be completed in about a month and an announcement of their findings could come in late June.
"This will be the first academic excavation of a deepwater shipwreck in the Gulf of Mexico," Bryant explains. "The waters are much too deep for human diving, so we use remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) to retrieve objects we find. We want to stress that at this time we are focusing our efforts on retrieving items and artifacts visible on the surface, and do not plan to excavate the entire hull."
The vessel's identity and origin remain a mystery, Hitchcock adds.
Based on analysis of video documentation from previous visits to the site, the artifacts scattered on the seafloor suggest it was likely from the late 1700s or early 1800s, he notes.
"We can see a cannon, a box of weapons, navigational instruments, plates and bottles, but there really is no way to tell what else is down there," he adds.
Ultimately, the team hopes the fieldwork and conservation that follows will answer the questions surrounding the ship and provide a better understanding of its historical context.
The project will be extensively recorded and a documentary film about it is planned, the organizers say.
The team has contracted with a private firm to use the recovery ship Toisa Vigilant leased by Veolia Environmental Services. Once the artifacts are recovered and conserved at the Conservation Research Laboratory at Texas A&M, they will be delivered to the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism. Eventually, many of the objects will be displayed by the Louisiana State Museum.
"This is an exciting time for us, but also very challenging," adds Bryant, who has conducted such underwater efforts for more than 40 years.
"At this depth, the pressure is about 1,700 pounds per cubic inch. The next few weeks are going to be interesting, to say the least."
Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by Texas A&M University.
A website hosted by the Florida Public Archaeology Network will provide