Do fundo do mar... Sea bottom

Danton wreck found in deep water

2009-02-19T11:59:00.003Z

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BBC
By Jonathan Amos
February 19, 2009

A French battleship sunk in 1917 by a German submarine has been discovered in remarkable condition on the floor of the Mediterranean Sea.

The Danton, with many of its gun turrets still intact, is sitting upright in over 1,000m of water.

It was found by the Fugro geosciences company during a survey for a gas pipeline between Algeria and Italy.

The Danton, which sank with 296 sailors still onboard, lies 35km southwest of the island of Corsica.

Naval historians record that the Danton's Captain Delage stood on the bridge with his officers and made no attempt to leave the ship as it went down.

The French government is now keen to see that the site is protected.

"Its condition is extraordinary," said Rob Hawkins, project director with Fugro GeoConsulting Limited.

"After it was hit by the torpedoes, the Danton clearly turned turtle and rotated several times. You can see where it dropped some infrastructure on the way down and then impacted on the seabed.

"You can see where it slid along the seabed before coming to a rest," he told BBC News.

A comparison with the original plans for the battleship - in particular, the position of its 240mm guns - confirms the wreck's identity.

The final resting place is a few kilometres from where people have traditionally thought the ship met its end.

"The French Admiralty did argue with us for a while that it should have been several nautical miles away, but we reminded them that modern GPS methods are more accurate than the sextants they used in those days," said Mr Hawkins.

Details of the discovery were released on Thursday at a press conference at the Museum of Science and Technology in Milan.

The pipeline is being built by the Galsi (Gasdotto Algeria Sardegna Italia) consortium and will be the deepest underwater conduit for gas ever constructed when it becomes operational in 2012.

Finding a safe route for it was extremely challenging, said Mr Hawkins.

About 20% of the course lies on the abyssal plain in water depths of about 2,850m. There are also steep descents from the continental shelf.

Fugro deployed its Autonomous Underwater Vehicle to gather bathymetric (depth) and geophysical data.

It also used Remotely Operated Vehicles to make more detailed surveys of particular locations, such as where sediment conditions were uncertain or the route crossed known submarine telecommunications cables.

The discovery of the Danton, named after the French revolutionary Georges Danton, requires the gas feed must take a slight detour to avoid the war grave.

The ship was one of the most advanced in the French Navy at the time of its loss, although it was already outclassed by the newer HMS Dreadnought design being introduced by the British.

The 19,000-tonne, 150m-long vessel was carrying over 1,000 men when it was attacked by Germany's U-64 submarine at 1317 on 18 March, 1917. Patrol boats and a destroyer managed to save most of those onboard.

The Danton was travelling between Toulon and Corfu, where it was due to meet up with other vessels in the French fleet. Many of those making the trip were actually crewmembers for the other ships at Corfu.

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Ships, Saints and Sealore:Maritime Ethnography of the Mediterranean and the Red Sea Conference

2009-01-27T15:32:00.001Z

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Ships, Saints and Sealore:Maritime Ethnography of the Mediterranean and the Red Sea Conference

Thursday, 16th April to Sunday, 19th April 2009

Convenors:
Dr Timmy Gambin (Malta)
Professor Dionisius A. Agius (Exeter)

Keynote Speakers:
Professor Cheryl Ward, maritime archaeologist, Florida State University

Professor Seán McGrail, maritime archaeologist, formerly of the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich and University of Oxford

To register your interest write to: tgambin@hotmail.com and to: D.A.Agius@exeter.ac.uk

For further information visit conference website:
http://www.um.edu.mt/events/maritimethnography2009/maritimeconf_index.html

Sponsored by The National Maritime Museum of Malta, the Centre for Maritime Historical Studies, University of Exeter and the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, University of Exeter. Supported by the Aurora Special Purpose Trust and Midsea Books.

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Chinese Junk Preservation Group Continues Efforts to Rescue Historic Vessel from Extinction

2009-01-27T14:14:00.002Z

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MUA
By Dione Chen

Schematic of the Free China.(Photo courtesy of Chinese Junk Preservation).

Efforts continue to save the Free China, a historic Chinese junk that was slated for destruction on Dec. 31, 2008, but begins 2009 with a tenuous extension of life.

The authentic junk is possibly the oldest Chinese wooden sailing vessel of operable condition in existence, and the last of its kind. However, the current owner—a boatyard owner in the Sacramento delta—has said that he would destroy the junk unless a new home was found by year end.

Chinese Junk Preservation is a small group of volunteers comprised of maritime experts, historians, members of the Chinese American community and friends and family of the crew that sailed the junk across the Pacific Ocean in 1955. The group hopes to beat the odds by finding a home for the junk in which it will have a public life contributing to awareness and interest in maritime, Chinese and American culture and history and immigration.

With the Dec. 31 deadline for destruction fast-approaching, the group negotiated a 3-month extension for continued temporary storage of the junk. This extension—granted at a cost to the preservation group, which has raised only minimal funds—is only a temporary lease on life, and so the group continues efforts to raise awareness and funds to save the junk.

Encouraged by interest in a recent MUA article as well as a December ’09 Associated Press article that was picked up by over 200 media (tv, radio, online and print newspapers) worldwide, the group hopes that the extension will “buy time” to find a new interim home for the remainder of the year, and, importantly, secure a long-term home and preservation plan.

Rather than abandon its efforts, the group has developed a pragmatic 1-year strategy to save the junk. The group needs to raise an estimated $50,000 within the next two months—no easy task, especially in this economy.

These funds would be used to undertake only the most essential steps to saving the junk:

Pay for interim storage of the junk in the San Francisco Bay Area, and transportation to the new location, while the group continues efforts to secure a long-term home for the junk. Provide for physical protection of the vessel from the damaging effects of weather.

Commission a professional survey and documentation of the junk’s construction and original and current (altered) condition. This study is vital in order to ensure that detailed knowledge of the vessel’s construction will be available in the future. This information is necessary to ascertain restoration requirements if the junk is saved, and all the more important to archiving the knowledge if the junk cannot be saved. Although John Muir, curator at the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, will volunteer his time, and is looking to recruit other volunteers, the work is time-consuming and requires specialized knowledge—hence the need to procure professional assistance.

Collect and save the rich array of documentation, photos, news clippings, and film that exist—but need to be preserved as they are currently vulnerable to deterioration. These items are vital to “telling the story” of the junk and its transpacific voyage, and to providing the historical background of the junk, i.e. what is special about this junk, and why it has attracted the interest and support of people throughout its century-long life.

Chinese Junk Preservation seeks assistance in the following areas:

- Identification of an interim and long-term home for the junk: There is an immediate need for an interim home located in the San Francisco Bay Area. The junk would be transported by water from its current location in the Sacramento delta to a new location, where it would be lifted by crane onto land, where it can be protected and surveyed pending identification of a long-term home. There is also the need for a long-term home—and a sponsor/organization that would become the new owners of the junk. The group hopes that by generating awareness of the preservation initiative, a home and sponsor for the junk may be found.

- Fundraising: The Chinese Junk Preservation group has operated on a shoestring budget, volunteers and members’ personal funds, but needs to raise an estimated $50,000 to implement its 1-year strategy to give the junk a last chance at survival. Tax-deductible donations can be made to the group via its fiscal sponsor, the Chinese Historical Society of America (www.chsa.org), which is the largest and oldest Chinese American historical society in the U.S. Information on how to donate can be found at the group’s website www.chinesejunkpreservation.com. The group also seeks an experienced fundraiser to lead fundraising efforts, and volunteers to assist with outreach.

- Professional survey/documentation: The group is seeking professional assistance in surveying and documenting the junk’s construction and condition. The work is time-consuming and specialized. Ideally, the services could be secured on a pro bono or discounted basis, as the group will need to raise funds for these expenses.
Outreach: Chinese Junk Preservation welcomes interest and support in this preservation project. To find out more, help spread the word about efforts, or to make a donation, please visit www.chinesejunkpreservation.com.

About Author: Dione Chen established Chinese Junk Preservation and is spearheading efforts to preserve the Free China vessel and the story of its transpacific voyage. She is the daughter of the late Reno Chen, who was one of the Free China crew.

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Curso Livre de Arqueologia Naval. Inscrições Abertas

2009-01-25T14:34:00.000Z

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Janury 25, 2009

À semelhança de anos anteriores o CIDMar/Ual vai realizar no ano de 2009 o
Curso Livre de Arqueologia Naval, organizado por módulos independentes, o
que permitirá aos interessados escolher os módulos que desejam frequentar,
segundo as suas necessidades ou preferências.

Este Curso Livre destina-se a todos os que, independentemente do seu grau
académico, se interessam pela temática do Navio em Madeira e à Vela, nas
suas diferentes vertentes, nomeadamente, a sua História e Evolução nas
diferentes épocas, a sua Construção (Tratados e Técnicas de Construção nos
Séc. XVI e XVIII) ou a vertente das Embarcações Tradicionais e a Arqueologia
Subaquática.

Contactos:

Centro de Investigação e Desenvolvimento do Mar, Universidade Autónoma de
Lisboa

Rua de Santa Marta
47. 5.ºandar
1169-023 Lisboa

Tel. 213177619

Call Center: 800 291 291

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UAL lança Mestrado em História da Náutica e Arqueologia Naval

2009-01-12T18:23:00.002Z

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CiênciaPT
By Vanessa Ribeiro
December 05, 2008

A Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa (UAL) anuncia o lançamento do Mestrado em História da Náutica e Arqueologia Naval, que irá decorrer a partir de Janeiro de 2009. Este ciclo de estudos, inserido no processo de Bolonha, tem como objectivo ministrar uma formação avançada nos domínios da História da Náutica e Arqueologia Naval, assim como promover o seu desenvolvimento e investigação.

Sob a direcção Cientifica do Prof. Dr. Adolfo António da Silveira Martins e do Prof. Mestre Cmd. José Manuel Malhão Pereira, o mestrado encontra-se estruturado em módulos que permitem uma formação especializada em História da Náutica, do Comércio Marítimo, Cartografia e Arqueologia do Navio.

Deste modo, os alunos podem aprofundar os seus conhecimentos nas áreas de História da Náutica e da Arqueologia Naval, especializando as suas competências no exercício das suas actividades profissionais e de investigação. Poderão ainda conhecer em profundidade, o estudo das técnicas náuticas e da sua interacção com as rotas marítimas oceânicas do Atlântico, Índico e Pacifico Oeste; incrementar conhecimentos nos domínios da Meteorologia Náutica, Astronomia de Posição, Navegação Estimada e Costeira; conhecer, manusear instrumentos náuticos e efectuar experiências de observação de astros, comparando resultados; desenvolver conhecimentos sobre a História da Cartografia Náutica, conhecer a História do Navio e da sua evolução tecnológica; aprofundar conhecimentos sobre modelos e processos de construção naval em madeira.

O Mestrado em História da Náutica e Arqueologia Naval terá a duração de dois anos, em horário pós-laboral, com uma estrutura divida em duas fases: a primeira parte será curricular e a segunda destinada à apresentação de uma dissertação original. O grau Mestre apenas será conferido após a aprovação nas disciplinas curriculares e na dissertação.

As candidaturas já estão abertas e a selecção dos candidatos será efectuada pela Comissão Coordenadora do Mestrado, tendo por base vários critérios, dos quais se salientam as classificação da licenciatura, a relevância do curriculum académico, científico e técnico e da sua experiência profissional. Os candidatos podem ainda ser submetidos a uma entrevista, sempre que tal se justifique.

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Maritime Texas Blog

2009-01-01T14:47:00.000Z

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January 01, 2009

We're pleased to announce the creation of Maritime Texas (http://www.maritimetexas.net/), an interdisciplinary blog devoted to Texas maritime history and archaeology. Regular contributors include both professional and avocational researchers with backgrounds in history, anthropology/archaeology and other areas. Guest contributors are welcomed, as well.

Over time, the authors hope to include a range of contents including historical vignettes, <>today-in-history, book reviews, adventures/misadventures in research, field project updates, info on museums/exhibits, inland navigation, maritime photos, historic charts, travel opportunities/reports, unusual/interesting artifacts, interviews, research/fieldwork tips/tricks, or unusual stories or odd connections between seemingly unrelated events. And maybe a few current events as well.

Above all, the hope is that this new blog will provide opportunities for discussion, collaboration, and maybe some fun along the way.

Please visit Maritime Texas and subscribe the RSS feed (upper right on the page).

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Mayor of Buenos Aires prays for gold as archaeologists raise Spanish vessel found while building apartment blockGiles Tremlett guardian.co.uk, Wednesd

2008-12-31T14:39:00.000Z

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Guardian
By Giles Tremlett
December 31, 2008

Mayor of Buenos Aires prays for gold as archaeologists raise Spanish vessel found while building apartment block.

Archaeologist Marcelo Norman Waissell holds a cannonball near two cannon of a Spanish galleon found while excavating a Buenos Aires building site. Photograph: Marcos Brindicci/REUTERS

Construction workers excavating the foundations of a luxury apartment block overlooking the river Plate in Buenos Aires may have dug up something far more valuable than what they are building.

The workmen uncovered the well-preserved remains of a 17th-century Spanish galleon, one of thousands that carried goods across the Atlantic when Argentina was a Spanish colony.

Eight metres of silt had covered and conserved the galleon in the 300 years since it sank or was abandoned by colonists.

At that time the exclusive Puerto Madero neighbourhood of the Argentinian capital was just a beach on the shores of the Plate. "The galleon was buried under Puerto Madero, in the sedimentation of a beach where many ships used to arrive centuries ago," explained city hall officials.

Five large cannons and a cannonball were among the first objects found by archaeologists who joined the workmen to excavate the site properly.

Speculation that the galleon may be carrying treasure is rife in Buenos Aires, with even the mayor, Mauricio Macri, praying for a find. "I hope there is a great treasure trove on board," he joked. "That way we can pay for many more public works."

So far, however, the only objects dug up apart from the cannons are ropes and old jars of olive oil. The galleon appears to have sunk as it was trying to reach the port at Buenos Aires.

"We feel it must be Spanish because we have not found signs of anything English," one archaeologist, Marcelo Weissel, told La Nación newspaper. "Our hypothesis is that it is from the end of the 17th or the beginning of the 18th century because we have not found any glass recipients which started appearing from Holland around 1720." Carbon dating would eventually give a better idea of when the vessel went down, he said.

Mayor Macri ruled out handing over the galleon's contents to Spain, saying that it belonged to the people of Buenos Aires.

Hernan Lombardi, the head of the city's culture department, said the find was unique and city archeologists planned to raise the whole ship, which would later be opened to the public.

"Now is the time to get down to some careful work," he said.

Development in the Puerto Moreno district began a decade ago. A complex of apartments, shop and offices is due to go up on the site where the galleon was found.

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Historic Chinese boat may be junked

2008-12-15T14:30:00.000Z

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Bnet

By Juliana Barbassa
December 15, 2008

SAN FRANCISCO -- Half a century ago, six men with no sailing experience climbed aboard an aging Chinese junk in Taiwan and survived a typhoon that nearly wrecked the little ship. But after sailing nearly 7,000 miles across the Pacific, they were greeted by cheering crowds as they sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge.

Now that turn-of-the-century junk, which experts say may be the last salvageable vessel of its type, could be destroyed if it does not find a permanent home by the end of December.

With it would go a piece of U.S. and Chinese history -- the boat's name, the "Free China," evokes Cold War rhetoric. But the ship also holds the unwritten knowledge of traditional Chinese boatbuilding, said Hans Van Tilburg, a historian with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

"It's a rare document, a rare record of hundreds, maybe thousands of years of seafaring tradition," said Van Tilburg, who has written about the "Free China" in his book, "Chinese Junks on the Pacific." "This was never recorded. It was always an art, a skill passed down in families."

The junk is sitting in a Sacramento River Delta boatyard -- abandoned by the last of a series of volunteer caretakers after he fell behind on storage payments. And the boat yard owner has given notice that it must be removed.

The hull has integrity; the curved wooden planks bent over fire by craftsmen on China's Fujian coast are still true. But the painted eels and phoenixes that brought luck are long gone, as are the mast and the battened sails. A 13-foot section of hull was hacked off the stern so the boat would take less room in storage.

But to Dione Chen, the aging hulk evokes the stories her father, Reno Chia-Lin Chen, told about his 112-day trip from Taiwan in 1955.

He was one of five Chinese middle-class professionals who fled their homeland's communist revolution and wound up as commercial fishermen in Taiwan. The dangerous work held no future, so one of them, Paul Chow, seized upon a newspaper item about a yacht race from the U.S. to Sweden; they sent in an application to enter the contest and somehow were accepted.

"There was never going to be any other way to come to America," said Dione Chen. "There was never going to be any sponsor, any money, any job, any relative to help."

The young men had no boat, so they sold what they had -- even bikes and typewriters -- to raise money. The governor of Taiwan offered to purchase an aging junk if they would name it the "Free China," advertising Taiwan's dispute with the communist People's Republic of China.

When they applied at the American Consulate for U.S. visas, Vice Consul Calvin Mehlert -- also in his 20s -- not only granted them the papers but asked for a place on board for an adventure of a lifetime, even if it wasn't well-planned.

"I thought 'This isn't a big deal, the winds blow in that direction,"' said Mehlert, now 80. "I knew I'd never get another chance like this."

After a failed launch attempt damaged the boat, delaying their departure from Keelung harbor, a typhoon off Okinawa destroyed the junk's rigging and forced weeks of repair in Yokohama.

They had hoped to sail through the Panama Canal to join the trans- Atlantic race in July, but the delays made that impossible. The junk never left San Francisco.

And yet, the trip across the Pacific went smoothly. They even kept two chickens; photos and movies shot by Mehlert show the crew feeding the birds -- and turning one into dinner on Paul Chow's birthday.

Arriving in San Francisco, they were feted with invitations, a television appearance and a historic marker.

Chow eventually became a physics professor at California State University, Northridge, and Chen an engineer. Mehlert returned to Taiwan and served as an interpreter during President Nixon's 1972 visit.

The junk did not fare as well, said Dione Chen. "Many people were passionate about it, fell in love with it, but it never had a permanent caretaker," she said.

After Reno Chen died in Sept. 2007, Dione Chen took her children to see the junk and was moved by the sight. "It struck me that this is a unique vessel, that tells a bigger story -- of immigration, of the Chinese community, of my own family," she said. "I was on the hook. I started doing everything I could to save it."

She reached out to the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, where curator John Muir recognized the 65-foot vessel's rarity.

"It's a basically extinct vessel type," Muir said. "It's very likely one of the last remaining original vessels of this type."

However, the maritime park run by the National Park Service cannot afford to take in the vessel, Muir said.

"We're all sailors, and in the dream scenario, someone could get it to sail again," he said. "But that's a tall order."

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SS City of Launceston (1863 - 1865)

2008-12-11T14:52:00.000Z

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Heritage Victoria
December 11, 2008

City of Launceston (1863 - 1865) was a 368 ton Clyde-built steamship from the small Scottish shipbuilding yard of Blackwood and Gordon. Built to order for the fledgling Launceston and Melbourne Steam Navigation Company. Its early role in colonial steam shipping was the forerunner of the modern Bass Strait ferry service between Tasmania and Victoria.

For two years, and without incident, City of Launceston carried passengers (it could accommodate 188), the Royal Mail and cargo across the Strait. On November 19, 1865, the vessel was under the command of Captain Thom. Within two hours of its 7.20pm departure from Melbourne to Launceston the ship was involved in a collision with the inbound Penola from Adelaide.

The 25 passengers and 24 crew were rescued by Penola before City of Launceston sank by the stern. In the following months attempts were made to salvage the vessel using lifting chains. As a last attempt the newly patented Maquay's lifting devices were unsuccessfully deployed and left on the wreck.

According to the Argus of September 26, 1866, the Maquay lifting devices consisted of a canvas bag with a cubic capacity of 5.75 ft, and an iron cylinder weighing three hundred weight (132kg) which were kept in their places by a light wooden frame. The cylinder contained zinc cuttings which were half filled with water, while a bottle of sulphuric acid was introduced and arranged so that by pulling a line from the surface it could be broken. When the acid came in contact with the zinc and water, hydrogen gas was evolved which flowed through a tube into the bag giving it enormous lifting power. Seventeen iron cylinders have been located on the wreck.

Found in 1980 by Maritime Archaeology Association of Victoria members Terry Arnott and Barrie Heard, and fisherman Bill Cull. City of Launceston became the first wreck to be listed and protected under the Historic Shipwrecks Act 1981 (Vic) (now amended and incorporated into the Victorian Heritage Act 1995).

Intact from the keel to the deck and sitting upright in a silty seabed in 21 metres of water, the shipwreck has been the subject of intensive archaeological investigations since 1997, with funding provided by the Heritage Council. A national team of maritime archaeological and conservation experts under the direction of Heritage Victoria's Maritime Heritage Unit has conducted a deck and silt survey, trial excavation, stabilisation and a full corrosion assessment of the ship's hull.

Fieldwork in March 1999 recorded the lines of the vessel. Shipbuilding plans for City of Launceston have not survived, however the lines will allow a model to be built which will accurately reflect the vessel's hull shape.

Tremendous significance

City of Launceston has tremendous archaeological and scientific significance. The vessel is representative of a period in the steam trade and it was part of the flourish of activity stimulated by the Australian colonies forging strong independent identities. City of Launceston site is unique because of the extent of its structural integrity, and the substantial archaeological deposits it contains. It is the only steamship in Victoria (and possibly Australia) to have survived with such a degree of cohesion.

Silts in the Sight Glass: Protectors and Raiders of the SS City of Launceston (1865) containing the results of all research and site surveys to date (2000) has been published by the Heritage Council.

There are no ship's plans for this unusual ship whose owners made steerage accommodation as appealing as first class. Through the work of Heritage Victoria's Maritime Heritage Unit, unique information about passenger travel in the 1860s - the quality of cabin and saloon facilities, personal space and catering arrangements for voyages and across Bass Strait - will come to light.

Trial Public Access Program 2006

City of Launceston is a very important link to colonial Victoria, sharing stories of life in 1860s Melbourne through the interpretation of the preserved archaeological relics found on the site. It also holds a special place for maritime heritage enthusiasts and researchers as it was the driving force behind the Victorian Government’s decision to introduce laws to protect shipwreck sites in this state.

For over 20 years City of Launceston was off-limits to Victoria’s recreational diving community. A protected zone has been in force on the site since 1982 – prohibiting access to the area without a permit. The Heritage Council of Victoria funded several seasons of maritime archaeology fieldwork on the site so that archaeologists could to learn about the preservation of the site and about life aboard a luxury 19th century passenger vessel. More than 400 artefacts were excavated from the site, and data was gathered to learn how the ship was built, how the ship has been transformed into an archaeological site, and how it is deteriorating. Artefacts can be viewed by searching the Heritage Victoria's Flickr webpage.

In 2004 Heritage Victoria began investigating how the site might be opened to allow divers to experience this special place. After much community consultation, a Trial Access Program was commenced in March 2006, and ran for three months. Despite many windy days, almost 150 divers accessed the site during the trial period.

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Alexandria Centre for Maritime Archaeology & Underwater Cultural Heritage

2008-11-24T15:10:00.000Z

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On the 23rd of October 2008, the Alexandria University - Egypt announced the
inauguration of the Alexandria Centre for Maritime Archaeology & Underwater
Cultural Heritage. The Centre is the first of its kind in the Arab Region
dedicated to providing education and training at a postgraduate level in
aspects of Maritime and Underwater Archaeology.

The creation of the Centre is funded through a grant from the Trans-European
mobility scheme for university studies (Tempus), as well as a number of
corporations and private donors.

The establishment of the Centre is a collaborative project between eight
consortium members from the EU and Egypt fronted by the University of
Southampton – UK. In addition to the Alexandria University, the consortium
includes the Nautical Archaeology Society – UK, the Arab Academy for
Science, Technology and Maritime Transport - Egypt, the Supreme Council for
Antiquities – Egypt, the Centre for Alexandrian Studies – France, the
University of Ulster – UK and the Université de Provence – France.

Collectively the consortium members provide the necessary academic,
technical and administrative expertise required for the achievement of the
centre's objectives.

The Centre offers a postgraduate Diploma and Master of Arts degrees in
Maritime Archaeology and Underwater Cultural Heritage, which aims to provide
graduates from different backgrounds with a sound theoretical and
methodological foundation in the investigation, interpretation and
management of the maritime and underwater archaeological resource within its
wider context.

For more information please contact:

Alexandria Centre for Maritime Archaeology & Underwater Cultural Heritage
Faculty of Art
Alexandria University
Hussein Sobhi Street, El-Shatbi 21526
Alexandria
Egypt

Phone: +2 010 520 3650

Fax: +203 4810 599

E-mail: centreformaritimearchaeology@gmail.com

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O tesouro mais bem guardado do mundo

2008-11-10T15:14:00.000Z

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Público
By Ana Machad0
November 10, 2008

Durante 32 dias, Francisco Alves, arqueólogo, especialista em arqueologia
náutica e submarina, esteve na Sperrgebiet, a "terra proibida", a zona de
exploração diamantífera da costa atlântica de Oranjemund, na Namíbia. O
arqueólogo andou a recolher aquela que classifica como " a maior descoberta
arqueológica da África subsaariana". Uma nau portuguesa, carregada de moedas
de ouro, lingotes de cobre, presas de marfim. Ficou ali durante 500 anos, no
areal da Namíbia, destroçada após um naufrágio. Para agora se revelar. Por
Ana Machado

Pode não ser a nau que transportava Bartolomeu Dias, que naufragou em 1500.
Mas decerto é uma nau portuguesa, da rota das Índias, ou melhor, o que resta
dela após um violento naufrágio. Seguia para oriente numa data não muito
distante de 1500. Mas posterior.

Fustigada pelos musculados braços do monstro Adamastor, senhor das correntes
do Cabo, a embarcação foi esventrada pelas ondas e empurrada para a costa da
Namíbia, deixando no caminho um rasto de carga, de ossos e destroços de
navio. Tudo morreu na praia. E por lá ficou ao longo de cinco séculos.

A descoberta desta embarcação naufragada há 500 anos está a fascinar a
arqueologia náutica mundial. Em Abril passado um funcionário da Namdeb, o
consórcio do Governo da Namíbia com a multinacional de exploração
diamantífera DeBeers - que faz a exploração da região -, encontrou uma pedra
estranha enquanto extraía as preciosas pedras brilhantes das areias da
Sperrgebiet, "terra proibida". Um canhão empedernido foi a primeira peça a
revelar-se. Depois vieram mais, muitas mais.

Duas mil moedas cunhadas pelas coroas espanhola e portuguesa, 20 toneladas
de lingotes de cobre e estanho, semi-esféricos, mas também de outras formas,
algumas estranhas, cravados com o tridente dos banqueiros alemães Fugger,
que forneciam de metal a coroa Portuguesa. E ainda dezenas de presas de
marfim africano, instrumentos científicos, baixelas de estanho e restos de
candelabros, espadas, restos de ossos humanos (pelo menos uma costela e
parte de uma bacia) e até restos de chinelos em couro. Um espólio típico de
um navio que vai para o oriente, dizem os especialistas.

Isto para além de peças da estrutura do navio, de tamanho colossal, que
começaram a aparecer por todo o lado ao longo dos cerca de 600 metros
quadrados, na mina U60 da Sperrgebiet.

O local da escavação é um pedaço de terra roubado ao Atlântico, resguardado
do mar por uma parede artificial de areia com seis metros de altura. Um
carreiro de camiões encarregou-se de alimentar a muralha constantemente, ao
longo dos 32 dias de trabalhos. Só 1700 euros diários eram necessários para
esta operação, totalmente financiada pela NamDeeb. Para cá dessa parede, e
depois da água e areia aspirada (e cuidadosamente filtrada para revelar
diamantes), os achados quinhentistas foram expostos.

Numa primeira fase os trabalhos foram coordenados pelo arqueólogo
sul-africano Dieter Noli, especialista na área da Sperrgebiet. Mas era
necessária a participação de uma equipa que soubesse lidar com a raridade em
causa: uma nau quinhentista. Foi então que o nome de Francisco Alves surgiu.
A única nau quinhentista, da rota das Índias, descoberta e estudada até
hoje, a Nossa Senhora dos Mártires, em 1998, na barra do rio Tejo, foi um
trabalho da sua equipa, do Centro de Arqueologia Náutica e Subaquática, o
CNAS.

A equipa portuguesa

"É o achado mais importante encontrado da África subsariana, pelo menos dos
estudados por arqueólogos, exceptuando talvez a fragata de Santo António de
Tana, de final do século XVII, escavada em Mombaça no final dos anos 70,
estava a arqueologia náutica portuguesa a nascer. Não falo de pilhagens,
claro", defende Francisco Alves que reconhece o esforço do Governo da
Namíbia em resistir a "caçadores de tesouros" que assediaram as autoridades
na esperança de chegar ao achado.

Para além de Francisco Alves e Miguel Aleluia, do CNAS e de um grupo de
investigadores espanhóis indicados pelo Ministério da Cultura do país
vizinho e do Museu de Arqueologia Subaquática de Cartagena, a equipa era
ainda formada por um grupo de especialistas da Universidade de Texas A&M,
uma das melhores instituições de investigação do mundo em arqueologia
náutica, representada pela equipa do também português Filipe Vieira de
Castro. Este último também tinha participado, com Francisco Alves, nos
trabalhos da Nossa Senhora dos Martíres. Mas a participação desta equipa de
excelência, que se encarregaria agora da investigação ao pormenor e da
conservação dos achados, parece ser incerta.

"A única parte do projecto em que nós poderíamos adicionar algum
conhecimento era na conservação das concreções metálicas porque o nosso
laboratório aqui tem capacidade para radiografar e reconstruir objectos há
muito desaparecidos, mas cujos moldes ficaram preservados nas concreções,
juntamente com pólenes e traços ínfimos de exosqueletos de insectos. Mas
para isso era preciso que os governos, português e da Namíbia, nos deixassem
trazer as concreções para o Texas. E como os representantes de ambos os
países colocaram reticências a este respeito, nós não pensámos mais nisso",
adiantou ao P2 Filipe Castro.

Francisco Alves também afirma não saber nada sobre os planos para o futuro
da investigação: "Os trabalhos preliminares são muito importantes. Muitas
vezes precisamos de instrumentos de dentista. Mas tem de haver um trabalho
de equipa", diz Francisco Alves sobre uma autêntica investigação digna da
famosa série CSI. O que se passou na Sperrgebiet foi uma verdadeira
investigação forense que levou a que conseguisse fazer o levantamento de
tudo aquilo que era recuperável nos 600 metros quadrados de achados disperso
pela mina U60.

A primeira moeda de ouro

Mas a etapa seguinte não é menos importante: "Todos os pormenores surgem
agora na leitura destes vestígios delicadíssimos retirados do seu contexto.
A construção de uma embarcação tem vestígios arquitecturais, sinais
inscritos na madeira, nos quais a náutica portuguesa é muito rica", diz o
arqueólogo sobre o que agora se seguirá, uma espécie de montagem de um
puzzle muito incompleto.

Nos 32 dias passados na "terra proibida" Francisco Alves e Miguel Aleluia
conseguiram recuperar tudo o que era possível. "As surpresas eram diárias.
Temos mais de meia centena de peças estruturais do navio e foram todas
recuperadas. Tudo o que interessava e que se encontrou foi salvo dentro da
abordagem possível", diz Francisco Alves que, em quatro décadas de
arqueologia náutica encontrou, na Namíbia, a sua primeira moeda de ouro.
Mas o arqueólogo português está certo, contudo, que a rocha e a natureza
ficaram com muito mais. Uma das peças mais importantes da estrutura do
navio, o calcez, "uma peça colossal", com dois metros de comprimento, usado
para içar os panos do navio, e que estava descrita num manual de época mas
que nunca tinha sido vista, foi encontrada intacta a quatro quilómetros da
mina U60, onde decorreram os trabalhos.

Identificaram as peças e deixaram-nas num banho acuoso essencial à
conservação. Nada sairá da Namíbia, visto que a legislação do país protege
os achados encontrados em território nacional. Mas, para além das moedas de
ouro que terão sido guardadas num banco da Namíbia, tudo o resto está num
dos lugares mais seguros do mundo: "Toda a fronteira do Sperrgebit é um
'ScanEx' gigantesco, como o de controlo de bagagens nos aeroportos",
descreve Francisco Alves. Ninguém sai da zona de alta segurança da
exploração diamantífera sem ser virado do avesso. "Até as tampas das
esferográficas eram revistadas".

Por isso Francisco Alves acredita que a nau quinhentista da Rota das Índias
está a salvo. Apesar de pairar sobre este tesouro, sempre, o risco de
sucumbir ao feroz assédio do mercado internacional de antiguidades.

Sobre o valor do achado, Francisco Alves recusa-se a avançar com números:
"Recuso-me a avançar com valores. Seria inédito que algum arqueólogo
avaliasse um achado. Quanto é que vale o túmulo do Tutankamon? Isso é para
as lojas de antiguidades".

Mas são as moedas de ouro que falam mais alto. São elas que vão indicar,
pela data de cunhagem, a datação da embarcação: "Nos primeiros dias de Maio
foi encontrada uma moeda cuja cunhagem só existiu a partir de 1525. Mas só
nos podemos pronunciar quando forem todas classificadas. A cunhagem mais
recente indicará a data provável".

E é também nas cerca de duas mil moedas que se concentram as atenções em
relação a valores. As portuguesas, mais valiosas, uma vez que tinham um grau
de pureza de 999,2 por mil, representam apenas um terço da colecção. Mas
estes "portugueses" de século XVI, como se chamavam então a estas moedas,
estavam avaliados, há cerca de dez anos, conta Francisco Alves, em cerca de
50 mil euros. Cada moeda.

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www.dofundodomar.blogspot.com

2008-11-01T15:18:00.000Z

_____________________________________________________________

November 01, 2008

Academia de Marinha, Lisboa

De dia 4 (3.ª feira) a 7 de Novembro (6.ª feira) 2008, das 10:30 às
12:45, simpósio "Os Naufrágios Portugueses e Espanhóis no Arquipélago
dos Açores" co-organizado pelas Academia de Marinha e Fundácion
Iberoamericana para el Fomento de la Cultura y Ciencias del Mar, na
sede da Academia de Marinha (Rua do Arsenal, porta H, Lisboa).

Dia 4 de Novembro

(10:45-11:00) Abertura.

(11:00-11:35) "Açores: refúgio de navegantes e regalo de malfeitores
na época moderna". Artur Teodoro de Matos.

(11:35-12:10) "Metodologia en arqueologia submarina". Carlos Leon Amores.

(12:15-12:45) Debate.

Dia 5 de Novembro

(10:30-11:05) "Da nota de rodapé ao monte de lastro: naufrágios
ibéricos na área dos Açores". Alexandre Monteiro.

(11:05-11:40) "Naufragios españoles en la carrera de Indias". Miguel
Aragón Fontenla.

(11:45-12:15) Debate.

Dia 6 de Novembro

(11:00-11:35) "A legislação internacional e nacional sobre o
património arqueológico subaquático". Neves Correia.

(11:35-12:10) "La protección juridica internacional del patrimonio
cultural subacuatico". Mariano Aznar Gomez.

(12:15-12:45) Debate

Dia 7 de Novembro

(10:30-11:05) "Tecnicas de exploracion submarina". Jorge Juan Rey Salgado.

(11:05-11:40) "A tecnologia ao serviço da arqueologia submarina".
Ventura Soares.

(11:45-12:15) Debate.

(12:30-12:45) Encerramento.

Informações: Academia de Marinha, telf. 213 255 493/6.

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www.dofundodomar.blogspot.com

España indemnizó a los dueños privados del tesoro capturado por Odyssey

2008-10-13T15:24:00.000+01:00

________________________________________________________________

ABC
By Jesús García Calero
October 10, 2008

Odyssey Marine Exploration no tiene derecho ni a una sóla de las monedas rescatadas del naufragio de «La Mercedes», puesto que es un buque de Estado. Pero es que ni siquiera puede reivindicar ya las fortunas privadas que se hundieron con la fragata, puesto que España indemnizó antes de 1870 a todas las víctimas que pudieron probar que sus propiedades estaban a bordo del barco hundido a traición por el inglés el 5 octubre de 1804 (hace justo ahora 204 años). Esto es lo que se desprende de la investigación histórica y jurídica realizada por el abogado José María Lancho.

Según el citado jurista, que ha rebuscado en archivos y libros de la época, el proceso se alargó durante décadas y fue penoso para un erario exhausto por las guerras. Pero lo cierto es que, en diciembre de 1869, se emitía una Instrucción que regulaba las caducidades de las reclamaciones de aquellas víctimas que debían ser indemnizadas por el apresamiento de buques de la Real Armada a manos de Inglaterra. Al unirse con Gran Bretaña contra Napoleón, España se comprometió a resarcir a las víctimas y lo hizo.

En 1824 se abrió el plazo para reclamar por las presas realizadas por Inglaterra antes de 1808, es decir, veinte años más tarde de la catástrofe de «La Mercedes». Era la España del Vuelva usted mañana de aquel Mariano José de Larra transmutado en Fígaro, donde la burocracia podía agotar la paciencia y la energía de aquellas desesperadas familias durante varias generaciones.

Es posible, según afirma Lancho, imaginar «la situación en que se encontraban estas familias y comprender la precariedad de un Estado, el español, que apenas sobrevivía tras las guerras napoleónicas, mientras América iniciaba su proceso revolucionario y estallaban los primeros conflictos civiles» en el reinado de Fernando VII.

El caso es que el artículo 9 de esa Instrucción de 1869 explica que los demandantes de indemnizaciones debían presentar «en el plazo de un año a contar desde el 21 de julio último (de aquel 1869), en las oficinas de la deuda, bajo pena de caducidad (...) los documentos que acreditan el apresamiento del buque, el hecho del embarque del metálico, géneros y efectos apresados, el valor de estos y el del buque». Es decir, que tenían que probar su demanda.

«La Mercedes», exento

Pero el caso de «La Mercedes», y el resto de los buques apresados en la traicionera batalla del Cabo de Santa María, fue tan doloroso -provocaría la guerra con Inglaterra- que quedaban exentos de toda prueba los demandantes de «las fragatas de guerra Mercedes, Fama, Medea y Santa Clara por la notoriedad de sus apresamientos», destaca Lancho.

El motivo de que España se comprometiera a indemnizar a las víctimas no fue otro que el cambio de alianzas, tras las guerras napoleónicas que volvieron a unir como aliados a Madrid y Londres, que se habían declarado la guerra tras el hundimiento de «La Mercedes», una guerra que en el mar terminaría con la tragedia de Trafalgar.

El caso es que el resto de las víctimas de los apresamientos corsarios de los ingleses necesitaba un testimonio del Almirantazgo inglés o del Tribunal que declaró buena la presa en cada caso. Asimismo debían «aportar el protesto del capitán del buque y el testimonio expedido por la comandancia de marina en que hubiera estado matriculado el buque».

Para el hecho del embarque de bienes, un testimonio sacado del registro de la Aduana del puerto de salida o expedido por el Almirantazgo inglés o el Tribunal que declaró buena la presa. Servían también los conocimientos de los capitanes, maestres o patrones de los barcos, las pólizas de seguros. etc.

Los demandantes podían sumar otras pruebas como los testimonios de los libros de comercio. Además, aquellos que quisieran justificar la propiedad y el valor del buque, debía aportar la escritura de adquisición o certificación expedida por el Almirantazgo inglés o el Tribunal que dispuso de la presa «siempre que constara la propiedad del buque y el precio de la venta del mismo», añade Lancho. Y, por último, también se aceptaba la certificación emitida por la Comandancia de Marina a la que «hubiesen correspondido los buques apresados, donde constara la matrícula y los arqueos de verificados».

El tiempo pasaba y no todas las víctimas tuvieron la suerte de reunir la documentación necesaria. Por ello, en diciembre de 1870 aún se publicaban varias cuantiosas reclamaciones caducadas de algunos herederos. Es el caso de Faustino del Campo, que reclamaba 100.000 reales de vellón de «La Mercedes» y 2.000 de la «Santa Clara». Él y tantos otros vieron caducar sus derechos por no presentar las pruebas exigidas en el citado artículo 9.

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Portugal e Namíbia vão discutir em Lisboa questão da nau portuguesa

2008-10-10T15:35:00.000+01:00

_______________________________________________________________

Público
October 10, 2008

O chefe da diplomacia da Namíbia visitará Portugal em breve e um dos temas da deslocação será o achado arqueológico subaquático de uma nau portuguesa, disse à Lusa a secretária de Estado da Cultura portuguesa.

Paula Fernandes dos Santos referiu que os trabalhos de resgate dos destroços da nau portuguesa naufragada no século XVI ao largo da Namíbia terminam hoje, e avançou que mais informações acerca do espólio e da sua importância histórica serão dadas em conferência de imprensa, a realizar no Palácio Nacional de Ajuda no próximo dia 17.

A Namíbia não ratificou a Convenção Sobre a Protecção do Património Cultural Subaquático, pelo que o espólio encontrado pertence na totalidade àquele país.

"Isso significa que nós teremos, em conjunto com as autoridades namibianas, de desencadear um processo bilateral em que procuraremos ver em que condições é que poderemos continuar a colaborar com eles", disse Paula Fernandes dos Santos.

O convite para a visita a Portugal do chefe da diplomacia namibiana, Marco Hausiku, foi feito pelo secretário de Estado dos Negócios Estrangeiros e Cooperação, João Gomes Cravinho.

"Temos acompanhado este trabalho em conjunto com o Ministério dos Negócios Estrangeiros. O próprio secretário de Estado João Gomes Cravinho, quanto
esteve agora em Nova Iorque para a Assembleia Geral das Nações Unidas, teve oportunidade de se encontrar com o MNE da Namíbia e falar sobre esta matéria e transmitiu-lhe um convite para vir a Portugal", referiu Paula Fernandes dos Santos.

"Não há data [para a visita]. Queremos manter estes contactos, mas não posso dizer, neste momento, sob que forma, qual a forma institucional que vai ter", frisou.

Questionada se o espólio poderá vir a ser exposto em Portugal, a secretária de Estado da Cultura preferiu não especular sobre o assunto.

"Não vamos especular sobre isso nem dizer coisas que possam não ser oportunas relativamente a isso. Pensamos que provavelmente haverá condições para que isso possa vir a ser feito, mas não discutimos formalmente com as autoridades
namibianas", salientou.

Os destroços da nau portuguesa do século XVI foram descobertos em Abril deste ano, durante uma prospecção de diamantes pelo consórcio NAMDEB, formado pelo governo da Namíbia e pela diamantífera sul-africana De Beers.

O espólio encontrado nos destroços da nau inclui objectos de ouro, prata, cobre e marfim, além de astrolábios e instrumentos de navegação quinhentistas, canhões e respectivas balas.

As operações estão a cargo de uma equipa de arqueólogos subaquáticos, em que participam os portugueses Francisco Alves e Miguel Aleluia, a convite das autoridades de Windhoek.

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Más de 1.500 años de historia egipcia descubierta bajo el mar

2008-04-16T10:39:00.000+01:00

________________________________________________________________

Arqueologos de Cadiz
April 16, 2008

La exposición ‘Tesoros sumergidos de Egipto’, inaugurada ayer, permanecerá en el Matadero de Madrid hasta septiembre

La exposición Tesoros Sumergidos de Egipto, que abre sus puertas en Matadero Madrid hasta el próximo 28 de septiembre, fue inaugurada ayer por los Reyes de España.

La muestra ofrece un repaso a más de 1.500 años de historia egipcia, con los restos del legendario puerto de Alejandría, la ciudad de Heraclion y parte de la ciudad de Canopo, descubriendo así obras que se creían perdidas para siempre y que han estado sumergidas bajo el mar durante más de mil años. El acto contó con la presencia del ministro de Cultura, César Antonio Molina; el alcalde de Madrid, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón; el presidente de la Fundación Hilti, Michael Hilti; y el arqueólogo submarino Franck Goddio, descubridor de estos hallazgos en colaboración con el Consejo Superior de Antigüedades de Egipto, además de autoridades oficiales y diplomáticas.

Entre las principales piezas de esta exposición destaca la estatua de Hapi, dios de la crecida del Nilo (símbolo de fertilidad y abundancia), que es la más alta hasta ahora descubierta en Egipto. Con unos 2.000 años de antigüedad, también se presentan las colosales esculturas de granito rosa de un rey y una reina ptolemaicos, de más de cinco metros de altura cada una. Asimismo, hay piezas espectaculares como la estatua de Arsínoe II, de granito negro (S. III a. e c.), de 1,50 metros que representa a una reina ptolemaica. Es una obra única, de gran belleza, que marca un cambio a nivel artístico puesto que fue realizada por un escultor egipcio pero bajo los cánones estilísticos griegos.

La estatua, que al principió se pensó que representaba a la diosa Isis de Menutis, lleva un vestido con pliegues y el chal anudado. El tratamiento de las telas recuerda a los mármoles de factura helenística que representan una Afrodita con “ropajes mojados” que, de frente, desnudan a la persona en lugar de vestirla.

Además, los visitantes que se acerquen hasta el Matadero podrán admirar la monumental Estela de Ptolomeo, que fue hallada no lejos de los colosos, al norte del templo de Heraclion. El monolito, de 6 metros y 16 toneladas de peso, se había roto en muchos fragmentos, que fueron recuperados del yacimiento. La inscripción, parcialmente destruida, hace mención específica de Ptolomeo VIII y permite datar la estela en la segunda mitad del siglo II a. C.

Los tesoros sumergidos permanecieron en el fondo del mar, cubiertos por sedimentos llevados por el Nilo y protegidos por los revestimientos que éstos formaron sobre ellos. Los hallazgos fueron increíblemente prolíficos y de un valor superior a lo imaginable.

Las cerca de 500 piezas que componen la exposición Tesoros Sumergidos de Egipto son sólo una mínima parte del total. Entre ellas estatuas de dioses y esfinges, estelas, objetos litúrgicos y de ofrendas, cerámicas, joyería y monedas, artículos de la vida diaria y adornos de guerreros.

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El Gobierno estudia controlar desde el aire los saqueos de barcos hundidos

2008-04-15T10:49:00.000+01:00

________________________________________________________________

La Vanguardia

By Ignacio Orovio
April 15, 2008

El sistema permitiría controlar si un barco merodea de forma reiterada un pecio Sólo Catalunya tiene un mapa completo de sitios arqueológicos, con una lista de 799.

El ojo de un satélite a decenas de kilómetros de altura podría convertirse en el vigilante de los cientos de yacimientos arqueológicos submarinos de las costas españolas, amenazados por la codicia de los cazatesoros. Tras el famoso episodio del barco estadounidense Odyssey, el Ministerio de Cultura sopesa la posibilidad de instalar un sofisticado sistema de control que integraría las coordenadas de los pecios y detectaría con fotos si estos son merodeados reiteradamente por barcos; de este modo podrían activarse sistemas de control y evitar el expolio de yacimientos submarinos.

España cuenta con un número inmenso de yacimientos de este tipo (se habla de 8.000), en buena medida barcos hundidos, de todas las épocas. Desde griegos y romanos hasta los imponentes galeones de la España moderna, algunos de ellos cargados de oro o plata, que se hundieron más o menos cerca de la costa. Con algún caramelo más reciente, como la nave británica Beatrice, que a mitad del XIX navegaba de Alejandría a Londres, cargada con el sarcófago del faraón Micerinos, entre otras cosas, cuando se fue a pique cerca de Cartagena; parece que muy cerca, dado que la tripulación alcanzó la costa a nado.

El Odyssey,origen de la alarma, extrajo hace un año un tesoro valorado en 315 millones de euros del pecio Black Swan,que la empresa sitúa "en aguas internacionales" y que el ministerio sospecha que pertenecía a un barco español. El caso está en los tribunales americanos. El director del Museu d´Arqueologia de Catalunya, Pere Izquierdo, remarca que "lo que para unos es un tesoro, para la mayoría es historia, patrimonio y conocimiento".

Todo ello, así como yacimientos que un día estuvieron en tierra firme, están a la relativa intemperie del mar. Los avances técnicos de la inmersión subacuática, el progresivo agotamiento de los sitios en tierra firme y, sobre todo, la virginidad de muchos yacimientos marinos empujan a los aficionados y los cazatesoros hacia el agua, por lo que el Ministerio de Cultura ha empezado a tomar cartas en el asunto.

"El caso del Odyssey es una desgracia, y también una suerte, porque ha removido las conciencias", dice Xavier Nieto, responsable del Centre d´Arqueologia Subaquàtica de Catalunya.

La idea de controlar a los barcos vía satélite ha sido tratada en la comisión técnica del Plan Nacional de Arqueología Submarina, formada por representantes del Ministerio de Cultura, de las comunidades autónomas, de la Armada, de la Guardia Civil y por expertos en la materia. El asunto está en plena discusión. El sistema tendría un elevadísimo coste si se llevara a la práctica, dada la cantidad de documentos por analizar, según un miembro de esta comisión. Esta impulsa la denominada carta arqueológica, con todos los yacimientos del Estado. Catalunya es la comunidad que la tiene más adelantada, con 799 emplazamientos. Andalucía ha contado unos 400, pero el resto de comunidades carece de un censo completo, según Nieto.

La empresa de arqueología Nerea, vinculada a la Universidad de Málaga, lleva tres años desarrollando la tecnología para controlar vía satélite a los saqueadores. El proyecto ha recibido 87.000 euros de la Consejería de Innovación andaluza, pero podría aplicarse, con la información de base adecuada, a cualquier costa.

"Ya es hora de que los arqueólogos aprovechemos la tecnología. Lo que está pasando con los yacimientos submarinos es una ocasión inmejorable, porque es un saqueo contra la humanidad", opina Javier Noriega, de Nerea. Varios países desarrollan sistemas similares.

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In Weak Rivets, a Possible Key to Titanic’s Doom

2008-04-15T09:31:00.000+01:00

________________________________________________________________

The New York Times
By William J. Broad
April 15, 2008

Researchers have discovered that the builder of the Titanic struggled for years to obtain enough good rivets and riveters and ultimately settled on faulty materials that doomed the ship, which sank 96 years ago Tuesday.

The builder’s own archives, two scientists say, harbor evidence of a deadly mix of low quality rivets and lofty ambition as the builder labored to construct the three biggest ships in the world at once — the Titanic and two sisters, the Olympic and the Britannic.

For a decade, the scientists have argued that the storied liner went down fast after hitting an iceberg because the ship’s builder used substandard rivets that popped their heads and let tons of icy seawater rush in. More than 1,500 people died.

When the safety of the rivets was first questioned 10 years ago, the builder ignored the accusation and said it did not have an archivist who could address the issue.

Now, historians say new evidence uncovered in the archive of the builder, Harland and Wolff, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, settles the argument and finally solves the riddle of one of the most famous sinkings of all time. The company says the findings are deeply flawed.

Each of the great ships under construction required three million rivets that acted like glue to hold everything together. In a new book, the scientists say the shortages peaked during the Titanic’s construction.

“The board was in crisis mode,” one of the authors, Jennifer Hooper McCarty, who studied the archives, said in an interview. “It was constant stress. Every meeting it was, ‘There’s problems with the rivets and we need to hire more people.’ ”

Apart from the archives, the team gleaned clues from 48 rivets recovered from the hulk of the Titanic, modern tests and computer simulations. They also compared metal from the Titanic with other metals from the same era, and looked at documentation about what engineers and shipbuilders of that era considered state of the art.

The scientists say the troubles began when its ambitious building plans forced Harland and Wolff to reach beyond its usual suppliers of rivet iron and include smaller forges, as disclosed in company and British government papers. Small forges tended to have less skill and experience.

Adding to the problem, in buying iron for the Titanic’s rivets, the company ordered No. 3 bar, known as “best” — not No. 4, known as “best-best,” the scientists found. Shipbuilders of the day typically used No. 4 iron for anchors, chains and rivets, they discovered.

So the liner, whose name was meant to be synonymous with opulence, in at least one instance relied on cheaper materials.

Many of the rivets studied by the scientists — recovered from the Titanic’s resting place two miles down in the North Atlantic by divers over two decades — were found to be riddled with high concentrations of slag. A glassy residue of smelting, slag can make rivets brittle and prone to fracture.

“Some material the company bought was not rivet quality,” said the other author of the book, Timothy Foecke of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a federal agency in Gaithersburg, Md.

The company also faced shortages of skilled riveters, the archives showed. Dr. McCarty said that for a half year, from late 1911 to April 1912, when the Titanic set sail, the company’s board discussed the problem at every meeting. For instance, on Oct. 28, 1911, Lord William Pirrie, the company’s chairman, expressed concern over the lack of riveters and called for new hiring efforts.

In their research, the scientists, who are metallurgists, found that good riveting took great skill. The iron had to be heated to a precise cherry red color and beaten by the right combination of hammer blows. Mediocre work could hide problems.

“Hand riveting was tricky,” said Dr. McCarty, whose doctoral thesis at Johns Hopkins University analyzed the Titanic’s rivets.

Steel beckoned as a solution. Shipbuilders of the day were moving from iron to steel rivets, which were stronger. And machines could install them, improving workmanship.

The rival Cunard line, the scientists found, had switched to steel rivets years before, using them, for instance, throughout the Lusitania.

The scientists discovered that Harland and Wolff also used steel rivets — but only on the Titanic’s central hull, where stresses were expected to be greatest. Iron rivets were chosen for the stern and bow.

And the bow, as fate would have it, is where the iceberg struck. Studies of the wreck show that six seams opened up in the ship’s bow plates. And the damage, Dr. Foecke noted, “ends close to where the rivets transition from iron to steel.”

The scientists argue that better rivets would have probably kept the Titanic afloat long enough for rescuers to arrive before the icy plunge, saving hundreds of lives.

The researchers make their case, and detail their archive findings, in “What Really Sank the Titanic” (Citadel Press).

Reactions run from anger to admiration. James Alexander Carlisle, whose grandfather was a Titanic riveter, has bluntly denounced the rivet theory on his Web site. “No way!” Mr. Carlisle writes.

For its part, Harland and Wolff, after its long silence, now rejects the charge. “There was nothing wrong with the materials,” Joris Minne, a company spokesman, said last week. Mr. Minne noted that one of the sister ships, the Olympic, sailed without incident for 24 years, until retirement. (The Britannic sank in 1916 after hitting a mine.)

David Livingstone, a former Harland and Wolff official, called the book’s main points misleading. Mr. Livingstone said big shipyards often had to scramble. On a recent job, he noted, Harland and Wolff had to look to Romania to find welders.

Mr. Livingstone also called the slag evidence painfully circumstantial, saying no real proof linked the hull opening to bad rivets. “It’s only waffle,” he said of the team’s arguments.

But a naval historian praised the book as solving a mystery that has baffled investigators for nearly a century.

“It’s fascinating,” said Tim Trower, who reviews books for the Titanic Historical Society, a private group in Indian Orchard, Mass. “This puts in the final nail in the arguments and explains why the incident was so dramatically bad.”

The Titanic had every conceivable luxury: cafes, squash courts, a swimming pool, Turkish baths, a barbershop and three libraries. Its owners also bragged about its safety. In a brochure, the White Star Line described the ship as “designed to be unsinkable.”

On her inaugural voyage, on the night of April 14, 1912, the ship hit the iceberg around 11:40 p.m. and sank in a little more than two and a half hours. Most everyone assumed the iceberg had torn a huge gash in the starboard hull.

The discovery in 1985 of the Titanic wreck began many new inquiries. In 1996, an expedition found, beneath obscuring mud, not a large gash but six narrow slits where bow plates appeared to have parted. Naval experts suspected that rivets had popped along the seams, letting seawater rush in under high pressure.

A specialist in metal fracture, Dr. Foecke got involved in 1997, analyzing two salvaged rivets. He was astonished to find about three times more slag than occurs in modern wrought iron.

In early 1998, he and a team of marine forensic experts announced their rivet findings, calling them tentative.

Dr. Foecke, in addition to working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, also taught and lectured part time at Johns Hopkins. There he met Dr. McCarty, who got hooked on the riddle, as did her thesis adviser.

The team acquired rivets from salvors who pulled up hundreds of artifacts from the sunken liner. The scientists also collected old iron of the era — including some from the Brooklyn Bridge — to make comparisons. The new work seemed only to bolster the bad-rivet theory.

In 2003, after graduating from Johns Hopkins, Dr. McCarty traveled to England and located the Harland and Wolff archives at the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, in Belfast.

She also explored the archives of the British Board of Trade, which regulated shipping and set material standards, and of Lloyd’s of London, which set shipbuilding standards. And she worked at Oxford University and obtained access to its libraries.

What emerged was a picture of a company stretched to the limit as it struggled to build the world’s three biggest ships simultaneously. Dr. McCarty also found evidence of complacency. For instance, the Board of Trade gave up testing iron for shipbuilding in 1901 because it saw iron metallurgy as a mature field, unlike the burgeoning world of steel.

Dr. McCarty said she enjoyed telling middle and high school students about the decade of rivet forensics, as well as the revelations from the British archives.

“They get really excited,” she said. “That’s why I love the story. People see it and get mesmerized.”

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Odyssey no identifica el pecio, pero dice que puede ser ‘Las Mercedes’

2008-04-14T10:42:00.000+01:00

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Arqueologos de Cadiz
April 14, 2008

La empresa mantiene que le resulta imposible saber de qué barco extrajo el tesoro de la polémica · Una opción es el buque español hundido frente a Portugal

La empresa norteamericana Odyssey Marine Exploration mantiene que no le resulta posible identificar con exactitud el barco hundido del que extrajo el tesoro cuyo descubrimiento anunció el pasado mayo y así se lo ha comunicado al juez federal de Florida Mark A. Pizzo. La compañía afirma que una serie de pruebas contradictorias le impide determinar el nombre del pecio, según publicó ayer El País.

El tribunal norteamericano realizó un segundo requerimiento a Odyssey hace un mes para que aportara toda la información de la que dispusiera sobre la identidad del buque naufragado. La empresa ya había aportado alguna a España, pero el Gobierno nacional mostró su disconformidad con la escasez de datos remitidos por la firma de Greg Stemm y así se lo hizo saber a Mark A. Pizzo, que atendió las demandas del Ejecutivo. El pasado viernes Odyssey entregó nueva información y corroboró su posición desde que comenzó la polémica: le resulta imposible identificar el pecio.

El juez de Florida, no obstante, exigió a Odyssey que, en el caso de que no le pudiera poner un nombre al barco hundido, expusiera las que cree que son las hipótesis más probables. La compañía, indicó ayer El País, ha ofrecido varias posibilidades al tribunal, entre las que se encuentra que el pecio sea el Nuestra Señora de Las Mercedes, la opción más plausible para los investigadores, recordó este periódico.

Casi desde el primer momento el Gobierno sospecha que Odyssey extrajo el tesoro de Las Mercedes, barco español que se fue pique frente a las costas del Algarve portugués en 1804 en plena batalla con naves inglesas. Es decir, un buque nacional naufragado en aguas internacionales.

Es razonable pensar que si Odyssey ha aportado como posibilidad que el galeón en el que encontró el tesoro es Las Mercedes, efectivamente realizó la operación frente a Portugal, en el Atlántico. Cada nuevo episodio en este caso aleja más la teoría, candente al principio de los acontecimientos y sumamente agotada ya, de que la compañía hallara el botín en el mar de Alborán, cerca de La Línea y Gibraltar.

Está previsto que una delegación española examine hoy y mañana en Tampa las monedas que recuperó Odyssey. La comitiva tiene la esperanza de obtener pruebas y alcanzar conclusiones que confirmen sus sospechas.

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Odyssey name the mystery Black Swan treasure ship

2008-04-13T20:11:00.000+01:00

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Tipiclly Spanish
April 13, 2008

The company says the most likely probability is that the vessel is the Spanish galleon 'Nuestra Señora de la Mercedes'.

The ‘Black Swan’, the name of the vessel found by the United States treasure salvage company, Odyssey, has finally been revealed to be ‘Nuestra Señora de la Mercedes’ – a Spanish galleon which went down in a battle with the British on October 5 1804 off Faro in Portugal.

The Mercedes was loaded with gold and silver, and included the wages for the soldiers and wealth of the mercenaries travelling on board. The estimated value of the treasure recovered by Odyssey is close to 1.5 million $.

Odyssey announced the find, without naming or locating the vessel, in May last year, saying they had found 17 tons of silver coins, and at the time the Spanish Government thought that La Mercedes had been found.

The judge who is hearing the case between the two sides, Mark Pizzo, had given Odyssey 30 days to reveal the boat’s identity, but the co-founder of the company told El País on Friday that there was still some doubt as to the vessel’s identity.

Legal experts now consider that Spain will now argue that they had never searched for La Mercedes, but that does not mean that the ship had been abandoned, and because it was acting for the Spanish state at the time of the battle the Spanish Government can now reclaim her and her contents.

Odyssey however consider that the boat was not engaged in military activity when she went down, and if anyone is entitled to the contents it is the family descendents of those on board.

The legal battle is set to last for months, if not years to come.

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Oro, plata y 249 cadáveres en el fondo del mar

2008-04-13T10:45:00.000+01:00

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Arqueologos de Cadiz
April 13, 2008

Los diarios de los capitanes de la batalla de Santa María reconstruyen la historia de una explosión trágica

Lo que sigue es la historia de lo que le ocurrió a la fragata La Mercedes el 5 de octubre de 1804. La narración de los hechos está basada en los datos que ofrece el capitán de navío de la Armada Española Cesáreo Fernández Duro (1830-190 en el volumen VII de su Armada Española. Él a su vez se basa en los diarios de a bordo y en algunos documentos de la época.

Son las ocho de la mañana del día 5. La fragata La Clara hace a esa hora señal de cuatro velas indicando al resto de la flota la aparición de fragatas inglesas en el mismo rumbo. La cosa está tranquila. Las noticias que han llegado de los bajeles que la escuadra se ha encontrado a su paso desde que saliera el 9 de agosto de Montevideo, sólo confirmaban la neutralidad de España en la guerra que mantenían Inglaterra y Francia. Pero el jefe de la escuadra, José Bustamante y Guerra, es hombre precavido. Ha pasado mucha mar como comandante de la corbeta Atrevida, compañero de Malaespina en la campaña científica y además ha sido gobernador político-militar de Montevideo. Así que prefiere estar preparado por si la cosa ha cambiado sin que él se enterase y ordena formar en línea con zafarrancho de combate.

Una hora más tarde, y a vista del cabo de Santa María, las fragatas inglesas se acercan por barlovento. La más grande de todas, la llamada Indefatigable, está comandada por el comodoro Moore, que acaba de mandar un bote con un oficial y un intérprete para decirle algo a Bustamante. Que tenemos orden de retener esta división y llevarla a Inglaterra y además nos vamos a quedar con todo lo que lleváis. A no ser que quieran ustedes derramamiento de sangre, en cuyo caso, a la vista está que les superamos en porte y cañones. Bustamante se lo pensó y lo consultó con sus oficiales, para concluir que mantendrían el honor si la Indefatigable y las otras tres se atrevían a atacar.

No se había separado el bote aún cuando se escuchó el primer cañonazo de aviso de Moore, los cuatro barcos se acercaron a corta distancia dando comienzo la batalla. A los pocos minutos de combate, La Mercedes salta por los aires llevándose al fondo los cadáveres de 249 de sus tripulantes y la fortuna acaudalada por soldados y mercaderes en las Indias. El resto son apresados sin mucha resistencia y llevadas a Inglaterra.

La prensa británica de la época ya tenía el colmillo que posee la de ahora y no se arredró a criticar con dureza la decisión de atacar a los españoles. “Un gran delito acaba de cometerse”, señalaba un papel de Londres. “La ley de las naciones ha padecido la violación más atroz: una potencia amiga ha sido atacada por nuestra fuerza pública en medio de una profunda paz [...] sus leales súbditos han perecido en su defensa, infestando nuestras costas sus saqueados tesoros, y, como el de un pirata, nuestro pabellón tremola sobre el débil, el infeliz y el oprimido…”.

La historia continúa con el apoyo de España a la Francia de Napoleón. La afrenta de esta batalla frente a la costa portuguesa del Algarve, y que supuso el hundimiento de La Mercedes y el apresamiento del resto de la flota, acabó con la paz entre Inglaterra y España y fue un antecedente reconocido de la batalla de Trafalgar un año después.El comodoro Moore amenazó con atacar al jefe de escuadra Bustamante

Fuente: elpais.com

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Las monedas de plata son españolas

2008-04-13T09:03:00.000+01:00

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El País
By Álvaro de Cózar
April 13, 2008

El Cisne Negro, el nombre en clave con el que Odyssey bautizó al pecio con el tesoro más valioso hallado hasta ahora en el fondo del mar, ya tiene identidad: Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes. Un buque español hundido en 1804. Odyssey Marine Exploration, la compañía estadounidense especializada en la búsqueda de pecios submarinos, anunció su hallazgo el 18 de mayo de 2007. La empresa sólo dijo entonces que se trataba de un tesoro de 500.000 monedas de plata (17 toneladas) procedente de un buque de época colonial, encontrado en un lugar indeterminado del Atlántico.

España siempre sospechó que Odyssey había expoliado La Mercedes, un mítico barco que saltó por los aires el 5 de octubre de 1804 tras un combate naval con los ingleses frente a la costa portuguesa del Algarve. Ésa es también la hipótesis de Odyssey desde hace mucho tiempo, según fuentes cercanas al caso.

Mark Pizzo, el juez que arbitra en la pelea entre España y Odyssey por los derechos del hallazgo, dio un plazo de 30 días a la empresa para que revelara la identidad del barco o bien la hipótesis más probable. En declaraciones a este periódico, Greg Stemm, el cofundador de la compañía, comentó el viernes que había dado al juez varias hipótesis, entre ellas la de La Mercedes. Stemm no especificó cuál de ellas era la más probable, pero entre bambalinas, ésa es la opción más plausible para los investigadores. Aun así, Odyssey sigue afirmando que un número indeterminado de pruebas contradictorias impide determinar con exactitud la identidad del buque.

El primer acto de la pugna legal que los abogados de ambas partes han mantenido durante todo este año en el juzgado de Tampa por los derechos sobre el hallazgo, se cierra así con la declaración de Odyssey.

La reticencia de la empresa a expresar públicamente el nombre del barco puede explicarse a través del pasado. A mediados de los noventa, Stemm y el otro cofundador de la empresa, John Morris, fueron investigados por la Comisión del Mercado de Valores de Estados Unidos bajo la sospecha de haber dado información inflada sobre un pecio que había hecho subir las acciones de la compañía. Así, pues, la idea de Stemm, según sus declaraciones, es que no debe haber más precipitaciones.

La historia está lejos de terminar. Una vez despejado el misterio, España argumentará ante el juez por qué nunca ha hecho esfuerzos por buscar y encontrar La Mercedes, es decir, le convencerá de que el buque no fue abandonado a su suerte. Si el juez ve razonables esos argumentos, el caso podría prolongarse durante años. Ambas partes reclamarían ante los tribunales estadounidenses los derechos sobre el pecio y la carga.

Las claves de esa batalla pasan por la condición legal del buque en ese tiempo. La historia da fe de que La Mercedes era un buque de guerra que participó en varias batallas. Según esa cualidad de buque de Estado, el Gobierno español podría reclamarlo. Hay jurisprudencia al respecto en al menos dos ocasiones, con los buques La Galga de Andalucía y El Juno, devueltos a España en 2000 tras ser descubiertos por una empresa de rescates submarinos también estadounidense.

Odyssey piensa otra cosa. Considera que el buque estaba realizando tareas no militares cuando se hundió. Un simple barco particular cargado con la fortuna de cientos de mercaderes y sus familias. Esas familias son importantes porque podrían dar un radical giro a la historia. O más bien sus apellidos. Si se demuestra que el barco es La Mercedes, Odyssey podría ofrecer a los descendientes la posibilidad de reclamar parte de aquella fortuna.

¿Por qué tanta generosidad? ¿Y por qué no? Cada descendiente podría tener un pedazo de oro que llevarse contento a casa. Una baratija si se compara con lo que ganaría la empresa en la Bolsa. Porque en esta larga historia que ya va a hacer el año, las monedas no tienen mucho valor intrínseco. Las 500.000 monedas de plata de El Cisne Negro podrían saturar un mercado que no cuenta con mucha gente dispuesta a pagar grandes sumas por algo que tiene todo el mundo. Porque en toda historia importa más el brillo del metal que el metal en sí mismo. Ese brillo mantiene la idea de que todos los proyectos saldrán adelante: las películas de Disney, los concursos de piratas, los libros, los documentales, los museos y las ilusiones de seguir encontrando durante mucho tiempo oro, el metal con el que todavía se siguen forjando los sueños y las pesadillas.

Ciencia y negocio, una difícil alianza
La idea de Greg Stemm y John Morris en la fundación de Odyssey Marine Exploration era unir ciencia y comercio, arqueología y beneficios. ¿Y si además se le añade el Mercado de Valores? El tintineo de las monedas en las manos de Stemm rechina en los despachos de las universidades de todo el mundo. Un dato. Según comentaba un arqueólogo de la Universidad de Tejas en la revista The New Yorker hace unos días, Odyssey no ha publicado una sola línea de información relevante para el gremio. La razón, según Odyssey, es que nunca les dejan. No han aceptado los artículos de sus arqueólogos porque su nombre se relaciona siempre con la palabra de la que la empresa no consigue desprenderse: cazatesoros. El rechazo de la ciencia hace que sus descubrimientos, incluso si son probados y útiles para la historia, caigan en saco roto. "Es difícil conjugar ciencia y negocio", señala Ángel Alloza, historiador del CSIC. "Creo que el problema en este caso es el oscurantismo y la ocultación deliberada de datos que la empresa ha hecho. Eso es lo contrario de la ciencia", concluye.

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La Xunta realizará este verano una exploración de los galeones de Rande

2008-04-11T10:52:00.000+01:00

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Atlantico
By Jose Teo Andres
April 11, 2008

La campaña descarta la extracción de piezas y se centrará en localizar y comprobar el estado de los históricos pecios

La Consellería de Cultura iniciará este verano una nueva campaña de exploración en Rande y la Ensenada de San Simón en busca de los galeones. O más exactamente, para constatar su localización y comprobar sobre el terreno cómo se encuentran. Así lo confirmó a este diario el director de Patrimonio de la Xunta de Galicia, Felipe Arias. La investigación correrá probablemente a cargo de un gran especialista, el arqueólogo vigués Javier Luaces.

Los históricos (y muy mediáticos) galeones de Rande siguen a la espera de salir a la luz pese a haberse realizado recientemente una campaña por encargo de la Consellería de Cultura en la que se confirmó la localización de dos buques y fueron señalizados otros diez como probables, todos ellos en el área comprendida entre Rande y la Ensenada de San Simón. Ahí se realizó la ya famosa foto, en realidad una composición a través del sónar, donde se puede observar el perfil de un barco. Javier Luaces, que iba al frente de aquella expedición en la que intervenían la Universidad de Vigo y la empresa Tecmarín y el CSIC, con el buque ’Mytilus’, cree que hay pocas dudas sobre la identidad del pecio en cuestión pero que en definitiva, lo mejor es bajar y verlo. Y eso es lo que se va a hacer en unos meses.

El director de Patrimonio de la Consellería de Cultura, Felipe Arias, señaló a este diario que probablemente en verano se pondrá en marcha una iniciativa que resultará probablemente de gran interés al tratarse de un tema que roza lo legendario. En esta ocasión no se trata de buscar el famoso tesoro, o lo que pueda quedar de él, hundido con la Flota de la Plata hace casi 306 años, con Europa en plena Guerra de Sucesión, sino de algo mucho más prosaico.

’Vamos a ver en primer lugar si son los galeones para poder localizarlos con precisión. Y después, a constatar el estado de sus restos’, explicó a este diario el director de Patrimonio de la Xunta.

Lo que en ningún caso se plantea con esta operación, y en ello quiso insistir Felipe Arias, es en recuperar alguna pieza de los históricos galeones de Rande. Eso, en todo caso, quedaría para más adelante, aunque el director de Patrimonio reconoció que es poco o nada partidario de una expedición de rescate. ’A menudo es mejor dejar las cosas donde están, al menos hasta que haya medios que garanticen su recuperación sin daños. Ahora vamos a ver los pecios y las piezas que quedan y su estado’, aclaró Arias.

’Hay que bajar y verlos’

Javier Luaces ya estuvo al frente de la anterior expedición, desde la superficie, que localizó hasta una docena de supuestos restos de los galeones de Rande.

Supuestos porque admite que algunos de los pecios podrían corresponderse a barcos naufragados en otros momentos. La razón es muy sencilla: ’Esa es una zona donde está acreditado que hubo numerosos hundimientos a lo largo de los años. Sin embargo creemos que al menos cinco son casi seguros y dos, con total probabilidad son galeones’, indicó el arqueólogo.

En todo caso, admitió que es necesaria una nueva campaña sobre el terreno para ’constatar y verificar’ todos los hallazgos, y él mismo está completando un completo informe que remitirá a la Xunta donde incluso pone nombre a algunos de los pecios descubiertos. Todo un hallazgo que revolucionará los actuales conocimientos sobre la Batalla de Rande siempre que sus observaciones se confirmen plenamente.

La definitiva

Aunque todavía no ha habido confirmación oficial, espera for mar parte de esta nueva investigación, que tendría que resultar definitiva. Sobre la posibilidad de recuperar, antes o después, alguno de los galeones de forma total o parcial, reconoce que sería una operación compleja que exigiría un planteamiento estratégico y una inversión muy fuerte.

Eso sí, cree que pensar en extraer a la superficie todos los barcos sería una utopía y que en Galicia no hay infraestructura suficiente para hacerlo. ’Hay que bajar al fondo de la Ría de Vigo y verlos directamente’, concluyó Javier Luaces.

La razón es muy sencilla: ’Esa es una zona donde está acreditado que hubo numerosos hundimientos a lo largo de los años. Sin embargo creemos que al menos cinco son casi seguros y dos, con total probabilidad son galeones’, indicó el arqueólogo.

En todo caso, admitió que es necesaria una nueva campaña sobre el terreno para ’constatar y verificar’ todos los hallazgos, y él mismo está completando un completo informe que remitirá a la Xunta donde incluso pone nombre a algunos de los pecios descubiertos. Todo un hallazgo que revolucionará los actuales conocimientos sobre la Batalla de Rande siempre que sus observaciones se confirmen plenamente.

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A unique anchor discovered

2008-04-11T09:34:00.000+01:00

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Turkish Daily News
By Vercihan Ziflioğlu
April 11, 2008

Professional diver Tevfik Camgöz discovers an ancient stone anchor bearing hieroglyphic inscriptions off the shores of Kyrenia, a major port city in northern Cyprus. The anchor was sent to the British Museum, where it was discovered to be 3,000 years old. Camgöz notes that his research is on going and does not give information about the coordinates of the spot

Archaeology and anthropology are two sciences trying to shed light on the lives of ancient civilizations. The main aim of all the research is to find vestiges of lost cultures and civilizations, to decode the code of the universe, and hence, life.

Ancient Egypt, with its aura of mystery, is one of the most important civilizations among the cultures of Antiquity and continues to attract the attention of scientists. As the pharaohs refuse to give up their secrets, science takes a further step toward unveiling what has been hidden for millennia.

Last year, a stone anchor bearing hieroglyphic inscriptions was discovered, by chance, off the shores of Kyrenia, a significant port city in northern Cyprus. Examined by professional diver Tevfik Camgöz, the historic artifact was sent by authorities in northern Cyprus to the British Museum's Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan. After a number of examinations, experts found the anchor to be 3,000 years old and that it has no equal in the world.

Camgöz refrained from giving concrete information about the coordinates of the spot where he found the anchor. Noting that research is ongoing, Camgöz said, “the main goal of the examinations conducted on the hieroglyphics inscribed on the stone anchor is to discover why the Pharaoh sailed the waters of Cyprus. That journey by the Pharaoh might change history fundamentally.”

History of humanity hidden beneath northern Cypriot shores

Camgöz's adventures in diving began when he was a 4-year-old. He performed his first dive when he was 15 and made many other dives in the waters of Turkey and northern Cyprus later in his life. He continued to search for the unknown under international waters as well. But it was the waters of northern Cyprus that attracted him the most. “North Cyprus is very rich in terms of underwater archaeology. An unbelievable treasure of sunken cities, ships, amphorae, and sculptures is hidden beneath the shores of North Cyprus.”

Camgöz founded the Nautilus Diving School, the only diving school in northern Cyprus, five years ago. It is the only dive center to be awarded a grant by the United Nations Development Programme and Office for Project Services (UNDP-UNOPS).

Behind a curtain of secrecy

Camgöz found, by chance, the invaluable anchor that belonged to an erstwhile pharaoh. “One day, nine years ago, I was trying to discover diving spots in Kyrenia, a mile offshore.” Exploring at a depth of 20 meters, an object caught his eye. After a few minutes, Camgöz decided that it was just an illusion and surfaced.

Last year, Camgöz made another dive at a spot near the location where he had made that dive nine years earlier. It was during that dive that he found the stone anchor. When he moved it slightly, he saw some hieroglyphics on its back surface.

“I immediately recognized the hieroglyphics. I was running low on air. That's why I had to surface,” he said. A second dive to further examine the anchor resulted in the discovery of a few other historic artifacts located close to the anchor. He went on a third dive with students from the North Cyprus Campus of the Middle East Technical University to conduct scanning and inventory studies. A fourth dive was undertaken with a professional team, led by underwater archaeologist Enver Gürsoy, during which the coordinates of the site were recorded and photographs were taken. Camgöz said all the studies were undertaken under the supervision of northern Cyprus' Office of Historical Monuments.

Coordinates not revealed

The anchor with the hieroglyphics was then sent to the British Museum to decipher the hieroglyphics. “After an initial examination, some of the hieroglyphics were decoded. The inscriptions included information about the pharaoh's Cyprus expedition,” said Camgöz.

What that discovery could fully yield is unclear for now as examinations on the ancient anchor have not yet been completed. “Studies have focused on the question of why the pharaoh conducted expeditions into the waters off Cyprus. Currently, we don't have adequate information, but experts have determined that this ancient anchor has no equal in all the world,” said Camgöz.

Funds insufficient for underwater archaeology

Camgöz said underwater archaeology is an evolving field, both in Turkey and northern Cyprus. “But funds are insufficient. There is a great need for financial support.” Cyprus' waters are available for diving throughout the year. The water temperature ranges between 16 and 20 degrees centigrade while diving depths range between 30 and 40 meters. Camgöz also produces underwater documentaries. Two years ago, together with Turkish state broadcaster, TRT, he prepared a documentary called “Blue Depths of Green Island” about northern Cyprus' underwater life and diversity of fish. The Web page of Camgöz's diving school is: www.nautilusdivingcyp.com.

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Cultura decide dejar en el mar los restos de un barco del siglo XV localizados por azar en Xove

2008-04-10T11:08:00.000+01:00

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La Voz de Galicia
April 10, 2008

Aduce que extraerlos del fondo aceleraría su deterioro y resultaría muy costoso

No es definitivo, pero los restos de la embarcación que se fue a pique en la costa de Xove hace unos quinientos años continuarán en el fondo del mar, protegidos, como hasta ahora, por el túmulo de arena formado en los años posteriores al hundimiento. A la espera de analizar con detalle el informe preliminar del equipo de arqueólogos contratado para valorar el hallazgo, la Consellería de Cultura opta inicialmente por dejar el pecio tal cual está, sin excavar.

Eso sí, el lugar será uno de los que se incluirán en el inventario de pecios de la costa gallega, ya en fase de elaboración. Los vestigios localizados serán inventariados y señalizados, explicaron fuentes de Cultura. Solo en caso de detectarse riesgo de pérdida o de destrucción de alguna de las piezas que se encuentran en el fondo marino, se valoraría la posibilidad de extraerla, para intentar conservarla.

Datados entre finales del siglo XV y principios del XVI, los restos han llegado hasta nuestros días porque han estado resguardados por arena que fue cubriéndolos y apelmazándose. Recuperarlos del fondo marino entraña un importante peligro para su conservación, porque al contacto con el aire su deterioro se acelera hasta el punto de que podrían perderse para siempre. Evitarlo requiere de un complejo y prolongado proceso de tratamiento, para impedir que el cambio de atmósfera los destruya.

Piezas recuperadas
Es una de las razones esgrimidas por Cultura para decidir que continúen en el mar. No la única, porque el elevado coste de la excavación y de la extracción también ha influido en el acuerdo inicial adoptado por los técnicos de Patrimonio de la Xunta, añadieron las fuentes de ese departamento consultadas.

Por azar, una draga que retiraba lodos en la ensenada de A Coba, en el entorno de la playa de Lago, extrajo tres piezas de artillería (el servidor de una bombarda, un falconete de de hierro y la cureña de una ballesta), así como ocho piezas de una vajilla de cuatro tamaños diferentes y una de pie, estilizada, que todavía conserva la tapa. Todos están siendo tratados en el Museo do Mar de Vigo, donde cuentan con los equipos necesarios para procurar que el contacto con el aire no los destruya.

Cultura todavía no ha adoptado ninguna decisión acerca del lugar donde serán expuestos, una vez concluya el proceso de recuperación.

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Arqueólogos de la empresa Argos confirman el potencial del pecio

2008-04-10T10:59:00.000+01:00

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La Voz de Galicia
April 10, 2008

Contratados por Cultura, arqueólogos subacuáticos de la empresa Argos investigaron el pecio a principios del mes pasado. Ignacio Crespo Liñeiro dirigió una intervención en la que también participaron David Santos Hernández, Davi Fernández Abella y Javier Chao Álvarez, asistidos por Pedro Caleja y José Antonio Betencourt, técnicos del Centro Nacional de Arqueología Náutica y Subacuática de Portugal.

Ignacio Crespo confirmó el potencial histórico del hallazgo y su aparente buen estado de conservación. No dudan que fue construida en la península ibérica, en las últimas décadas del siglo XV o en las primeras del XVI, pero no han hallado documentos que puedan indicar nombre, procedencia ni destino del buque.

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Retorno a la isla de los tesoros marinos de Cala Sant Vicenç

2008-04-08T11:13:00.000+01:00

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Diario de Mallorca
By M. Elena Vallés
April 08, 2008

Los restos del pecio griego hallados en 2002 en Pollença vuelven este mes de Girona para exponerse en el Museo de Mallorca

Las piezas de la embarcación griega halladas en 2002 en Cala Barques, una pequeña ensenada perteneciente a Cala Sant Vicenç, se trasladarán este mes desde el Centre de Arqueologia Subacuàtica de Catalunya al Museo de Mallorca.

Los restos, que se fueron extrayendo durante dos campañas de trabajos arqueológicos que se ejecutaron en el año 2002 y 2004, han sido restaurados y estabilizados en este centro de Girona que está suscrito al Museo de Arqueologia de Catalunya.

El departamento de Patrimonio del Consell de Mallorca dictaminó favorablemente el pasado día 31 de marzo el traslado de todas estas piezas al Museo de Mallorca. Su regreso está pendiente de aprobación en la próxima reunión de comisión. A continuación, se procederá a contratar una empresa de transportes para que traiga los vestigios helénicos hasta el museo.

Algunos de los restos hallados durante las campañas de extracción subacuática ya se remontaron y restauraron en la isla. Tanto es así que alguna de ellas ya luce en el Museo de Mallorca, como es el caso del símpulum que se encontró durante la primera campaña de 2002. Esta pieza es una especie de cucharón que usaban los sacerdotes durante los sacrificios. Aparece asociado al lituus (el bastón curvado de los augures) y al jarro para las libaciones, que es la acción de derramar vino sobre los altares.

Los restos extraídos durante la primera campaña ya se mostraron al público en una pequeña exposición en Pollença. Los vestigios están formados sobre todo de fragmentos de piezas de vajilla, como platos o morteros, de estilo rústico.

Durante la segunda campaña, ejecutada dos años después y en una nueva legislatura, se hallaron más piezas, como por ejemplo un molde joyas.

Durante estos años, el Centre de Arqueologia de Catalunya ha estabilizado sobre todo cerámicas, metales y algún elemento orgánico subacuático. La mayoría de estos tesoros submarinos están conformados por piezas bastante pequeñas y muy fragmentadas.

La importancia del descubrimiento estriba sobre todo en que éste es el único pecio griego que se ha encontrado en la isla y del que se podrán hacer estudios. Por lo que parece se trata de un barco que contaba con una estructura muy especial puesto que estaba construidos a partir de maderas ligadas y cosidas entre sí.

Por lo que hasta ahora se ha podido descubrir, se sabe que, puesto que en la isla no hay ningún antecedente de asentamiento griego, los navegantes de esas tierras helénicas debían pasar por la isla, tirando millas, para dirigirse a otros lugares. Este barco, encontrado en los fondos submarinos de Pollença, no tuvo tanta suerte de llegar a su destino y naufragó.

El hallazgo de la embarcación fue realizado fortuitamente por la escuela de buceo Los Pingüinos de Cala Sant Vicenç el mes de mayo de 2002. El temporal del pasado noviembre del mismo año había dejado al descubierto los restos del pecio. Junto a él se hallaron también algunas ánforas, trozos de cerámica, así como un clavo de grandes dimensiones que se supone que pertenecía al casco de la nave.

Para controlar las excavaciones subacuáticas realizadas en esta zona, el Consell de Mallorca firmó en julio de 2002 un convenio con la Generalitat de Catalunya. En este acuerdo se establecía la sistematización de la intervención arqueológica de las aguas. El Centre de Arqueologia Subacuàtica de Catalunya aportó el Thetis para realizar los trabajos.

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Government of Canada releases major underwater archaeological report on Red Bay, Labrador

2008-04-04T09:43:00.000+01:00

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CNW Group
April 04, 2008

ST. JOHN'S - On behalf of Canada's Environment Minister John Baird, Mr. Norman Doyle, Member of Parliament for St. John's East, today launched a major scientific report entitled: The underwater archaeology of Red Bay: Basque shipbuilding and whaling in the 16th century. This much-anticipated report paints a detailed picture of Basque whale hunting techniques, and of the Basque contributions in European shipbuilding and the development of transatlantic trade routes in the mid-16th century.

"Through the Red Bay project, Parks Canada's underwater archaeologists have set a great example in their field," said Mr. Doyle. "Our Government is proud to recognize their hard work, which will give Canadians a better understanding of Red Bay's history."

For a good part of the 16th century, the Basques engaged in the whaling industry on Canada's East Coast. Years of archival research by historical geographer Dr. Selma Barkham helped identify Red Bay, Labrador, as a site of intense Basque activity. Red Bay was the largest shore whaling station, where vestiges of the Basque presence tell a compelling story of commerce and
courage.

Artifacts profiled in the report include four galeones or naos (ocean-going vessels), one of which is believed to be the San Juan that sunk in 1565. Using pioneering techniques, the San Juan was systemically excavated, raised and recorded in pieces on the surface, reburied and monitored ever since in order to ensure its preservation for centuries to come.

"This report describes the most comprehensive underwater archaeological research project ever undertaken in North America, an invaluable addition to the subject," continued Mr. Doyle. "Our Government appreciates the support received from the residents of the Red Bay area, numerous international experts in the field and the Basque Province of Gipuzkoa."

Findings presented in the 1600-page, five-volume report are based on eight successive seasons of fieldwork led by Parks Canada's Chief Underwater Archaeologist Robert Grenier. Other work includes Dr. Barkham's archival research and the land-based archaeology carried out by Memorial University of Newfoundland under the leadership of Dr. James Tuck.

The report describes the methodology used to excavate and document the underwater site at 0 degrees Celsius and to carry out subsequent studies. The completed underwater archaeological work paints a complete picture of the rich history contained in Red Bay National Historic Site was included on Canada's priority list for consideration by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 2004. That United Nations body adopted the San Juan as its logo representing the Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage.

Copies of the Red Bay underwater archaeology report may be obtained through Publishing and Depository Services, Public Works and Government Services Canada; ISBN 978-0-660-19652-7; Cat. N0.: R62-389/2007E; Web: http://publications.gc.ca/.

For further information: Pamela Gautreau, Communications Manager,Atlantic Region, Parks Canada, (902) 426-5871; (Also available on the Internetat www.pc.gc.ca under Media Room.)

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ARCHAEOLOGISTS DIG UP HISTORIC BRUNEL CEMENT AT SS GREAT BRITAIN

2008-04-03T09:53:00.001+01:00

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24 Hour Museum
April 03, 2008

Isambard Kingdom Brunel is often credited as being the first man to master many of the engineering innovations that fuelled Britain’s industrial revolution. Now, it seems, Portland cement can be added to the list.

Archaeologists working on the site of Brunel’s Great Western Dockyard development next to Brunel’s ss Great Britain, have discovered what is thought to be the first ever substantial use of Portland cement in the construction of a major building.

As part of their work archaeologists uncovered the floor plan of the massive 20 by 50 metre Steam Ship Engine ‘Factory’, a building that survived until it was bombed during the Second World War.

A newly-unearthed Portland cement floor slab comprising of a continuous slab of concrete, up to 400mm thick, has been identified as an aggregate of Portland cement and broken-up stones. The building it supported was constructed in 1839, under the aegis of the great Victorian engineer, to house the machinery which fabricated the world’s first screw-propelled iron ship, the ss Great Britain.

Archaeologists believe that Brunel and colleagues realised the potential of the new material, and were keen to try it out on the new building in Bristol, some four years before it was being officially marketed as ‘Patented Portland Cement’.

The discovery came to light when the BBC Coast presenter and Bristol University academic Dr Mark Horton investigated archaeologists’ findings whilst on a visit to the ship to discuss Bristol University's role within the ‘Brunel Institute’ being built on the site.

“I was amazed to see an enormous expanse of cement floor – part of a floor built significantly earlier than when cement was first meant to have been used,” said Dr Horton.

“We already associate Brunel with a long list of world firsts, but now we can add cement to this. His genius lay in identifying the revolutionary materials that built the modern world.”

While concrete has been known from Roman times, all modern concrete structures owe their origins to the invention of Portland cement in 1824 by Joseph Aspdin. This substance, initially produced on a very small scale, was called Portland cement because of its similarity to stone.

Wessex Archaeology have been working on behalf of the ss Great Britain Trust and Linden Homes, who are building the new Brunel archive and library together with apartments at the dockyard, which was largely destroyed by bombing during World War Two.

The Brunel Institute recently received a £640,000 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund to develop the Brunel Institute Conservation Learning Trust. It will include many items that date back to the 19th century and will house several large collections of rare and historic photographs, books and papers relating to maritime history and archaeology.

The first phase of new apartments will be launched in spring 2008.

Brunel's ss Great Britain, Bristol
Great Western Dock, Gas Ferry Road, Bristol, BS1 6TY, England
T: 0117 926 0680

Open: The ship is open every day except Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. 10am to 6.00pm, April - October (Last entry 5.00pm) 10am to 4.30pm, November - March (Last entry 3.30pm)

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Un tesoro hundido

2008-04-02T11:04:00.000+01:00

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ADN.es

By Ana Parra Torreira
April 02, 2008

Arqueólogos coruñeses rescatan restos de un pecio de finales del XVEl barco está sumergido en la costa de la mariña lucense a tan sólo cuatro metros de profundidad

La costa de Xove esconde un tesoro, de ello ya hablaban los textos de López de Frías en una recopilación de 1545. Se trata de un pecio, pendiente de confirmar si es una nao o una carabela de finales del siglo XV, procedente del norte de Europa y hundido en la costa de la mariña lucense.

Los arqueólogos subacuaticos coruñeses David Santos Hernández, David Fernández Abella e Ignacio Crespo Liñeiro, de la empresa Argos, cuentan con el privilegio de ser los primeros en ver los restos de la nave en directo. Unos restos que se descubrieron hace más de medio año, durante los trabajos de dragado en Xove, en la que se encontraron restos que indicaban la existencia de un pecio. De aquel trabajo de dragado el Museo do Mar de Galicia, en Vigo recibió ocho platos y una jarra de peltre, así como la cureña de una ballesta, un falconete de hierro y un servidor de bombarda.

Primera inmersión

Hace quince días los arqueo-logos coruñeses realizaron la primera inmersión. Un auténtico recital para los ojos de los expertos que se encontraron con restos de bombardas, concreciones de clavos, maderas y lastre a tan sólo cuatro metros de profundidad, así como un túmulo de arena que indica la presencia de los restos del pecio. Y lo más sorprendente, en el puerto de Morás los responsables del dragado inicial habían dejado un saco de obra con restos del buque. Materiales que serán usados para concretar la hipótesis que indica que se trata de una nave construida en la península ibérica a finales del siglo XV o principios del XVI que posiblemente se hundió en su travesía devuelta del norte de Europay que fue sorprendido por una tormenta poco antes de tomar tierra.

Los investigadores

Ahora, tras la prospección inicial de Argos falta la concesión de un permiso por parte de la Xunta para realizar una excavación en la zona que ayude a sostener la historia del pecio hundido.

Si llegan los citados permisos el equipo de arqueologós subacuáticos coruñeses de Argos darán un importante paso en sus carreras.

Antes de comenzar con este trabajo los miembros de Argos ya habían participado en la prospección previa al comienzo de las obras del puerto exterior de A Coruña.

Además en los últimos cinco años han trabajado en el puerto de As Ánimas, Canido, o Bayona entre otros, desarrollando estudios de impacto y control arqueológico y patrimonial en las obras y dragados realizados.

EL TRABAJO

Primeros restos

Hallados durante el dragado de una playa en Xove. Entre lo que sacaron las palas se encontraban una jarra y ocho platos de cuatro tamaños diferentes. Así como maderos procedentes de la estructura de la nave hundida. También restos de una cureña decorada con apliques de bronce con el dibujo de la flor de lis.

Textos

Argos se documentó en el archivo de Mondoñedo en el que se encuentran textos que hablan de un hundimiento en la zona y época del que se cree que se ha encontrado y en otros se hace referencia al reparto de ruanes (telas fabricadas en Ruan Francia) que se rescataron tras el hundimiento.

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Descubren en Baiona el mayor yacimiento submarino de Galicia

2008-03-29T11:18:00.000Z

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La Voz de Galicia
By M. Torres / A. Martínez

March 29, 2008

Se trata de una colección única y fundamental para el estudio de la sociedad española del XVI al XIX

La empresa Archeonauta ha rescatado 35.000 piezas «excepcionales» ocultas en el fondo de la bahía.

Cerámicas, armamento, exóticas vasijas chinas, ánforas, lanzas, pertrechos de embarcaciones, un cañón y, así, hasta 35.000 piezas datadas entre los siglos XVI y XIX. En total, tres toneladas de un patrimonio de incalculable valor que atesoraba el fondo de la bahía de Baiona y que la empresa Archeonauta ha rescatado de su fondo.

El arqueólogo, Miguel San Claudio, director de la intervención, dio a conocer ayer la magnitud del hallazgo. «Sin duda, el yacimiento submarino más grande de Galicia en cuanto a material recuperado y puesto a disposición de la investigación y del público», confirmó el especialista.

Los trabajos de dragado se realizaron durante los últimos cinco meses tras una prospección arqueológica sufragada por Portos y enmarcada en el proyecto de ampliación del muelle baionés que confirmaba la existencia de un importante depósito de material sobre el fondo.

Este descubrimiento no sorprendió, ya que Baiona fue siempre uno de los puertos más importantes de Galicia durante la Edad Media. Sin embargo, la media de restos recuperados, centenares por cada semana de prospecciones, así como la variedad en los objetos y su datación, sí han sido extraordinarios. San Claudio destacó precisamente: «Casi todo nos fue sorprendiendo de una forma u otra pero, quizás, lo más llamativo de todo es el conjunto, la constatación de un tráfico comercial y mercante de primer orden en su momento que hoy hemos podido detectar».

El proceso de catalogación de este tesoro, que comenzará la próxima semana, podría ampliar aún más el intervalo de estudio ya que «algunas de las piezas son probablemente de la época romana».

La cultura material recuperada permitirá analizar un período histórico como es la Edad Moderna, «con unas piezas excepcionales tanto en calidad como en cantidad, que nos remiten al comercio atlántico europeo y aun más allá, al circuito mundial establecido por la Corona Española durante los siglos XVI al XIX». El estudio, manifestó el especialista arqueólogo, «posibilitará poner al alcance de la investigación en España una colección única, que será especialmente útil en un campo con tan pocas referencias en nuestro país como el que abarca este yacimiento».

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Tesoros abandonados

2008-03-26T09:10:00.000Z

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El País
By Raúl Jimeno Mouzo
March 26, 2008

Hace casi un año nos enteramos de que el cazatesoros Odyssey halló y extrajo el botín de un barco español que se hundió a comienzos del siglo XIX muy cerca de nuestras costas. Y esta semana escuchamos que otra empresa "cazatesoros" espera rescatar un tesoro valorado en casi 100 millones de euros (para rescatarlo destinarán poco más de 1 millón de euros) de un galeón español hundido en 1641 en la costa norte de República Dominicana.

En el caso del Odyssey, España mantiene abierto un contencioso ante los tribunales de Estados Unidos, mientras tanto el tesoro rescatado, valorado en 370 millones de euros (17 toneladas de oro y plata), está siendo subastado. Respecto al segundo pecio encontrado, la empresa cazatesoros tiene un acuerdo con República Dominicana para entregarles la mitad del botín, y mientras tanto las autoridades españolas "a mirar" y nosotros a frustrarnos mientras sigue el expolio.

Según diversos estudios, España es el país del mundo con más pecios, y por lo tanto, con un tesoro inmenso que nos pertenece pero que no se hace nada por buscarlo. Hoy en día estamos más concienciados en cuidar nuestra cultura y patrimonio, pero estas noticias duelen en todos los aspectos. Tenemos el viento a favor, y se debería de empezar a hacer algo para recuperar estos tesoros de incalculable valor y con parte de nuestra historia.

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Patrimonio subacuático

2008-03-24T09:23:00.000Z

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El País
By Fernando Santiago
March 24, 2008

El expolio efectuado por la empresa norteamericana Odyssey frente a las costas andaluzas ha devuelto a la actualidad la importancia de la arqueología submarina. La facilidad con la que una empresa localizó, extrajo y transportó a los EE UU el tesoro de un barco, al parecer español, llama la atención sobre la falta de control sobre un amplio patrimonio propiedad del Estado español. Tanto si los pecios están en aguas territoriales españolas como si son barcos de bandera española hundidos en otras aguas, son propiedad del Estado español y, en cualquier caso, merecen ser expuestos al público en vez de formar parte de un negocio privado. En un juzgado de Tampa ( Florida ) sigue el juicio sobre el medio millón de monedas de plata y oro extraídas por la empresa norteamericana y llevadas a EE UU desde Gibraltar. El pecio, denominado por la empresa Odyssey como Black swan, puede ser el buque español La Mercedes, hundido en aguas del Golfo de Cádiz con un importante cargamento de metales preciosos. El Gobierno español contrató los servicios del mismo bufete de abogados norteamericano que ganó el litigio sobre la propiedad de los restos de El Juno y La Galga, dos buques españoles hundidos frente a las costas de Carolina del Norte. El juez ha ordenado a la empresa que entregue toda la información sobre la localización del pecio y sobre el nombre del barco, lo que espera España para declarar su propiedad. De manera paralela, Odyssey ha comprado a otra empresa los derechos sobre un pecio situado en Carolina del Norte que pudiera ser El Salvador, hundido en 1750 cuando viajaba hacia España.

Estos pleitos van a determinar el futuro de miles de restos de barcos, tanto españoles como de otras naciones, hundidos por todo el mundo. Los restos de un barco, ¿pertenecen al país en cuyas aguas se han encontrado? Si se demuestra que eran propiedad de un Estado soberano, ¿siguen siendo suyos? Por si acaso, la Real Academia de la Historia ha pedido que los restos de barcos españoles en todo el mundo sean declarados patrimonio de la humanidad, con lo que se evitaría, en parte, su expolio o, al menos, su comercialización legal. La Junta de Andalucía, mientras tanto, ha iniciado el expediente para declarar Bien de Interés Cultural hasta 55 yacimientos submarinos en toda la plataforma continental andaluza. Lugares señalados e identificados de manera exhaustiva por el Centro de Actividades Subacuáticas de la Junta de Andalucía con sede en la playa de La Caleta de Cádiz. La Junta inicia un expediente que tiene como fin garantizar la conservación de esos restos y puede mejorar la protección de los mismos. Porque no sólo está el caso de la ya famosa empresa norteamericana, que como cotiza en bolsa da publicidad a sus hallazgos. Hay innumerables buzos que sacan a escondidas cañones, ánforas y otros restos desde el fondo del mar. Siempre hubo un expolio continuado y casi natural en las zonas de mayor riqueza, como la provincia de Cádiz. A la vez, había un mercado clandestino en el que participaban, al principio, algunos buzos y luego anticuarios sin escrúpulos que sacaban restos para coleccionistas privados en todo el mundo. Hace años hubo incluso algún militar involucrado en el tráfico de objetos extraídos de pecios situados en el litoral gaditano.

Las fantasías de algunos historiadores o aprendices de tales que señalan fabulosos tesoros en barcos hundidos en el Golfo de Cádiz ha excitado la codicia de muchos que han visto la oportunidad de lucrarse. Hubo quien dijo que en la Bahía de Cádiz había más oro que en el Banco de España, lo que a todas luces es una afirmación temeraria porque nadie ha podido demostrar la riqueza en metales preciosos de los barcos que se hundieron en estas costas. Y lo que es más importante, que los supuestos tesoros sigan enterrados en el lecho marino sin que nadie, en los últimos tres siglos, haya sido capaz de rescatarlos. Es cierto que puede haber tesoros, no sólo en aguas andaluzas, sino en otros lugares. Y no es menos cierto que son de todos los españoles y es necesario preservarlos.

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Un buque cazatesoros rescatará un tesoro español en aguas de República Dominicana

2008-03-24T09:18:00.000Z

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El País
March 24, 2008

'Nuestra Señora de la Concepción' naufragó en 1641 con lingotes de oro y plata, sedas y porcelana china

La empresa estadounidense Marine Explorations Inc. tratará de rescatar el tesoro del galeón español Nuestra Señora de la Concepción valorado en 150 millones de dólares (más de 97,2 millones de euros) de las profundidades de un arrecife de la costa norte de República Dominicana.

El tesoro incluye cientos de monedas de plata y oro y objetos de cerámica china, según la empresa que financia la expedición submarina que zarpará esta semana desde Miami, Florida, rumbo al arrecife de la zona caribeña.

"Hemos esperado este momento durante mucho tiempo", dijo Paul Enright, uno de los propietarios de la firma "cazatesoros", quien destacó la importancia de contar con un "permiso exclusivo" del Gobierno de República Dominicana para efectuar la "búsqueda y recuperación" del tesoro millonario.

Los "objetos ornamentales, monedas, cadenas de oro y cerámica china perteneciente a la dinastía Ming que esperamos recuperar", comentó Enright, forman parte del tesoro del galeón español del siglo XVII, que naufragó a causa de un huracán en 1641, tras hacer escala en La Habana, Cuba, rumbo a España.

La expedición es liderada por Burt Webber Jr., un aventurero y famoso "cazatesoros" estadounidense que, tras años de investigación en archivos, encontró finalmente en 1978, en la costa norte de República Dominicana, los restos del galeón español.

Entre las piezas arqueológicas extraídas entonces figuran lingotes de plata y oro, sedas e incluso porcelana china, un rico tesoro valorado en 14 millones de dólares (más de 9 millones de euros) que, según Webber, forma parte de un pecio hallado unos 120 kilómetros al norte de la costa dominicana y que no está agotado.

La concesión otorgada por el Gobierno de República Dominicana a la empresa de exploración submarina, con sede en Colorado, permitirá explorar en el arrecife llamado banco de Plata, con el único compromiso de entregar al Estado dominicano la mitad de las piezas que puedan ser recuperadas.

"Es una gran aventura en la que vamos a utilizar avances tecnológicos" para localizar el tesoro del galeón español naufragado, destacó Webber, de 65 años y socio de la empresa.

Con un costo superior a los dos millones de dólares (unos 1,3 millones de euros), la misión submarina del barco Ocean Lady, capitaneada por Webber, permanecerá cerca de cinco meses en aguas dominicanas, unos 100 kilómetros al norte de Puerto Plata, a la búsqueda del rico resto arqueológico submarino.

España vs Odyssey

España mantiene abierto un contencioso ante los tribunales de EE UU con otra empresa cazatesoros, Odyssey Marine Exploration, a cuenta de la propiedad de El Cisne Negro, el nombre en clave con el que esta empresa estadounidense bautizó un pecio encontrado en mayo de 2007. Desde que la compañía anunció el descubrimiento del pecio, España ha sospechado que se trataba de un barco español de guerra llamado La Mercedes, hundido en 1804.

Preguntado por la batalla legal sobre el tesoro extraído por el buque Odyssey, Webber criticó la "política de intimidación" que acostumbra a emplear el Gobierno español contra "cualquiera que encuentra restos arqueológicos españoles".

"Honradamente -precisó-, existen muchos, muchos naufragios ricos en la costa española y el Gobierno español no tiene ninguna misión de rescate" en ninguna zona.

Por ejemplo, agregó, frente a la costa de Cádiz "se halla el tesoro increíble de un buque naufragado en 1656", y "hay muchos, muchos más" en aguas territoriales españolas sin que España se preocupe por localizarlos, afirmó.

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Sailor to recreate Phoenicians' epic African voyage

2008-03-22T10:17:00.000Z

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The Independent
By Emily Dugan
March 22, 2008

On the ancient Syrian island of Arwad, which was settled by the Phoenicians in about 2000BC, men are hard at work hammering wooden pegs into the hull of a ship.

But this vessel will not be taking fishermen on their daily trip up and down the coast. It is destined for a greater adventure – one that could solve a mystery which has baffled archaeologists for centuries.

The adventure begins not in Arwad but in Dorset, where an Englishman has taken it upon himself to try to prove that the Phoenicians circumnavigated Africa thousands of years before any Europeans did.

Philip Beale, 47, has commissioned the building of a replica Phoenician ship that he plans to sail around the continent with a crew of 20. Their 10-month expedition sets off in August and will follow the route that seafaring Phoenician merchants are said to have taken more than 2,500 years ago.

Apart from navigation and communications equipment, Mr Beale's crew will have none of the comforts of a 21st-century vessel – their ship has no toilet or running water, no spare sails and no emergency motor. If they run into difficulty, they will have to rely on old-fashioned brawn – and row.

"For me it is the challenge that is the attraction but I am a little wary," Mr Beale admitted yesterday. "I have been round the Cape of Good Hope before in a traditional vessel and I know there are risks. There is a 30 per cent chance that we won't be able to complete it at all."

Mr Beale had the idea for his unusual quest when he read the works of Herodotus, who wrote about the Phoenician voyage. According to the Greek historian, their journey began on the shores of the Red Sea, when the Egyptian King Necho asked a group of Phoenician seamen to attempt the first near-circumnavigation of the continent in 600BC. Mr Beale's crew will use the Suez Canal to reach the point of their predecessors' departure.

Two thousand years after the Phoenicians, the first European known to have rounded southern Africa was a Portuguese navigator, Bartolomeu Dias. He was blown off course in 1488 as he explored the coast in the hope of finding a trade route to Asia.

In pre-Christian times the Phoenicians – referred to in the Bible as "rulers of the sea" – were considered the only sailors capable of navigating their flimsy wooden vessels on such a treacherous voyage. So how will Mr Beale's crew fare in their flimsy replica ship?

"There are lots of dangers," he admitted. "In rough seas there is a risk that it could simply fall apart. And because we have got just one square sail, we cannot sail into the wind, so we might get blown on to rocks."

As if that did not sound frightening enough, the crew also face a considerable risk of running into modern-day pirates as they navigate the African coast.

This is not Mr Beale's first maritime adventure. In his early twenties, he was inspired to study old ships by a picture of an ancient Indonesian schooner that he saw in Java. In 2003, he gave up a career as a City fund manager to commission a replica of that 2,800-year-old boat and sail it to Africa. Since then, he hasn't looked back. "I don't think I could do a nine-to-five now," he said.

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El pecio de Matagrana hallado en El Portil podría ser de un mercante holandés del siglo XVII

2008-03-19T11:22:00.000Z

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Europa Press

March 19, 2008

El arqueólogo coordinador de las actuaciones, José María García Rincón, indicó que "sólo se ha conservado entre el cinco y el diez% de la estructura del mercante"

El pecio de Matagrana localizado el pasado día 14 de febrero en la playa de El Portil de Huelva podría corresponder a un mercante holandés de entre finales del siglo XVII y principios del XVIII, "aunque no se descarta" que pudiera pertenecer incluso al siglo XVI, según dio a conocer el delegado de Cultura de la Junta de Andalucía en Huelva, Juan José Oña.

En rueda de prensa, Oña instó no obstante a esperar a los resultados de los informes científicos y del análisis del carbono-14 que se están realizando en estos momentos, tras concluir el martes la investigación 'in situ' del pecio, para poder ofrecer una cronología y funciones más exactas, aunque sí quiso destacar que a su labor como mercante podría haber seguido una actividad "de tipo industrial relacionada con la pesca en la Costa".

En este sentido, el delegado provincial del ramo señaló que durante el periodo de trabajo de campo han trabajado en la playa de El Portil una media de seis arqueólogos, ayudados por personal auxiliar y asesorados por técnicos foráneos como el francés Eric Rieth, en representación del Centre National de Recherces Scientifiques, y Manuel Izaguirre, técnico de la Diputación Foral de Guipúzcoa, que se han sumado al proyecto y aportarán informes referentes a la datación de la embarcación y a la conformación de su arquitectura naval.

Tras incidir en los "muchísimos inconvenientes" para trabajar en el pecio por el lugar en el que se encontraba, "de difícil acceso para vehículos y maquinaria", Oña se refirió al destino final del pecio de Matagrana e informó de que se están realizando gestiones con un centro de Cartagena especializado en tratar la madera sumergida durante una gran cantidad de tiempo.

El responsable de Cultura vaticinó que "hasta dentro de seis meses no se podrá hablar del traslado del pecio", estableciendo un plazo de cuatro años para la recuperación de la madera, mientras que aseguró que "todavía está por definir las condiciones en las que podría ser exhibido".

Sólo se conserva el 10% de los restos

Del mismo modo, Juan José Oña puso de manifiesto que el pecio "no puede estar más tiempo a la intemperie" e indicó que los expertos "aconsejan su enterramiento en un medio natural lo más parecido a donde ha estado enterrado todo este tiempo", aunque para evitar su deterioro se colocó una trinchera en el perímetro del pecio y un tablestacado, así como un toldo que permite tener ventilado el recinto y evitar el aumento de temperatura en el interior y la evaporación de agua, a la vez que impide que los rayos solares afecten a los restos de madera.

Por su parte, el jefe del Servicio de Bienes Culturales de la Delegación Provincial, Juan José Fondevilla, preció que a partir de ahora se llevarán a cabo una serie de actuaciones encaminadas a "asegurar la conservación preventiva de los restos", mientras que este lunes se mantendrá una reunión con el servicio de Costas del Ministerio de Medio Ambiente "para elegir el emplazamiento para llevar a cabo el soterramiento".

Por último, Fondevilla, que también estuvo acompañado en la rueda de prensa por el arqueólogo encargado de coordinar las actuaciones, José María García Rincón, dio a conocer que "sólo se ha conservado entre el cinco y el diez% de la estructura del mercante".

La excavación del pecio ha sido acometida por la Consejería de Cultura, a través del Centro de Arqueología Subacuática (CAS) dependiente del Instituto de Patrimonio Histórico Andaluz (IAPH) y con la colaboración de arqueólogos de la Delegación de Cultura de la Junta en Huelva.

Fuente: Huelvainformación.es

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Floating a big idea: MIT demos ancient use of rafts to transport goods

2008-03-19T10:24:00.000Z

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Eurekalert.org
By David Chandler
March 19, 2008

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.-- Oceangoing sailing rafts plied the waters of the equatorial Pacific long before Europeans arrived in the Americas, and carried tradegoods for thousands of miles all the way from modern-day Chile to western Mexico, according to new findings by MIT researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Details of how the ancient trading system worked more than 1,000 years ago were reconstructed largely through the efforts of former MIT undergraduate student Leslie Dewan, working with Professor of Archeology and Ancient Technology Dorothy Hosler, of the Center for Materials Research in Archaeology and Ethnology (CMRAE). The findings are being reported in the Spring 2008 issue of the Journal of Anthropological Research.

The new work supports earlier evidence documented by Hosler that the two great centers of pre-European civilization in the Americas-the Andes region and Mesoamerica-had been in contact with each other and had longstanding trading relationships. That conclusion was based on an analysis of very similar metalworking technology used in the two regions for items such as silver and copper tiaras, bands, bells and tweezers, as well as evidence of trade in highly prized spondylus-shell beads.

Early Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch accounts of the Andean civilization include descriptions and even drawings of the large oceangoing rafts, but provided little information about their routes or the nature of the goods they carried.

In order to gain a better understanding of the rafts and their possible uses, Dewan and other students in Hosler's class built a small-scale replica of one of the rafts to study its seaworthiness and handling, and they tested it in the Charles River in 2004. Later, Dewan did a detailed computer analysis of the size, weight and cargo capacity of the rafts to arrive at a better understanding of their use for trade along the Pacific coast.

“It's a nontrivial engineering problem to get one of these to work properly,” explained Dewan, who graduated last year with a double major in nuclear engineering and mechanical engineering. Although the early sketches give a general sense of the construction, it took careful study with a computerized engineering design program to work out details of dimensions, materials, sail size and configuration, and the arrangement of centerboards. These boards were used in place of a keel to prevent the craft from being blown to the side, and also provided a steering mechanism by selectively raising and lowering different boards from among two rows of them arranged on each side of the craft.

Although much of the raft design may have seemed familiar to the Europeans, some details were unique, such as masts made from flexible wood so that they could be curved downward to adjust the sails to the strength of the wind, the centerboards used as a steering mechanism, and the use of balsa wood, which is indigenous to Ecuador.

Dewan also analyzed the materials used for the construction, including the lightweight balsa wood used for the hull. Besides having to study the aerodynamics and hydrodynamics of the craft and the properties of the wood, cloth and rope used for the rafts and their rigging, she also ended up delving into some biology. It turns out that one crucial question in determining the longevity of such rafts had to do with shipworms-how quickly and under what conditions would they devour the rafts? And were shipworms always present along that Pacific coast, or were they introduced by the European explorers?

Shipworms are molluscs that can be the width of a quarter and a yard long. “Because balsa wood is so soft, and doesn't have silicates in it like most wood, they are able to just devour it very quickly,” Dewan said. “It turns into something like cottage cheese in a short time.”

That may be why earlier attempts to replicate the ancient rafts had failed, Dewan said. After construction, those replicas were allowed to sit near shore for weeks before the test voyages. “That's where the shipworms live,” Dewan said. “One way to avoid that is to minimize the amount of time spent in harbor.”

Dewan and Hosler did a simulation of the amount of time it would take for shipworms to eat one of the rafts and concluded that with proper precautions, it would be possible to make two round-trip voyages from Peru to western Mexico before the raft would need replacing.

The voyages likely took six to eight weeks, and the trade winds only permit the voyages during certain seasons of the year, so the travelers probably stayed at their destination for six months to a year each trip, Dewan and Hosler concluded. That would have been enough time to transfer the detailed knowledge of specific metalworking techniques that Hosler had found in her earlier research.

While Hosler's earlier work had shown a strong likelihood that there had been contact between the Andean and Mexican civilizations, it took the details of this new engineering analysis to establish that maritime trade between the two regions could indeed have taken place using the balsa rafts. “We showed from an engineering standpoint that this trip was feasible,” Dewan said. Her analysis showed that the ancient rafts likely had a cargo capacity of 10 to 30 tons-about the same capacity as the barges on the Erie canal that were once a mainstay of trade in the northeastern United States.

Hosler said the analysis is “the first paper of its kind” to use modern engineering analysis to determine design parameters and constraints of an ancient watercraft and thus prove the feasibility of a particular kind of ancient trade in the New World. And for Dewan, it was an exciting departure from her primary academic work. “I just loved working on this project,” she said, “being able to apply the mechanical engineering principles I've learned to a project like this, that seems pretty far outside the scope” of her work in nuclear engineering.

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Wreck found on a Huelva beach could date from XVII century

2008-03-19T10:20:00.000Z

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Typically Spanish
March 19, 2008

The remains of what could be a Dutch trading vessel were uncovered in stormy weather last month

The remains of a centuries-old ship uncovered in stormy weather last month in the Matagrana area of the beach in El Portil, Huelva province, could be a Dutch merchant ship from the end of the XVII century or the beginning of the XVIII.

Speaking to the press on Wednesday, the Junta de Andalucía’s chief of culture for Huelva province, Juan José Oña, and the archaeologist, José María García Rincón, said the trading vessel may also have later been used in the fishing industry along the coast. The results of carbon-14 dating are expected in around a month.

A team of archaeologists has been working at the site since the discovery in February, where the remains, said to be between 5 and 10% of the original structure, have been enclosed in a protective area to prevent any deterioration. The process of moving what is left of the ship to preserve the remains starts with a meeting on Monday to discuss a suitable location.

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Grant to aid shipwreck study

2008-03-18T10:29:00.000Z

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Times Union
By Leigh Hornbeck
March 18, 2008

LAKE GEORGE -- Bateaux Below, a nonprofit organization that studies historic shipwrecks in Lake George, has been awarded a $15,000 grant from the Fund for Lake George.

The grant will help pay for the group's work with side-scan sonar, used to locate and record shipwrecks and other submerged cultural resources.

The fund also committed an annual grant of $5,000 for general support.

"The $15,000 grant is the largest grant ever received by Bateaux Below, and we are indeed very grateful to the Fund for Lake George," said Joseph W. Zarzynski, the group's executive director.

"Lake George has one of the best collections of sunken vessels in the country, and this grant will help in our archaeological studies of these noteworthy shipwrecks."

The underwater archaeology team has been conducting a shipwreck inventory of the lake since 1988. Once the inventory is completed, probably over the next few years, Bateaux Below will be able to determine how best to use its resources toward the interpretation and historic preservation of the lake's underwater treasures.

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Ancient seafarers may have been first settlers

2008-03-15T10:32:00.000Z

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Times Colonist
By Randy Boswell
March 15, 2008

B.C. coast was earliest gateway to Americas, scientists say, challenging prevailing theory

A team of U.S. researchers has proposed a new "working model" for when and how humans came to the New World.

Their research adds credence to a controversial theory that ancient seafarers, travelling by boat along the ice-fringed British Columbia coast, launched the peopling of the Americas about 15,000 years ago.

The proposal, published yesterday in the journal Science, challenges a long-held view that the earliest newcomers to North America were big-game hunters who arrived about 12,000 years ago from Siberia, pursuing mammoths and other ice age prey across the dried-up Bering Strait to Alaska and the Yukon.

They then eventually spread south to warmer parts of North America through an ice-free corridor in present-day Alberta.

It appears, the U.S. researchers conclude, that both streams of migration occurred. But their study tilts the crucial matter of identifying the "first" wave of North Americans toward the coastal migrants, and sets the date of that arrival back by at least 2,000 years, to 13,000 BC or earlier.

"If this is the time of colonization, geological data from Western Canada suggest that humans dispersed along the recently de-glaciated Pacific coastline," the team, led by Texas A&M University anthropologist Ted Goebel, asserts.

"The first Americans used boats, and the coastal corridor would have been the likely route of passage, since the interior corridor appears to have remained closed for at least another 1,000 years," the study adds.

"Once humans reached the Pacific Northwest, they could have continued their spread southward along the coast to Chile, as well as eastward."

This entry route would help explain the growing number of archeological sites dating from before 13,000 years ago, which the previous prevailing theory of an overland migration couldn't account for.

Presumed archeological traces left by the New World pioneers along B.C.'s coast would have been submerged by the rising Pacific Ocean about 10,000 years ago, after the final retreat of the glaciers. That's why Canadian scientists have been scouring raised sea caves on Vancouver Island and elsewhere in B.C., looking for direct proof that this earlier coastal migration took place.

Those caves, it's believed, were among the earliest ice-free refuges after the glaciers retreated, and later escaped flooding from the rising Pacific. Researchers believe they harbour evidence of a prehistoric ecosystem -- and potentially even human artifacts.

In another project funded by the Canadian government, federal scientists are preparing this year to probe the shallow seafloor off the Queen Charlotte Islands in search of possible abandoned campsites inundated by the ocean millennia ago.

The investigation near Burnaby Island, led by Parks Canada scientist Daryl Fedje, is seeking evidence that ancient Asian seafarers, drawn on by food-rich kelp beds, began populating this hemisphere thousands of years before the migrants of the continental interior tracked prey east of the Rockies.

The earlier maritime migrants are thought to have plied the coastal waters of the North Pacific in sealskin boats, moving in small groups over many generations from their traditional homelands in the Japanese islands or elsewhere.

In their study, the U.S. researchers also cite genetic evidence suggesting "all modern Native Americans descended from a single-source population" in ancient Asia.

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Los arqueólogos confirman que en Xove hay un pecio de unos 500 años

2008-03-13T12:06:00.000Z

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La Voz de Galicia
By Salvador Serantes
Marh 06, 2008

La prospección submarina aconseja un sondeo para valorar el potencial de los restos de un barco sin identificar

Confirmado. Los restos arqueológicos que por casualidad aparecieron en la ensenada de A Coba, en el litoral de Xove, proceden de una embarcación que se fue a pique entre finales del siglo XV y principios del XVI, quinientos años atrás. La prospección submarina realizada el pasado fin de semana aconseja un segundo sondeo para valorar el potencial histórico de lo que queda de un pecio aún por identificar, pero que aparentemente estaría en buen estado de conservación. Son las primeras impresiones de Ignacio Crespo, el director de una intervención arqueológica financiada por la Consellería de Cultura.

Un equipo de cuatro personas se sumergió varias veces durante el pasado fin de semana en la zona marítima próxima a la playa de Lago. Pertenece a la empresa Argos, a la que Cultura encomendó la misión de averiguar la procedencia de los vestigios que aparecieron por casualidad hace casi dos años, cuando una draga retiraba lodos en la zona. Fue un punto y seguido en una investigación iniciada hace meses, que todavía no ha permitido concretar con certeza el tipo de barco, su nombre, su nacionalidad ni su procedencia.

Protegido por un túmulo
Ateniéndose a la estricta normativa en materia de patrimonio, la prospección se ciñó a una revisión de la superficie del fondo marino, sin removerlo. Equipados con cámaras y detectores de metales, entre otros medios, los arqueólogos han comprobado que el pecio está protegido por un túmulo que ha formado la arena, que cubrió la embarcación en los años posteriores al hundimiento y que fue apelmazándose con el paso del tiempo. Constataron que bajo el fondo marino hay piezas metálicas, partes del lastre del barco e incluso restos la madera con la que fue construido.

Aunque el informe valorativo previo aún está siendo elaborado, el director de la investigación apunta que probablemente sugerirán a Cultura la conveniencia de sumergirse de nuevo para sondear por tramos la zona donde está localizado el pecio. Una nueva fase del estudio científico que permitirá cerciorarse del estado de conservación del barco y de los vestigios que puedan quedar en la zona.

La opción de excavar
Si finalmente se confirma el interés arqueológico que se percibe a primera vista, quedaría por decidir si se excava la zona y, en función de los hallazgos, si se extraen. Depende de Cultura, pero resulta determinante la necesidad de garantizar que recibirán el tratamiento adecuado para conservarlos y evitar que se deterioren para siempre al entrar en contacto con el aire.

Por esa razón, los restos de piezas de artillería y de vajilla que aparecieron por casualidad cuando se dragaba la zona, están siendo custodiados en el Museo do Mar de Vigo. Allí cuentan con los medios apropiados para someterlos al complejo y prolongado proceso de conservación y de restauración que, de no surgir inconvenientes, permitirá exponerlos al público en el futuro.
Vestigios ya recuperados

Ignacio Crespo considera «espectaculares» los vestigios ya recuperados, aunque se muestra cauto y reitera que, con excepción de esos restos, por ahora trabajan con «indicios».

Palpables, aunque solo para los expertos que trabajan en su tratamiento y restauración, ya son los restos extraídos por azar en la ensenada de A Coba. Entre ellas las piezas de artillería, como el servidor de una bombarda (cañón de retrocarga), de unos 50 centímetros de longitud; un falconete de hierro que mide alrededor de 160 centímetros y que está dañado por la sal marina; o la cureña de una ballesta, de unos 30 centímetros de longitud, cubierta de bronce en su extremo y con apliques en forma de flor de lis.

Lo mismo ocurre con las ocho piezas de una vajilla, de cuatro tamaños diferentes y construidas en peltre, una aleación de estaño, cobre y plomo, así como con la jarra de pie, estilizada y que todavía conserva la tapa.

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Wreckage found under 25 feet of water leaves authorities searching for answers

2008-03-12T14:47:00.000Z

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Al.com
By Ron Colquitt
March 12, 2008

A fisherman experimenting with his new sonar detection device discovered the wreckage of a single-engine airplane this week under about 25 feet of water in Big Creek Lake, authorities said.

The fisherman, Teddy Shepherd, made the discovery about noon Monday near the lake's boat ramp. The plane appeared to be upside down but not badly broken up, he said.

"At first I didn't believe it and had to take a second look," he said. "There is not supposed to be a plane under water."

Kate Johnson, Mobile County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman, said divers with the Sheriff's Flotilla went down Tuesday and did not find any bodies in or near the plane, which was identified as a Beechcraft Sierra.

She said the water was murky, and the divers had trouble reading the plane's tail number. As a result, they are not sure if they got the right number to report to the Federal Aviation Administration to help determine ownership.

Johnson said flotilla members brought up a seat cushion, part of the landing gear and what appeared to be a side window. She said no drugs or personal items that would help identify the plane's owner or the pilot were found during the dives.

There have been no reports of recent plane crashes in that area of northwest Mobile County, she said.

That type of plane carries four people and has retractable landing gear, according to Jim Coleman, a Baldwin County attorney and private pilot. Coleman did not see the plane but was told about it by the Press-Register.

The Mobile Area Water and Sewer System regulates the lake, which is the city's drinking water source.

"The only concern for water quality is if the plane is moved," MAWSS Director Malcolm Steeves said Tuesday. "We would hope there would be care taken to contain any fuel or other cargo that might have potential for causing problems."

Johnson said it could be days or weeks before the plane is removed.

Shepherd, 45, said he bought the sonar device for $1,000 four days before he took it to Big Creek Lake to try it out. He purchased it from a Baldwin County search and rescue organization.

Shepherd uses the instrument to search for underwater objects, such as trees or parts of old bridges, that attract fish. It can detect objects up to 400 feet deep.

Coleman, the 52-year-old attorney, has been a pilot for about 10 years and volunteers with the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary in its searches for missing people, dead bodies and water pollution.

He said there is a small grass landing strip near the lake and other places nearby that a pilot could put a plane down in an emergency. The lake also is just a few miles north of Mobile Regional Airport.

Coleman said the plane has two doors, so it would be easy for an uninjured person to escape in an emergency.

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www.airplanes-underwater.blogspot.com

Underwater Archeology in Iran

2008-03-12T08:55:00.000Z

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Iranian.ws
March 12, 2008

As evidenced by archeological documents, the ancient city of Kish, the wall of the ancient city of Gorgan, Takht-e Suleiman and part of the Portuguese Castle are submerged in Iran's coastal waters. Although Iran's underwater archeological activities are over half a century old, this topic is yet to be treated in a suitable manner.

Two centuries have passed and archeology has yet to achieve its rightful position in Iran. This science needs full revision, as Iran has special importance in human civilization and its role in establishing other cultures inspired by its civilization is undisputed. For this reason, Iran Cultural Heritage Organization (ICHO) is not able to take charge of many historical grounds. Dissemination of information is so poor that many in our society still consider archaeologists as treasure hunters! On the other hand, Iranian archaeologists are deprived of the most elementary facilities, with credits being allocated to field activities being grossly disproportionate with the vast expanse of historical sites, cited 'Iran International Magazine'.

Information obtained during 28 years of explorations has not yet been published and it seems they are going to become as ancient as the archeological relics themselves! Also, the wide gap between academic archeological centers and the executive bodies has damaged educational fundaments and prevented archeology from being divided into specialist subgroups. Therefore, after five decades of underwater archeological activities, Iran Cultural Heritage Organization has only recently decided to form such subgroups. These so called "subgroups" often have so few members that it brings into doubt whether they could be called a group at all. But all problems aside, the following is the result of a research on underwater archeology in Iran.

The necessity of establishing an underwater archeological group has been always felt due to Iran's long marine borders and presence of a powerful navy during various periods of Iran's history, especially during the rule of Achaemenids. Therefore, ICHO established an underwater archeology group in 1999 in line with conventions for preserving underwater cultural heritage as a research and field group supervised by the Archeology Research Institute.

The group has so far carried out three independent expeditions off the coasts of Siraf Port, Kish and Lahijan, but information about the results of their studies is largely lacking or scanty. Although 50 years have passed since initiation of underwater archeological activities, this topic has not been treated seriously in our country, so that although the above group was established four years ago, it only has three archaeologists as members. This trend can also affect underwater cultural heritage due to widespread destruction of underwater relics at national and transnational levels and this must sound the alarm for the concerned officials.

Results of Underwater Explorations

Dispatching an underwater archeology group to Siraf port in Bushehr province was a turning point in archeological studies. Another group of archaeologists were sent to Takab in 2002 to find answers to ambiguities with regard to submerged relics in Takht-e Suleiman Lake located 45 kilometers from the city, had obtained valuable information.

Identifying canals and outlets of the lake, discovering relics from Ilkhanid period at southwestern corner of the lake and observing small animals and plants grown at shallow waters were the most important achievements of the explorations.

A member of underwater archeological group said other results of the study were identifying outlets of the lake at the depths of 5 and 15 meters considering sediments formed on the outlets. Therefore, initiation of the new phase of archeological activities in Bushehr port will undoubtedly reveal valuable information about the historical Siraf port.

Underwater Archeology in Iran, Strategies and Challenges

Despite having potential grounds, vast seas, numerous islands and a long history of sailing in Iranian waters (the first documents on marine navigations were obtained in Choghamish). Iranian officials have not been able to establish a qualified group in the field. Therefore, the seas that were once a passageway for Achaemenid and Ashkani ships conducting trade or putting down invaders have been left unstudied. Historical sources, especially Western historians, have written a lot about the might of the Iranian navy under Darius, but it is not clear why our officials ignore the importance of strategic studies in this regard.

Even Arab countries spend a lot to prove their past civilization's identity, while our officials do nothing and are waiting for another part of our historical documents to be destroyed under waters. For years, the Foreign Ministry has been haggling with neighboring countries about the three Iranian islands, while those countries were satellites of Iran until several years ago and studies related to past civilizations around the Persian Gulf can refute their claims. But instead of accepting the reality, we are trying to make excuses, because basically we never think about the acme of our culture and civilization let alone recapturing those summits.

Rich in Marine Sites

Historical and artistic richness of archeological sites, especially historical coasts are such that according to available reports, historical objects have been washed ashore along Bushehr coasts during the ebb of the sea. For this reason, a 15-day study in this port city was launched in February 2002 and found historical pieces of pottery and a millstone along Bushehr coasts.

With regard to his activities, Mir-Eskandari said that "when we started our research in Bandar Rig, at the beginning of 2003 we noticed that nets cast into the sea by local residents hit pottery pieces. Our group was dispatched to the region. The region is about 10 hectares and we found a helmet, a suit of armor and pieces of pottery after exploring a small part of the region. Therefore, given the area of the region, we hope to resume our studies in summer. During our sessions about underwater archeology, we reached the conclusion that our finances were minimal and we were even risking our necks, but we started studies after passing theoretical and practical diving courses."

With regard to method of study or access to archeological sites, he added, "We refer to our texts in this regard. For example, we know that many ships sank during the Achaemenid period or that the city found in Egypt belongs to a historical period. In fact, underwater archeology must be based on studies and it cannot be done out of the blue. We went to found objects related to the Islamic era in Bandar Rig and we didn't think that we would find anything more ancient, like pottery used for carrying drinks, which belonged to Mesopotamia."

Referring to the fact that UNESCO is setting regulations for underwater archeology, Mir-Eskandari noted that the world body has drawn up sanctuaries and marine borders as well as laws related to discovered relics. The current year has been called the Year of Underwater Archeology by ICOMOS and UNESCO is trying to mark this occasion in Iran.

The prospects of marine archeology have a bright outlook, but organizational measures inside the country are few and two or three people cannot accomplish much. At present, limitations and factionism has weakened our efforts and we have to sign contracts with people outside the organization. The so-called societies favoring cultural heritage mainly pursue their own interests or cooperate with smugglers!

Underwater Heritage Endangered

Just at the time that our grandfathers were asleep or pretended to be asleep, the most precious of Iran�s artistic property was being amassed at large European museums. It is a bitter reality that a lot of cultural works of our country have been smuggled out, but there are no documented reports available. It should suffice to note that most large museums have a special section on Iran. Although no authentic reports have been presented on smuggling of underwater heritage, but the mere thought of those treasures is enough to tempt the cultural heritage mafia and guide them toward the Iranian waters. Intact areas can only be encroached upon through a collusion of power, economy and immunity from prosecution. An example was four years ago when a ship belonging to the Qajar period was taken out of waters in Lahijan, Gilan province, only to reveal that no historical relics remained inside.

Regret will not change anything and historical relics that have been there for centuries are being plundered due to our negligence. Therefore, it is necessary for Iran Cultural Heritage Organization to prepare documents for underwater historical sites and study them.

Necessity of Reviewing Programs

As evidenced by archeological documents, the ancient city of Kish, the wall of the ancient city of Gorgan, Takht-e Suleiman and part of Portuguese Castle are submerged. The ICHO has put studying Gorgan wall on its agenda for the current year, but nothing has been mentioned about inaugurating a marine museum or programs for repairing submarine cultural heritage. Whether the organization would be able to save this heritage by drawing up appropriate plans would be clarified in the course of time. But its officials should know that every leaf which is taken off this ancient book could not be repaired and they would be held responsible for the performance of the organization currently run by them.

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Divers to probe shipwreck's secrets

2008-03-11T08:26:00.000Z

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The Gazette
By Ken Meaney
March 11, 2008

A team of divers bolstered by an underwater robot will head to an area off Cape Breton this spring to hunt for the wreck of the ferry Patrick Morris, which sank in heavy seas in 1970 while trying to reach another ship in distress.

Originally called the New Grand Haven, the Morris was built in Quebec in 1945, and operated between Florida and Cuba until the revolution there in 1959, said diver Terry Dwyer, who will lead the expedition to find the railcar ferry in April.

When it was bought by the Canadian government, it was renamed in honour of a 19th century Newfoundland politician named Patrick Morris, Dwyer said, and put on the run between Cape Breton and Newfoundland.

The 140-metre vessel sank during a failed rescue attempt for another ship in distress in 1970 with the loss of four lives, including the captain, Newfoundlander Roland Penney, who remained on board the sinking ship with three other officers as the crew got away in a lifeboats.

His last, prophetic words: "Boys, I think you'd better get that boat out as fast as you can. You haven't much time."

Penney was right. The Morris went under in 30 minutes or so.

The other ship, a wood fishing boat called the Enterprise, also was lost with its crew of eight. The Morris met her end trying to retrieve a body from the Enterprise, Dwyer said.

Dwyer's interest in the Morris, which he hopes to turn into a documentary, stems from a lifelong love of wreck diving. Nova Scotia and Newfoundland are a paradise for divers - Nova Scotia alone is home to over 10,000 shipwrecks.

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Neanderthal treasure trove 'at bottom of sea'

2008-03-10T14:45:00.000Z

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The Independent
By David Keys
March 10, 2008

Some of the world's best preserved prehistoric landscapes survive in pristine condition at the bottom of the North Sea, archaeologists claimed yesterday.

Academic interest in what are being described as drowned Stone Age hunting grounds is likely to increase dramatically after the discovery of 28 Neanderthal flint axes on the sea bed off the East Anglian coast.

Dating from at least 50,000-60,000 years ago, they were found with other flint artefacts, a large number of mammoth bones, teeth and tusk fragments, and pieces of deer antler. The sea bed location was probably a Neanderthal hunters' kill site or temporary camp site.

The axes – one of the largest groups ever found – were spotted by a keen-eyed amateur archaeologist when a consignment of North Sea gravel arrived at the Dutch port of Flushing.

The cache was found 8 miles off Great Yarmouth and is the most northerly point in the North Sea that Neanderthal tools have been discovered. It had been feared that the ice sheets that destroyed most pre-ice age Brit-ish landscapes had done the same to the land surfaces which existed where the North Sea is now.

But archaeologists now suspect that some Neanderthal landscapes have survived under the North Sea. What's more, they are now certain that hundreds or even thousands of square miles of post-ice age prehistoric landscapes do survive there. On land they have largely been destroyed or degraded by centuries of agriculture, later human settlement and natural erosion.

The North Sea is of immense value to archaeologists and is the largest area of drowned landscape in Europe. "It's vital that parts of it should be considered as a potential World Heritage site," said Professor Vince Gaffney of the University of Birmingham, a leading authority on North Sea archaeology.

Professor Chris Stringer, Research Leader in Human Origins at the Natural History Museum, said: "The quality and quantity of material from the North Sea shows what a rich resource it is for helping to reconstruct missing phases of our prehistory. The evidence should be preserved and studied. World heritage status would help in that process."

In the southern North Sea, Dutch prehistorians working alongside North Sea fishermen over the past decade have identified about 100 Neanderthal flint axes, 200 later Stone Age bone, antler and flint artefacts made by anatomically modern humans, and the remains of thousands of mammoths, woolly rhinos and other ice-age mammals.

Detailed archaeological research at the bottom of the North Sea would be likely to solve a host of Stone Age mysteries. It should help establish when Britain was recolonised by humans after a 100,000-year uninhabited period. It may also reveal for the first time the full technological capabilities of Neanderthal Man, because preservation on and in the sea bed is extremely good. Wooden, stone and bone implements have almost certainly survived.

Later this week, British and Dutch archaeologists will meet in Holland to formulate a joint program of North Sea research. German, Belgian, Danish and Norwegian archaeologists and oceanographers are likely to be included in a plan to map and investigate the North Sea's prehistoric landscapes in detail.

The discovery of the 28 Neanderthal axes was initially reported to the Dutch government archaeological agency, who passed the information via English Heritage to the gravel extraction firm Hanson Aggregates.

"This is the single most important archaeological find from the North Sea. We have stopped dredging that area and have created an exclusion zone to protect the site," said a senior Hanson geologist Robert Langman.

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Missing sailor discovered 60 years later

2008-03-09T12:35:00.002Z

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The Argus
By Rachel Wareing
March 09, 2008

The last resting place of a Sussex sailor has been discovered in the icy depths of a Norwegian fjord.

Charles Gowers and more than 100 of his crewmates died when HMS Hunter was sunk during the Battle of Narvick in April 1940.

Mr Gowers, 39, is remembered on the village war memorial in Selmeston, near Polegate, where he lived with his wife Annie, but his grave remained unmarked when the Norwegian navy found the ship during a training exercise.

Now the site will finally be marked as a war grave, after laying undiscovered for almost seventy years 1,000ft underwater.

On Saturday ships from the Royal Navy, the Netherlands Maritime Force and the Norwegian Navy laid wreaths over the spot in a commemorative service.

Major General Garry Robison, the commander of the UK Amphibious Force, said finding HMS Hunter had been a "poignant moment".

He said: "Being able to pay our respects along with our Norwegian and Dutch allies is particularly fitting to those who lost their lives."

The ship was discovered by a Norwegian minehunter participating in a large multinational exercise with the Royal Navy, Royal Norwegian Navy and the Royal Netherlands Navy along with ships from Spain, Belgium and Germany.

The sunken vessel was picked up on an echo sounder, and a remote-operated submarine was sent to investigate.

Several attempts had previously been made to locate the ship without success.

Colonel John Øglænd, of the Norwegian Army, said it was "very special" to have found the ship during a multinational exercise.

He added: "We remain close allies and are eternally grateful to those who helped preserve our freedom."

Colonel Mike Paine, a county field officer for the Royal British Legion in Sussex, said he was pleased the site would be treated with the respect it deserved.

He said: "We strongly support the preservation of war graves. This prevents diving clubs from gaining access to wrecks, ensuring the remains of servicemen entombed in wrecks are undisturbed."

HMS Hunter was one of two Allied destroyers lost during the first Battle of Narvik, which took place on the night of April 9 1940.

The Hunter and five other H-class destroyers of the 2nd Destroyer Flotilla had attacked the German destroyers which had transported German land forces to occupy Narvik in northern Norway the previous day.

The flotilla had sunk the destroyers Z 21 Wilhelm Heidkamp and Z 22 Anton Schmidt, heavily damaged Z 17 Diether von Roeder and sunk seven enemy transport ships.

As they turned to leave, the flotilla was attacked by three German destroyers emerging from the Herjangsfjord and then by two more coming from Ballangen Bay.

The flotilla leader, HMS Hardy, was badly damaged and had to be beached in flames, while the Hunter sank at 5.30am after it came under fire and collided with HMS Hotspur.

Just 35 of the 145-strong crew survived.

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Destroyer a prospect for NLR museum fleet

2008-03-06T16:08:00.002Z

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MWA News
By Jake Sandlin
March 06, 2008

North Little Rock’s maritime museum is studying the addition of a 390-foot-long destroyer to its site on the Arkansas River at no initial cost, the museum’s director said Wednesday.

Ship preservationists have been looking for a new home for the USS Orleck since the sale last summer of the Levingston Island property in Orange, Texas, where it had been since December 2006.

The buyers gave the Southeast Texas War Memorial and Heritage Foundation that owns the Orleck until this month to move it.

“Basically I’m just doing our cost analysis if it gets here and what it’s going to cost us [to maintain ],” said Greg Zonner, director of North Little Rock’s Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum, 120 Riverfront Drive. “For us, it [the proposal ] is just kind of sitting there. We haven’t said yea or nay.” The Orleck would join the USS Razorback submarine at the on-river museum just east of the Main Street Bridge. But its arrival would hinge on the feasibility of towing such a large vessel up the Mississippi and Arkansas rivers.

“They think they can do it,” Zonner said, referring to a group associated with the Orleck’s preservation and fundraising. “We’re not really pursuing it. I basically told them if it costs us anything, we couldn’t do it.” Bob Orleck of Randolph, Vt., executive director and treasurer of the USS Orleck Association, confirmed that North Little Rock is being seriously considered for the destroyer.

“We’re working toward the goal of getting her up there,” said Orleck, a nephew of Lt. Joseph Orleck, for whom the ship is named. “We’re hopeful that it’s a perfect fit for the ship.” The association has about 1, 500 members, said Orleck, who served on the Gearing Class destroyer. He is also president of the Orleck’s nonprofit Education Preservation and Information Corp., which promotes reunions, fundraising and news about the Orleck.

“Our group would provide not only financial support for the ship but also would help in providing a great deal of volunteer effort, not only to help with the Orleck but with any ships at the [North Little Rock ] museum,” Orleck said.

Zonner said the Orleck association contacted him about relocating the ship to North Little Rock, and he at first turned it down.

“I said, ‘ Gee, guys, first I don’t think you can get [the Orleck ] up here, and secondly we don’t have the money to do it, ’” Zonner recalled. “They came back and said, “ We think we can get it there. And can you take it if we pay all the expenses in getting it there ?’” The museum is still trying to add the tugboat Hoga that survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and is now part of the Navy’s inactive fleet at Suisun Bay near San Francisco. North Little Rock obtained the title to it in 2005, but it could cost the city a minimum of $ 400, 000 to transport the Hoga from California. When North Little Rock got the Razorback submarine from Turkey in 2004, the draft of the submarine — or how much water depth is needed for a vessel to float — wasn’t sufficient in shallow parts of the Arkansas River, and the craft was held in Rosedale, Miss., for more than two weeks.

The submarine draft was as much as 14 feet; the river’s channel was mostly between 10 and 12 feet deep.

Barges were eventually employed to lift the sub higher in the river to finish its journey.

Zonner said he’s been told the destroyer drafts about 13 feet now but could get close to 10 feet “after they basically empty her out.” “They seem to think they can do it,” he said.

Orleck called the movement upriver “very do-able.” “It takes an awful lot of smart people, but they will be able to do it from what I hear,” Orleck said.

Where the destroyer would be placed along the river is another question.

The museum would likely pull away the two barges moored on the river and put the 390-foot destroyer next to the 311-foot Razorback.

A distance of 427 feet lies between the Junction Bridge that crosses over the river and the end of the Patriot tugboat, used by the Arkansas Queen Riverboat operation alongside the museum. That’s enough room for the Orleck, Zonner said.

“Theoretically, it should fit,” Zonner said. “But we’re still a long way from it going there.” If the already-renovated barges had to be moved from the museum site, they could be moved upriver near Burns Park for small groups to rent, said Bob Rhoads, the city’s parks and recreation director.

“I really haven’t looked at the costs,” Rhoads said, adding that he was told of the possibility only last week. “It could be a similar situation for our rentals to smaller groups at like the [park’s ] hospitality house or pavilions. That’s one way I look at it.” The Orleck, built in Orange, Texas, and commissioned during World War II, served in the Korean and Vietnam wars. As it did with the Razorback submarine, the U. S. Navy sold the Orleck to Turkey after it was decommissioned in 1982.

It made a return in 2000 to Orange after being decommissioned from the Turkish navy in 1998.

After Hurricane Rita tore the Orleck and other vessels from their moorings at Ochiltree-Inman Park in September 2005, severely damaging the Orleck, the ship was moved for repairs. Once completed, the ship relocated to Levingston Island the next year.

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Wreck of 1940 Royal Navy destroyer found in a Norwegian fjord

2008-03-06T15:12:00.002Z

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Mirror.co.uk
March 06, 2008

The wreck of a Royal Navy destroyer sunk by the German navy in 1940 with the loss of 110 lives has been found in a Norwegian fjord.

The location of HMS Hunter was a mystery until Norwegian minehunter Hnoms Tyr found her earlier this week during an exercise.

Its echo system revealed the vessel 305metres underwater, the Ministry of Defence said yesterday.

A wreath-laying ceremony will be held on Saturday involving the Royal Navy, the Netherlands Maritime Force and the Norwegian Navy.

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Why deep-sea wrecks need protection

2008-03-06T15:04:00.001Z

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The Herald
By David Ross
March 06, 2008

From Scapa Flow to the Sound of Mull, their scattered remains chronicle Scotland's rich seafaring history.

Now ministers want to increase protection for the country's shipwrecks, ensuring future generations are able to explore and enjoy a precious historic marine environment.

The aim of new legislation is to better record and safeguard sites from the Spanish merchantman overcome by seas off Kinlochbervie at the close of the 16th century while carrying Italian pottery, to the Blessing of Burntisland, a ferry that sank in the Firth of Forth in 1633 carrying the baggage train of Charles I.

Launching a consultation on the proposed Scottish Marine Bill yesterday, Culture Minister Linda Fabiani said the legislation was a significant step forward.

"By enabling discussion with stakeholders, this consultation will help to provide the Scottish Government with informed policies to work towards our aspiration for a marine historic environment that is better defined and recorded, safeguarded and understood, with a positive contribution to make to the economic and cultural fabric of today's Scotland."

Historic Scotland said the legislation will broaden the range of marine historic assets that can be designated on the basis of "national importance", establish mechanisms for consultation prior to designation, and appeal procedures.

At present there are 15 underwater wreck sites around Scottish coasts that enjoy the statutory protection of two different laws. For example, the HMS Campania, which was sunk in the Firth of Forth in 1918, comes under the Protection of Wrecks Act 1973.

But seven of the remaining wrecks of the German fleet scuttled in Scapa Flow, Orkney, in 1919 are scheduled as ancient monuments, and enjoy the same protection afforded to 8000 nationally important monuments scheduled on Scottish land.

According to Philip Robertson, Historic Scotland's senior inspector of marine archaeology, there is need for reform.

"The existing laws are widely considered ineffective below the low water mark. The proposals for new legislation would give us a more effective and workable tool with which to safeguard wrecks and other marine sites which are considered to be of national importance.

"Three-and-a-half thousand divers a year visit the wrecks in Scapa Flow and the people of Orkney have done a great job in protecting them, but occasionally things are removed. The new legislation would make it crystal clear that this was not permitted, but without adding onerous licensing conditions for visitors to these sites.

"Meanwhile, divers wishing merely to visit Scotland's eight historic wrecks designated under the Protection of Wrecks Act 1973 must obtain a licence from Historic Scotland. The proposals would allow Historic Scotland to manage activities depending on the needs of each site."

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Sonar scanning of HMAS Sydney site begins

2008-03-06T14:58:00.001Z

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Perth Now
By Braden Quartermaine
March 06, 2008

SONAR scanning of the HMAS Sydney search area off the WA coast has begun - despite initial fears about the difficult seabed terrain.

Shipwreck hunter David Mearns initially feared the difficult seabed encountered could sabotage the mission.

But after a few "uneasy'' hours, Mr Mearns said the seabed flattened out and his dream of solving our greatest wartime mystery is now continuing in earnest.

The 24-hour a day search that will continue for up to two months or until the Sydney is discovered, with Mr Mearns predicting "many twists and turns to come''.

"As our sonar was tracking through the initial section of our first trackline I started to get very concerned that luck wasn't going to be on our side,'' Mr Mearns said.

"The seabed geology wasn't that awful, but it certainly wasn't going to be easy to detect a shipwreck amongst all the geological formations that cluttered our screens.

"The Geosounder's watch officers were also finding it difficult maintaining the perfectly straight trackline we require at the slow speeds of 2.5 knots. The combination of the two difficulties, amongst a number of other technical issues, made the first few hours searching very uneasy.

"As the sea is ever changing, however, so was our fortunes and a couple of hours later the seabed started to get very flat and featureless -- ideal terrain for shipwreck hunting -- and the Geosounder began crabbing down the line at an angle that maintained good steerage as well as speed.

"It always takes some time to iron out the kinks and for a search to take on a pattern and rythm of efficiency and this is what first tracklines are for. We can only hope that our good fortune continues although experience tells me that there are many twists and turns to come.

"The most anxious time for any search is the first sonar trackline through the search area. This is when you learn whether the area you are searching consists of either rough geological terrain or a flat smooth seabed.

"You also learn for the first time whether the weather and sea conditions will allow you to tow the sonar in the direction and speed your desire without difficulty. Complications due to rough geology and/or uncooperative weather and sea conditions can make all the difference to whether a search ends successfully, or in failure.''

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Laws to shore up shipwreck protection

2008-03-06T14:51:00.002Z

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Evening News
March 06, 2008

SHIPWRECKS in the Forth are set to be protected from scavengers by new Scottish Government legislation.

Ministers want to better record and safeguard wreck sites off the Scottish coast, by allowing more marine sites to be designated of “national importance”.

Currently, 15 wrecks are protected under two different laws – the Protection of Wrecks Act 1973 and ancient monument legislation. The new proposals would bring all shipwrecks under the Scottish Marine Bill.

Two wrecks in the Forth are currently safeguarded – the Blessing of Burntisland, which sank in 1633 carrying King Charles 1’s baggage train worth £160,000 at the time, and the HMS Campania, a Cunard liner and converted aircraft carrier which was sunk in 1918.

But Philip Robertson, Historic Scotland’s senior inspector of marine archaeology, admitted: “The existing laws are widely considered ineffective below the low water mark.

“The proposals for new legislation would give us a more effective and workable tool with which to safeguard wrecks and other marine sites, which are considered to be of national importance.”

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Conklin: Dig deeper into history at ship festival

2008-03-06T10:48:00.000Z

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Wisconsin State Journal
By Melanie Conklin
March 06, 2008

Neither Keith Meverden nor Tamara Thomsen have ever seen a ghost. But they have encountered plenty of skeletal remains in the watery graveyards that their profession demands that they frequent.

The pair work for Wisconsin Historical Society's Maritime Preservation and Archaeology Program and the more temperate months of the year find them diving in lakes Superior and Michigan to map and document shipwrecks.

Meverden, an author and nautical archaeologist, says Wisconsin waters house about 750shipwrecks. And despite an increased popularity in amateur diving because of more affordable sonar technology, only 150 of these have been discovered.

But he says they "are not in the business of finding wrecks." Rather, they research the ships' stories and how they ended up in the murky depths. And as featured speakers at this weekend's Ghost Ships Festival in Milwaukee, Meverden says he'll offer an "underwater tour" of the steamer SS Wisconsin, located in Lake Michigan near Kenosha. Thomsen will talk about technical diving.

But if you go, try asking them about finding the anchor from the Rouse Simmons, aka the "Christmas Tree Ship," or removing enough zebra mussels from the Ocean Wave, which sank off Door County, to uncover an eagle figurehead with its eye still painted red.

The Ghost Ships Festival, happening Friday and Saturday, is hosted by the Great Lakes Shipwreck Research Foundation, Inc., and in addition to attracting maritime historians, it offers the public a glimpse at life below our lakes' surfaces. For details visit www.ghostships.org.

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Judge tells Spain, treasure hunters to reach accord on evidence

2008-03-05T15:01:00.000Z

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MacroWorldInvestor.com
March 05, 2008

Miami - A federal judge said Wednesday that he would give Odyssey Marine Exploration and the Spanish government until the end of the week to settle their differences over the documentation the Florida treasure-hunting firm provided on the $500 million in gold and silver coins the company recovered last May.

"I think our position was well-understood by the court," James Goold, the attorney representing Madrid, told Efe.

He said that Judge Mark A. Pizzo "did not issue any ruling," but instead warned the parties in the hearing held Wednesday in Tampa that if they do not resolve their differences by Friday he will be obligated to intervene.

Goold said that Tampa-based Odyssey had not "supplied all the information that the court ordered" about the items salvaged from a colonial-era shipwreck code-named Black Swan.

Though the recovery took place in international waters, Madrid contends the company plundered Spanish cultural assets.

Goold said that Odyssey is hiding information and that its attitude with respect to the confidentiality clause "is not the appropriate one."

In his Jan. 25 ruling ordering the company to turn over information, Pizzo conceded to Odyssey's concerns about the possible compromise of trade secrets by instructing Spain to keep the data provided by the firm confidential.

The judge also said that Odyssey must allow Spanish authorities to examine the treasure haul.

The company announced last May 18 that it had made a huge find of silver and gold coins that, according to Spain's Culture Ministry, "is cargo removed from a Spanish-flagged" vessel.

Odyssey, however, has told the judge the objects found aboard the wreck indicate it may date from the 19th century, after the heyday of Imperial Spain.

The firm also insists its salvage operation complied with all legal requirements.

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History lies in depths of the bay

2008-03-04T15:28:00.000Z

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Bayside Leader
By Jon Andrews
March 04, 2008

SHARP objects lurk in the depths of Bayside waters.

But they are not shark's teeth or coral reefs.

They are the metal and wooden remains of some of Australia's wonders of the maritime world.

Shipwrecks and submarines that were either scuttled or sank in Port Phillip Bay near Bayside beaches include the famous HMVS Cerberus and the moored J7 submarine.

There are other, less well-known wrecks from a list of almost 200 sunken ships and submarines in the bay, compiled by Heritage Victoria.

Maritime Archaeology Association of Victoria treasurer Peter Taylor has studied these treasures for three decades.

He said the J7 submarine, now residing as a hulk in the water near Sandringham Yacht Club was an important piece of maritime history.

"The J7 submarine was a high-tech gift from England at the time," Mr Taylor said.

"But because of financial cutbacks, it had to be laid up after World War I.

"It is important to know we have a virtually intact submarine right here, in full view; one that was the nucleus of our navy at that time.

"This whole area is rich in shipwreck and maritime history."

He said the Cerberus, which sits off Half Moon Bay, could be on its last sea legs without money for urgent preservation works.

It is an integral part of Australia's naval history, having been the first modern, armoured battleship built in pre-federation days, he said. It was scuttled in 1926 to form a breakwater.

Heritage Victoria maritime archaeologist Cassandra Phillipou said people did not focus enough on cultural history.

"It is true to say there is less attention paid to maritime history than perhaps there should be," Ms Phillipou said.

"People pay a lot of attention to their natural environment, but less to their cultural heritage."

Heritage Victoria runs maritime courses for divers and non-divers. Details: www.heritage.vic.gov.au

Sunken ships and submarines in Port Phillip Bay include:
Sandringham/Brighton: wooden schooner Water Witch
Sandringham: Francis Henty, a cable layer
Sandringham/Brighton: Margaret Russell, a wooden schooner
Sandringham (approximately): trading ship Phoenician
Elwood: unknown wreck
Port Melbourne: (thought to be) ferry Nairana
Frankston: yacht Isis
Patterson River: Uralba, a wooden steamer
Rye: trading ship Eivion
Queenscliff: J3 and J5 submarines
Sorrento: Wauchope, a passenger ship
Williamstown:J4 submarine
SOURCE: Heritage Victoria and Maritime Archaeology Association of Victoria

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Hitler's Titanic: Film recalls horror of world's worst maritime disaster

2008-03-04T15:10:00.000Z

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Belfast Telegraph
March 04, 2008

The life jackets on "Hitler's Titanic" were designed to save adult lives, the manufacturers had not thought about children. So when the ship's trainee purser, Heinz Schön, bobbed to the surface of the icy Baltic on 30 January 1945 after the German liner Wilhelm Gustloff was torpedoed by a Russian submarine, he was confronted with a sight he will never forget.

"There was this sea of adult heads floating all around me, but alongside them there were hundreds of children's legs half sticking up in the air. Their heads were under water," Mr Schön, now 82, said. "They all drowned. Nobody realised that a child's head is heavier than its legs."

More than 9,000 of the 10,000 passengers and crew drowned or died of exposure after the ship sank. The vessel is often referred to as "Hitler's Titanic" yet the death toll was six times higher than the Titanic's, making it the world's worst maritime disaster. Some 5,000 of the dead were children.

Nazi Germany's responsibility for the Holocaust meant that the plight of the Wilhelm Gustloff remained a taboo subject for decades after the war. There were fears that it would be seen as an attempt to equate German suffering with that of the Jews in Auschwitz. Even the Nobel Prize-winning author Günter Grass's attempt to address the disaster in his 2002 novel Crab Walk provoked controversy.

Last night, however, more than eight million Germans viewers tuned in to the ZDF channel for a two-part €10m (£7.6m) dramatised TV feature about the sinking. It tells the story of the Wilhelm Gustloff, a Nazi "Strength through Joy" liner built in the 1930s to give German workers a chance to cruise the world. But by the end of 1944, the ship was being used to accommodate U-boat crews and was moored in the Baltic port of Gotenhafen, now Polish Gdynia.

The ship was a symbol of hope for tens of thousands of German refugees from East Prussia fleeing the invading Red Army in January 1945. Shortly after midday on 30 January, the ship set out for the port of Kiel at the western end of the Baltic with 10,000 people on board. Most were women and children. Hitler had ordered the men to stay behind and fight to the death.

Nine hours later, Wilhelm Gustloff was in its death throes, after being hit three times by torpedoes from the Russian submarine S13, which assumed it was full of troops and a legitimate target.

Mr Schö*remembers the torpedoes striking the ship and then trying to climb the main gangway to the upper deck. "After a few metres there were just the dead bodies of women and children who had been trampled to death in the panic," he said. On the heavily listing upper deck he ran into a Nazi official who pulled out a pistol and shot his wife and child in the head before turning the weapon on himself. "At that point he ran out of ammunition and had no option but to drop into the sea," he said.

Mr Schön, who acted as an adviser to the producers of the TV film, was among the approximately 1,000 survivors who were picked up by two German torpedo boats that were escorting Wilhelm Gustloff. They did not hold a reunion until 1984. Only 55 are still alive.

The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, and scores of MPs attended the premiere of the series, but the production still managed to provoke controversy, more than 60 years after the event. Der Spiegel magazine's online site accused the film-makers of failing to mention the Holocaust: "The production makes the outrageous suggestion that a nation of innocents drowned," it said.

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Beeswax from centuries-old shipwrecks still found on Oregon beaches

2008-03-03T12:27:00.000Z

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The Seattle Times
March 03, 2008

GOLD BEACH, Ore. — It was the amber luminescent glow of an egg-shaped object in the winter sun that grabbed Loretta LeGuee's attention on the beach she had combed for years.

Experts say it almost certainly is a chunk of beeswax from a Spanish trading vessel that sank off the coast more than 300 years ago.

The wax has been turning up on Oregon's north coast in the Nehalem and Manzanita areas for centuries. A find this far south is rare.

"From the picture they sent me, that's what it looks like to me, it's definitely beeswax," said Scott Williams of Olympia, assistant state archaeologist for Washington.

He leads the Beeswax Wreck Project of volunteers probing why blocks of beeswax have been popping up along the Oregon Coast for centuries.

This hunk could have been from the Santo Christo de Burgos, which sank in 1693, or the San Francisco Xavier, which disappeared in 1705. Both were en route from the Philippines to Acapulco, Mexico, with tons of wax.

Such discoveries have been traced to the Philippines by the wings of the bees, native to those islands, found in the wax.

"Where she [LeGuee] found it would be unusual, being so far south," Williams said, noting the ocean currents off Oregon flow north, not south. "But we know the Indians were trading it prehistorically up and down the coast."

LeGuee, 52, and her German shepherd, Norman, found the 10-pound chunk just south of Gold Beach in early December.

After a ferocious storm in the area, she kept a sharp eye out. She had found fishing floats and agates in the past after storms. "And we had just had high winds, real bad weather," she said.

Beeswax was once preferred for candles over malodorous tallow, or rendered animal fat.

"The Catholic Church required the use of beeswax," he said. "There were no native honeybees in the New World. The churches in Mexico had to get wax from someplace and the large Asian honeybees produced a lot of beeswax."

Records dating to the early 1800s record Indians trading cakes of beeswax to settlers arriving in the Pacific Northwest.

"As soon as the Northwest fur traders came into the country, the Indians were trying to trade beeswax to them," he said. "The Indians told them it was from a shipwreck."

The San Francisco Xavier was carrying some 75 tons of beeswax, according to shipping records. Because a massive earthquake and tsunami in January of 1700 would have sent earlier ship remains farther inland, a researcher on the team says the Nehalem Bay beeswax is likely from the 1705 shipwreck.

Finds of the wax along the north coast still occur. The wax lacks the monetary value of the gold and silver thought to be lost, or even buried, along the north coast but discoveries are considered priceless to archaeologists.

"It's 300-year-old beeswax from a Spanish galleon — to me, that's really neat," Williams said.

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Navy still owns cannons found on beach from 1846 wreck

2008-03-03T12:24:00.000Z

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KGW.com
By Joseph B. Frazier
March 03, 2008

When beachcombers found two small cannons that likely came from the 1846 wreck of the Navy's USS Shark on the north Oregon coast, the state assumed it had some priceless artifacts. And for now, it does.

But the Navy reminded Oregon that if the cannons were Navy property back then, they're Navy property now — 162 years notwithstanding.

There is no immediate sign the Navy will come get its guns, which are fairly rare. The shipwreck itself closed out a little-known chapter of naval history.

The Shark, an 86-foot-long schooner, sank outbound from the Columbia River, one of the world's riskier river crossings.

One of its cannons was found in 1898. It is the namesake for Cannon Beach and is in the town's history museum.

Chris Havel of the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department acknowledged that the Navy owns the guns.

"Federal law says part of a warship, no matter how old, belongs to the federal government," Havel said. "There is no conflict (of ownership)."

Nehalem Bay State Park interpretive ranger Shelley Parker said she is unaware of any attempt by the Navy to get the first one back. The other two are at the park undergoing early steps in preservation and restoration.

Robert Neyland, who heads the Navy's Underwater Archaeological Branch at the Naval Historical Center in Washington, D.C., says the wreck of the Shark ended a brief but fascinating era in naval history.

The Shark and a few fast-sailing schooners like her were built in the 1820s to suppress slave traders and pirates. Most had short lives, and the Shark was the last of the lot.

"If the cannon turn out to be from the USS Shark, I foresee that the Navy and the State of Oregon would work together to preserve these guns and see that they are properly displayed and interpreted," he said.

He said his office has considered looking for the Shark and ships of its class.

"It is an interesting period of naval history of which not much is known," he said.

"The guns are pretty rare. If either one still has a firing mechanism, that would be extremely rare."

The Navy's interest now, he said, is seeing that the guns are properly handled and conserved.

"Any such guns are in high demand by museums," he said.

The Shark had spent a month in the Fort Vancouver area near today's Vancouver, Wash., with orders to "obtain correct information of that country and to cheer our citizens in that region by the presence of the American flag."

Ownership of the region was still unresolved with Great Britain.

The crew survived after the Shark hit a sandbar.

Parker said the ship carried ten of the small but punchy "carronade" cannons like the three found so far, and two larger "Long Tom" guns.

The Shark was built in 1821, the first of seven Navy vessels to carry the name. One was a captured Confederate blockade runner, later renamed.

There were frequent shipwrecks along that part of the coast, but the guns found were of the type carried by the Shark and archaeologists are assuming, absent other evidence, that that's where these came from.

Parker said the guns were discovered on exposed beach bedrock Feb. 16 and Feb. 19 after winter storms and low tides had removed sand.

She said it was remarkable they were recognized, since they had become heavily encrusted and resembled the surrounding rock.

Neyland said Oregon is correctly keeping the concretions, or encrustations, intact until an expert can remove them, and keeping the cannons covered in changing baths of water. He said the concretions can contain valuable archaeological matter.

He said they ultimately must be kept indoors and that the Navy would have a say about whether they went on loan to other museums.

Mike Petrone of Tualatin and his daughter, Miranda, found the first cannon. Sharisse Repp, also of Tualatin found the second one.

State agencies are working with the Navy to determine the guns' futures.

Not many people are in the cannon restoration trade.

But the Conversation Research Lab at Texas A&M has restored 22 over the past 10 years.

Lab manager Jim Jobling said the two new Arch Cape finds could undergo an 18-month stretch in an electrified bath of sodium hydroxide to leach out the salts.

They then would be boiled in de-ionized water, coated with tannic acid to give them their original black color, then coated to protect the finish.

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Public gets closer look at cannons discovered on beach

2008-02-28T11:24:00.001Z

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KGW
February 27, 2008

The public is getting an up-close look at two 18th-century cannons believed to have come from the same shipwreck as the cannon beach cannon.

The 18th century cannons were found last week on the beach at Arch Cape, just 100 feet from where the first cannon was found 110 years ago.

The cannons have Nehalem Bay locals feeling proud and archeologists ready to go to work.

For protection, the cannons were covered in burlap and submerged in fresh water. Then, with the public watching Tuesday, state parks workers opened the drains and revealed the two cannons, expected to be about 200 years old.

“It’s very amazing, fascinating. There's not enough words to describe it," said one excited onlooker.

The cannons will be stored in tubs and archeologists will soon begin peeling back the sediment.

Locals said the winter’s gale force winds made the discovery possible. The cannons had been buried under several feet of sand but Mother Nature blew all that away.

"Possibly two feet of sand and rock had been taken out in the last three weeks, so all of a sudden these things were unearthed,” one local told KGW.

Mike Petrone and his daughter found the first cannon and Sharisse Repp soon found another.

Historians think both of the cannons came from the same warship that produced the namesake of the town of Cannon Beach. Experts said before it came west, the USS Shark cruised the West Indies fighting pirates and the slave trade.

The Oregon Coast is dotted with shipwrecks but there are no doubt more secrets still under the sand.

The Columbia River Maritime Museum has an interactive map showing locations of other treasures and shipwrecks along the Oregon Coast.

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Search for HMAS Sydney to begin tomorrow

2008-02-27T18:58:00.001Z

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Perth Now
By Andrea Hayward
February 27, 2008

THE quest to find the resting place of HMAS Sydney, sunk off the West Australian coast by the German raider Kormoran in 1941, will begin tomorrow.

An international crew of 30 people will depart the port of Geraldton tomorrow afternoon to search an 1800 square nautical mile area, due west of Dirk Hartog Island off the Midwest coast.

Australia's greatest maritime mystery claimed the lives of the cruiser's 645 crew, whose memory has been immortalised with an impressive memorial overlooking Geraldton harbour.

Leading shipwreck hunter David Mearns is one of the 30 crew who will board SV Geosounder to search for the wreck.

The Finding Sydney Foundation has raised $5 million to mount the operation, which will allow the search to go on until the end of April.

Finding Sydney project manager Patrick Flynn said the search area had been defined by close examination of historical records.

"That led to the northern area,'' Mr Flynn said.

"As well as what we've been doing over the last month, a fairly meteorological review of the actual weather patterns that occurred on that day, and you use a thing called hindcasting (testing a theoretical model).''

Royal Australian Navy historian Lieutenant John Perryman said there was a high degree of confidence the search area would result in success.

"That has bought us to where we are at the moment, which is on doorstop of an historic voyage of discovery and hopefully commemoration,'' Lieutenant Perryman said.

But there were split feelings among researchers about the wreck's whereabouts, Lieutenant Perryman said.

"I'm aware that there are detractors out there who have made remarks about looking in the wrong spot, this being a waste of taxpayers money, but there's nothing that I can say that will alter their deeply and long held views,'' he said.

"I think we're probably going to come up trumps.''

The search will focus on identifying the resting place of the Kormoran before turning its sights to the Sydney.

"It's certainly our intention if we find either or both wrecks we will be commemorating those crews and having a short service on behalf of the relatives of both the German and Australian crews,'' Lieutenant Perryman said.

The loss of the Sydney often overshadowed the sacrifice the sailors made for Australia, he said.

"They removed a deadly and very, very lethal threat from Australia's wartime sea lines of communication,'' he said.

"Had Kormoran continued to roam the Indian Ocean, she could have caused untold damage to the troop ships.

"I think that sometimes the loss of the entire crew overshadows the fact, their sacrifice wasn't in vain.

"To the last there was evidence that these people remained at their post, they fought to the end and then they fought to save their ship right up until the last.''

Of the 390 crew from the German ship, 341 were rescued

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Campaign to save Hulks gets high-profile backing

2008-02-26T16:01:00.000Z

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Gazette
By Liza-Jane Gillespie
February 26, 2008

A TV archaeologist has given his support to the campaign to get the Purton Hulks special recognition.

Dr Mark Horton, archaeology lecturer at the University of Bristol and presenter of BBC series Coast and Time Team regular, has given his backing to the nautical relics.

"The Hulks are the largest collection of historic vessels surviving in Britain. As a group the site is a unique archaeological resource," said Dr Horton.
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The Purton Hulks are the remains of 80 old ships left on the River Severn to protect its banks almost 100 years ago.

Dr Horton, who first discovered the Hulks 13 years ago, said he will join local enthusiast Paul Barnett in his quest to raise the profile of the Hulks and help educate people about their historical importance.

Dr Horton said: "It's fantastic that Paul's drawing attention to them. Since I've been visiting the site since the mid 1990s I've just seen them get worse and worse.

"There seem to be two angles to this campaign, one is to find a way to get them protected.

"They are in a Site of Special Scientific Interest but the heritage designation doesn't cover them because they are not a ship wreck or a listed building, unfortunately they fall between all the designations.

"The second thing is it is my belief that a lot of the damage to the Hulks has been done by souvenir hunters.

"Therefore Paul's campaign to raise historical awareness of the site is absolutely vital for their protection because then people will realise what they are destroying."

Mr Barnett started campaigning to save the Purton Hulks eight years ago and said Dr Horton's support will do wonders for the site.

He said: "It's great. I couldn't believe it when my phone rang and it was him. Everything is now going in the right direction for the Hulks."

Mr Barnett is also currently collecting signatures for a petition to be handed to Andy Barnham, Secretary of State for Media, Sport and Culture, asking for protection for the Hulks.

For more information about the petition call Paul Barnett on 07833143231 or email Barnadillo@aol.com.

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Talk of the bay: Spanish paper floats name for Odyssey wreck

2008-02-26T10:49:00.000Z

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St. Petersburg Times
February 26, 2008

While Tampa-based Odyssey Marine Exploration says the identity of a North Carolina shipwreck it recently acquired has "not yet been confirmed," the Spanish newspaper El Pais speculates that Odyssey may be talking about El Salvador, a Spanish merchant ship that sank in 1750 with treasure aboard.

The treasure-hunting company could not be reached for comment late Monday, but someone anonymously registered the Internet domain name http://www.elsalvadorshipwreck.com/ on Feb. 21. That's the same day Odyssey announced it had acquired the legal right to pursue the North Carolina shipwreck - code-named "Firefly" - from BDJ Discovery Group of Beauford, N.C. Separately Monday, Odyssey disclosed that in exchange for those rights, it agreed to give BDJ 15 percent of any proceeds from the sale of Firefly artifacts, after deducting certain expenses.

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Captain's account discredited in 1927 South Haven shipwreck

2008-02-25T11:00:00.000Z

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The Daily News
February 25, 2008

When the freighter Hennepin sank off the shores of South Haven in August 1927, Capt. Ole Hanson reported sinking in rough seas.

But was the veteran captain telling the whole truth?

Nearly eight decades after the Hennepin sank in Lake Michigan, the Michigan Shipwreck Research Associates (MSRA), located in Holland, set out to find the ship and unravel the mystery of why it sank.

What they knew was that Hanson and his crew survived the sinking thanks to a nearby tugboat which rescued them.

Researchers also knew that after the sinking, Hanson realized the sinking of the Hennepin, valued at over $100,000, meant a huge loss for his company.

He also was an unlicensed captain and - under the circumstances - future employment might be unavailable.

When the Hennepin crew reached land, Hanson blamed a "stiff nor'wester" for the loss of his ship.

But MSRA researchers discovered that historic weather records indicate the wind never exceeded 17 miles per hour, which in nautical terms is a gentle breeze that creates two- to three-foot waves.

What the MSRA team determined was that mistakes made aboard the Hennepin, especially by the chief engineer, allowed the vessel to take on water, which led to its eventual sinking.

It seems likely that Hanson invented the tale to shift blame from himself and the crew.

Besides questioning the real cause of the Hennepin's sinking, MSRA has spent the last eight years looking for lost ships in Lake Michigan.

In 2006, they found Capt. Hanson's vessel in 230 feet of water.They dove on the shipwreck and found it in remarkably good condition.

For more on the fascinating story about the Hennepin, look for the January/February issue of Michigan History magazine.

For more information call (800) 366-3703 or visit http://www.michiganhistorymagazine.com/.

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Storms reveal secrets on Oregon's coast

2008-02-24T09:27:00.000Z

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SeattlePI.com
By Anne M. Peterson
February 24, 2008

PORTLAND, Ore. -- The storms that lashed Oregon's scenic coast this winter have dredged up an unusual array of once-buried secrets: old shipwrecks, historic cannons, ghost forests - even oddities known as "red towers."

One of the first ships to emerge from the sands was recently identified as the George L. Olson, which ran aground at Coos Bay's North Jetty on June 23, 1944.

The shipwreck has become a tourist attraction on the southern Oregon coast. Interest had become so great the Bureau of Land Management had to reroute traffic around the ship and post signs warning visitors to leave it alone because it is now an archaeological site.

Shipwrecks and other curiosities began showing up after December when Pacific storms pummeled the state, damaging thousands of homes and causing an estimated $60 million in damage to roads, bridges and public buildings.

Hardest hit was Vernonia, a Coast Range town of about 2,400 people, where floodwaters damaged about 300 homes, ruined schools and temporarily closing businesses.

The storms also brought high seas, which caused beach erosion. Although sands commonly shift in winter, this season appeared especially dramatic. There were reports that up to 17 feet of sand eroded away at Arch Cape.

"It's really an unusual event, the magnitude of it," said Chris Havel of the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department.

Other shipwrecks have emerged recently - a wooden ship near Bandon, also on the southern coast, and another where the Siuslaw River flows into the ocean near Florence.

Little is known about either ship, Havel said, and sands have reclaimed the Siuslaw wreck.

"In modern days we don't let people leave shipwrecks. If a boat washes up on shore the owner has to come and remove it," Havel said. "Back then the only craft that would really survive would have to be a pretty good size."

Ships aren't the only things surfacing on the coast.

Ghost forests are groves of tree stumps, some estimated as 4,000 years old, that were engulfed by the sea. Because of shifting sands, many have suddenly popped up.

The stumps are especially impressive at Arch Cape, where locals say they haven't seen them for some 40 years, according to Tiffany Boothe of the Seaside Aquarium.

"The forest floor is actually uncovered too, You can see the floor," she said. "There's like these mud cliffs. As your walking on it, it resembles clay. It's definitely not sand at all."

Arch Cape also was where a pair of historical cannons were recently discovered by beachcombers. The origin of the cannons, each weighing between 800 and 1,000 pounds, is not known.

State archaeologist Dennis Griffin supervised the removal of the cannons, which were placed in tanks of fresh water and burlap for preservation.

The Oregon Parks and Recreation Department does not yet know what they will do with the cannons. They possibly came from the USS Shark, a survey ship that wrecked in 1846 off the Columbia River Bar, Havel said.

The "red towers" are strangely shaped deposits of iron that are hidden beneath the sand. The orangy-red lumps, most no more than 3-feet tall, are usually buried deep beneath the sand but now dot the coastal landscape.

"These formations could be gone in the next week. That's how fast the coast changes," Boothe said.

The George L. Olson, uncovered around the New Year, has drawn a great deal of attention because it's origin was a mystery until recently.

After determining the wreck resembled the schooner, local archeologists delved into its history, determining where and when it went down. The facts added up, said Bureau of Land Management spokeswoman Megan Harper.

But it was a local man's photograph from 1947 that really convinced the agency, she said.

"It showed him and his brothers on the shipwreck with the words "George L." on the hull," Harper said. "Once we saw that it was, `Yep, that's the one.'"

The George L. Olson was a 223-foot long wood-hulled schooner launched in 1917 and originally named the Ryder Hanify. It eventually wound up on the southern Oregon coast, where it hauled lumber until it ran aground.

The wreckage has drawn curious crowds, including about 3,000 visitors this past weekend alone, Harper said.

"I think there's two reasons, first, the shipwreck here is really accessible. It's easy for people to get right up to it," Harper said. "Second, this area has a real connection to maritime history, or the fishing industry and the lumber industry. So there's a neat tie to the local community and history."

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Odyssey «compra» otro tesoro en vísperas de ser llamado a declarar

2008-02-23T11:55:00.000Z

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ABC.es

By J. G. Calero
February 23, 2008

MADRID. «Tratándose de Odyssey, piensa mal y acertarás», decían ayer en el Ministerio de Cultura, para comentar la noticia de que los cazatesoros han comprado los derechos de un pecio hundido a 12 millas de la costa de Carolina del Norte, que reclamaba ante un juez otra empresa, BDJ Discovery Group. Tras el escándalo del «Black Swan» por el que Greg Stemm ha sido imputado en La Línea y en visperas de ser llamado a declarar, el próximo lunes, 25 de febrero, Odyssey arroja con esta noticia una cortina de humo.

El subdirector de Patrimonio, Luis Lafuente, declaró a ABC que «no nos sorprende la noticia, pero sepa que la instrucción que recibimos es perseguirlos cual sabuesos y caer sobre ellos judicialmente en cuanto se pueda». Sin embargo, Lafuente confirmó que hasta ahora sólo se ha pedido información al juzgado de Carolina del Norte, cuando se da la circunstancia de que ABC informó del expolio de este pecio el pasado 12 de diciembre. En más de dos meses España ni se ha personado en este caso, como sí hizo en Tampa por el presunto expolio del «Black Swan», un tesoro de 500.000 monedas de plata y cientos de oro, más otros pertrechos del barco.

Aun así, Cultura mantiene la fe en que sentará un precedente en el Juzgado de Tampa que sirva para reclamar el patrimonio sumergido de origen español en aguas internacionales, «como ya ocurriera con el «Juno» y «La Galga» en aguas de EE.UU.». Una vez más, se da la circunstancia de que el pecio ahora adquirido por Odyssey puede pertenercer a la misma flota que dichas naves, hundida en 1750, con lo cual dicho precedente no ha sido tenido en cuenta hasta ahora.

Para el abogado especializado en patrimonio submarino José María Lancho, «está claro que Odyssey intenta desviar la atención hacia EE.UU. y despistarlos cada vez menos rumores y más certidumbres de las acciones criminales que se están llevando a cabo en La Línea y de las que la empresa deberá informar a sus accionistas». Lo fundamental, para este abogado, es que en Europa «hace mucho tiempo que los restos sumergidos de un pecio no son comercializables, han perdido legalmente su valor como oro o plata». Según su parecer, «la empresa cazatesoros sólo tiene una estrategia mediática: se persona en un pleito que comenzó en el 2005 días antes de que tenga que declarar en los Juzgados españoles, lo cual, probablemente, no hará».

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Shipwreck speaker comes to library

2008-02-23T11:21:00.000Z

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HollandSentinel.com
February 23, 2008

Valerie van Heest will give a presentation about shipwrecks off the West Michigan shoreline from 1 to 2 p.m. March 1 at Herrick District Library, 300 S. River Ave.

Van Heest is the director of the Michigan Shipwreck Research Associates. She's also a member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame, a shipwreck hunter and recently appeared on the History Channel while exploring a Chicago shipwreck.

She recently released a book for young readers titled "Icebound! The Adventures of Young George Sheldon and the SS Michigan."

After the presentation, van Heest will be available for questions and for signing books.

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2008 Great Lakes Underwater conference (March 15)

2008-02-22T11:23:00.000Z

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Travelvideo.tv
February 22, 2008

If you’ve seen the movie Titanic, you have had a glimpse of Dennis Hale’s real life drama. Hale is the sole survivor of the sinking of the steamship Daniel J. Morrell. The 603-foot-long ship sank in the dark early morning hours of November 29, 1966 on Lake Huron. Hale will share his story as the only survivor of a 29-member crew as part of the 2008 Great Lakes Underwater conference in Oswego on Saturday, March 15.

“The seas were estimated at 30 to 35 feet; the wind at 60 to 65 miles per hour. The water temperature was 44 degrees; the air temperature 33 degrees. I was barefoot, and wearing only undershorts, a life vest and a peacoat,” says Hale, who has written his story in a book title “Sole Survivor.”

Also on the agenda for the annual conference for maritime history and shipwreck enthusiasts and divers are Jim Kennard, who has found more than 200 shipwrecks in the past 30 years and technical diver Dan Scoville who uses a custom mix of breathing gases to dive to depths of greater than 300 feet. Kennard and Scoville will talk about using a high-tech sonar device they built to discover the wreck of the mid-1800s Canadian schooner Orcardian. They will also talk on the last flight of the Sea Bee.

Back by popular demand are Two Tank Tips presented by the New York State Divers Association (NYSDA). The Tips are for places where divers can take two tanks of oxygen out on one trip and easily dive on two wrecks within close proximity. NYSDA members will present a variety of “Two Tank” shipwrecks found in New York waters including sites in Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, the Finger Lakes, Lake George, the St. Lawrence River, Raquette Lake, Blue Mountain Lake, and the Sacandaga Reservoir.

Representatives of the Eastern Ontario Artificial Reef Association, headquartered in Mallorytown, Ontario, will speak on the planned sinking of Her Majesty’s Canadian Ship HMCS Terra Nova in the Canadian waters of the 1000 Islands. By creating an artificial reef out of the steel hull destroyer escort ship for the 20,000 divers expected to visit the new wreck, the Association that is mandated to obtain and sink decommissioned Canadian destroyers hopes to take some diving pressure off the more historic wrecks.

According to a 1999 New York Sea Grant study, scuba divers add more than $108 million in annual economic impact to New York’s Great Lakes Seaway Trail region. Recreation and Tourism Specialist David G. White of New York Sea Grant, Oswego, NY, says efforts such as the New York State Blueway Trail and the Dive the Seaway Trail project are linking divers with the vast underwater resources and the submerged heritage preserves that are developing across the state.

At the March 15 Great Lakes Underwater program, White and Underwater Blueway Trail Interim Director David Decker will report on progress in the development of the New York State Blueway Trail and the Dive the Seaway Trail project that highlights sites for different levels of diving skill and of different interest from historic shipwrecks to unique geological and ecological quality.

“The opportunities these trails create for underwater and on-land exploration of our maritime history will return a tremendous economic boost to shoreline communities,” White says.

In the past year, Seaway Trail, Inc. has installed five new shipwreck theme outdoor storyteller interpretive panels along the 518-mile byway at Alexandria Bay, Clayton, Oswego, Pultneyville and Dunkirk.

The 12th annual Great Lakes Underwater will be held March 15, 2008, from 9 am to 4:30 pm on State University of New York at Oswego campus, Oswego, NY. Registration is $25 ($20 for students) payable to Cornell University includes lunch. Great Lakes Underwater 2008 is hosted by New York Sea Grant and the Oswego Maritime Foundation and co-sponsored by Seaway Trail, Inc.

For more information, go online to http://www.nysgunderwater.org/ or contact New York Sea Grant at 315-312-3042 before March 7.

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Photos, stories help identify the wreck

2008-02-22T09:31:00.000Z

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The World
By Elise Hamner
February 22, 2008

Archaeologists credit high-resolution photos as the key to solving the identity mystery of the George L. Olson shipwreck on Coos Bay’s North Spit.

“This post is the same. The porthole locations are the same, even though in the wreck they were squared off,” said Steve Samuels, the cultural resource coordinator at the local U.S. Bureau of Land Management office.

The historical photos show the vessel with round portholes, but Samuels said the holes in those days were framed square behind the planking. Likely time and erosion took away the circular cut of the planking to reveal the squares holes behind.

“The thing that got me and convinced me ... these iron fasteners are offset at the bottom. It just has to be,” Samuels said Wednesday.

He was looking at a photo illustration comparing a bow photo of the then-Ryder Hanify to the now-wreck of the Olson. The holes from the through-hull iron fasteners still show in the bow. Other matches include the hawsepipes, where the anchor chains slid through circular iron housings out of the bow and into the water. Those now are exposed above sand out on the spit.

Chain plates also remain on the shipwreck and those match the ones in the bow photo from 1917.

“They spent so much energy building this. It was really massive,” Samuels said.

Photos weren’t the only decider for historians.

“We want to thank people calling us and telling their stories,” said Megan Harper, BLM’s public affairs specialist. “It really helped us narrow it down.”

And they aren’t done. Samuels still wants to hear from other residents who might have memories of the Olson to fill in the details of its final months before it was towed out to sea and the tow line cut.

The shipwreck also is significant in another sense, Samuels said.

Few researchers in Oregon have any experience with marine archaeology. In the coming weeks, they will be at the site documenting more about the shipwreck and trying to decide what to do with it. There’s still 20 to 25 of keel buried in the sand. More of the ship’s sides also have been exposed in the sand bank, ensuring Samuels and the research crew will have work for weeks to come.

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Historic cannons found, removed from Oregon beach

2008-02-21T10:28:00.000Z

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Bend Weekly
February 21, 2008

ARCH CAPE, Ore. -- Oregon Parks and Recreation Department staff removed a pair of historic cannons from the beach near Arch Cape on February 19. The cannon were discovered by beach visitors over the weekend, and had been revealed by extreme low tides and the natural loss of beach sand due to winter storms.

Park staff, under the supervision of state archaeologist Dennis Griffin, transported each of the 800-1,000 pound cannon by truck to a nearby park office. On February 20, with guidance from historic cannon restoration experts from Texas A&M University, staff submerged the artifacts in tanks of fresh water and covered them with layers of wet burlap. The fresh water bath, refreshed weekly, will draw salt from the objects and protect them from further corrosion. The cannon are fragile, having survived in a protective, oxygen-free environment for many decades. Because the cannon are kept covered, public viewing is not yet possible, but staff plan to announce a regular schedule for viewing as early as the week of February 25.

The Oregon Parks and Recreation Department and the Department of State Lands will work together with local, regional and national historians over the coming days on a plan to place the cannon in the hands of qualified experts for study, and eventually transfer ownership to a suitable local museum so the public can enjoy these important parts of Oregon's history. It is possible the cannon are remnants from the USS Shark (a survey ship wrecked in 1846 off the Columbia River Bar), but the cannons' origins have not been determined; a thorough review by qualified historians may take weeks or months.

Winter storms, low tides, and the continual movement of sand from one beach to another have revealed a bounty of Oregon's secrets this season. Visitors to the beach, whether around Arch Cape or elsewhere, who find items they think may be of historical value should: 1) Document the location by marking on a map and taking photos or video; 2) Leave the items where found; and 3) Contact the nearest state park office or a local historical society.

As always, beach visitors should also be mindful of their safety, and keep careful track of tides, beach logs and other debris, unstable cliffs, and unusually powerful waves.

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Sunken treasures

2008-02-20T12:20:00.000Z

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The Capital Times
By Debra Carr-Elsing
February 19, 2008

Wisconsin Historical Society Images
A diver videos the capstan on the bow of the SS wisconsin

as it lies today near Kenosha.

Take an underwater video tour of the steamer SS Wisconsin as it lies today near Kenosha's shoreline. Learn about its colorful history and how it served in New York Harbor as a convalescent ship for the U.S. Army during World War I before returning to Wisconsin waters, where it sunk in 1929.

Hear about an old wooden schooner that has possible connections to the Underground Railroad. It was discovered off the shores of a Lake Michigan beach, and experts believe it was used to transport fugitive slaves to Canada during the 1800s.

And not to be overlooked is the famous Rouse Simmons shipwreck, which rests 165 feet below the surface of Lake Michigan, 12 miles northeast of Two Rivers. The three-masted schooner -- known as the "Christmas tree ship" -- was built in Milwaukee in 1868. It was used to carry pine trees for holiday decorating from Michigan's Upper Peninsula to the docks of Chicago. All 16 crew members went down with the ship and perished on a blustery November day in 1912 when a storm overpowered them.

Those are among the stories of shipwreck dives and discoveries that will be shared March 7-8 during the 2008 Ghost Ships Festival in Milwaukee.

"Three-quarters of our population in Wisconsin live along the shorelines of Lake Michigan and Lake Superior, but very few people understand the importance of shipping here and how Wisconsin was built as a maritime state," says Keith Meverden, a nautical archaeologist with the Wisconsin Historical Society.

That strong maritime influence is evident in the design of our state flag, he says. In addition to the flag's sailor and anchor, for example, there's also an arm holding a caulking mallet, which is a tool used in ship construction.

"Milwaukee was a huge port, and still is," says Tamara Thomsen, a historic preservation specialist with the Historical Society. She also scuba dives and is a technical diving instructor.

Last year, Thomsen and Meverden went down hundreds of feet into Lake Michigan to document and chart numerous shipwrecks.

Beneath Wisconsin waters lies an entire ghost town of sunken schooners, steamers and tankers, many of which date back to the mid-1800s. In fact, experts estimate that the remains of more than 750 vessels dot the bottom of Wisconsin waters.

"We know the locations of only about 150 of those shipwrecks, so there are still plenty out there that need to be discovered," Meverden says.

And with the availability of side-scan sonar and other advances in technology, it's predicted that more underwater discoveries will be made in years to come.

Most of the shipwrecks are wooden commercial ships from the 19th century, and while they may be perfectly preserved beneath the waters, they would deteriorate very quickly if they were raised to the surface.

"This happened in the late 1960s when the Alvin Clark was brought up from the waters of Green Bay near Chambers Island," Meverden says. "Once it started drying out, the Alvin Clark started shrinking and cracking. It literally turned to dust within 20 years because they were unable to preserve the ship quick enough."

Current federal and state legislation, for the most part, prevents the raising of old shipwrecks. In 1987 the federal government passed a law, the Abandoned Shipwrecks Act, which regulates underwater archaeology sites.

"Chicago was the greatest lumber port of all time, and a lot of ships wrecked along our shorelines getting to and from Chicago in the late 1800s," Thomsen says.

"We certainly have a large distribution of shipwrecks here. There are clusters of shipwrecks around Milwaukee, for example, as well as in Door County, where there's a narrowing of passages near a chain of islands."

Particularly hazardous for vessels, historically, is what's known as "Death's Door" passage near Washington Island.

"Interest in maritime history is growing," Thomsen says. "People want to be connected with their past, and they come from around the world to see and dive the many shipwrecks in Wisconsin waters.

"Even the Wisconsin Department of Tourism has jumped on the shipwreck bandwagon," she says. "An entire page on its Web site is devoted to popular shipwrecks."

To explore some of the wrecks, people don't necessarily need to be able to scuba dive. Some wrecks are in such shallow water that even snorkelers can view them.

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Cannons found on Oregon coast could be from 1846 ship

2008-02-20T09:51:00.000Z

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Statesnab journal
February 19, 2008

CANNON BEACH — A pair of cannons found on the Oregon Coast over the holiday weekend may have come from a ship that ran aground in 1846.

Historians and archaeologists say the cannons may be the remaining cannons of the three that were aboard the survey schooner USS Shark. The first cannon was found in 1898 and is the namesake of Cannon Beach, about four or five miles north of Arch Cape, where the other cannons were found over the Presidents Day holiday.

The first of the two latest cannons was spotted by Mike Petrone of Tualatin, and his daughter, Miranda, while they were walking on the beach last Saturday.

The second was spotted Monday while a state park official was documenting the discovery of the first one.

Petrone said he and his daughter first thought the cannon was an old stump.

“I go, ’Gee, that’s a funny looking stump.’ Miranda said, ’I don’t think it’s wood, Dad. It’s rusting,”’ Petrone said.

So the pair did a bit of digging and soon the rough form of a cannon took shape. Petrone called the Cannon Beach Historical Society. Before long, the mayor showed up to check out Petrone’s discovery.

Petrone, 40, said he’s thrilled he and his daughter found the lost cannon.

“I’m ecstatic,” he said. “I have been on that beach since I was a little tot. I haven’t found anything bigger than a glass ball. To find this was pretty amazing. I was in awe.”

Gary McDaniel, a supervisor with the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department’s Nehalem Bay management unit, said the cannons appear to be two of the three cannons that were mounted on the USS Shark.

McDaniel said the cannons are heavily encrusted, still have their wood mounts and are “in pretty good shape.”

He said the state archaeologist and other state parks officials will handle their removal.

David Pearson, curator at the Columbia River Maritime Museum in Astoria, said the USS Shark was launched from the Washington, D.C., naval yard. He said it will take a couple of days to determine whether the cannons are from the Shark.

If they do turn out to be from the ship, “they would be very significant to the history of Oregon.”

Joanne Hill, a longtime resident of Arch Cape, said the discovery has been the talk of the community.

“It’s thrilling,” she said. “The whole neighborhood and town are abuzz. It really is quite a wonderful discovery.”

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El CAS identifica con «una certeza casi total» al 'Fougueux' y al 'Bucentaure'

2008-02-18T18:58:00.000Z

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Lavozdigital.es

By Daniel Pérez
February 17, 2008

Más de ocho años después de que el CAS se embarcara en el ambicioso Proyecto Trafalgar -dirigido a localizar e identificar los barcos hundidos en la histórica batalla que se libró frente a las costas de Cádiz-, los responsables del Centro han dado por finalizada «circunstancialmente» la investigación, al menos hasta que «aparezcan nuevos datos que aporten algo importante a las conclusiones actuales de nuestros estudios», según apunta Carmen García Rivera, directora de la institución.

Uno de los propósitos fundamentales del programa -sobre todo por su alta carga simbólica-, consistía en ubicar definitivamente los míticos navíos de bandera francesa Fougueux y Bucentaure, considerados insignias de la flota hispano gala.

García Rivera explica que ese objetivo prioritario de la iniciativa se «ha cumplido sobradamente», puesto que, de entrada, «pretendíamos confirmar o refutar el origen francés de los buques y determinar su cronología, pero estamos en condiciones de asegurar, casi con total certeza, que tanto el Fougueux como el Bucentaure están exactamente donde pensábamos que estaban».

Rivera se muestra convencida de que «las contundentes evidencias de los restos hallados, junto con la riqueza de las fuentes documentales, no dejan demasiado lugar a la duda, pero en esta profesión da siempre un poco de miedo expresarse con tanta rotundidad porque nunca se sabe a ciencia cierta si la aparición de elementos novedosos puede acabar variando tus hipótesis».

Durante 2006 los esfuerzos se volcaron en el Pecio de Las Morenas (San Fernando), que se identifican con el Fougueux. La zona se escaneó con la tecnología geofísica de última generación para determinar la presencia de registros arqueológicos, a la vez que se realizaron largas prospecciones sobre el terreno.

Expertos internacionales

Pero para eliminar cualquier duda, el CAS se puso en contacto con varios equipos de expertos en arquitectura naval francesa. Durante el mes de julio del pasado año se desplazaron hasta La Isla los especialistas franceses Eric Rieth (arquitecto) y Martine Acerra (documentalista de la Universidad de Nantes), que estuvieron acompañados por Manu Izaguirre, del departamento de Patrimonio de la Diputación Foral de Bizkaia.

El estudio detallado de la arquitectura, de la artillería y del resto de sus elementos muebles les llevó a afirmar que con toda probabilidad el pecio de Las Morenas es el navío de 74 cañones Fougueux, construido en Lorient en el año 1785.

Después comenzaron los sondeos en el yacimiento del Pecio de Chapitel, donde se da por supuesto que se encuentra el mítico Bucentaure que capitaneaba el almirante Villeneuve y desde el que se daban las órdenes a toda la flota combinada.

Durante mucho tiempo se pensó que este navío de 80 cañones se encontraba hundido frente al gaditano Castillo de San Sebastián. Sin embargo, después de analizar en profundidad las fuentes escritas de la época y recopilando la documentación arqueológica previa, se localizó en un punto a medio camino entre Cádiz y Rota.

Una de las pistas más decisivas que se tienen se reflotó recientemente del fondo del mar y, después de ser tratada para evitar su degradación, fue expuesta al público en Los naufragios de Trafalgar. Se trata de uno de sus cañones de hierro de 12 libras, que lleva grabados el año de construcción y las iniciales del maestro de forja.

Protección, conservación y puesta en uso
El siguiente paso, según indica el protocolo convenido, consiste en que la Consejería de Cultura de la Junta comunique a Francia que se han localizado buques de estado en aguas nacionales y, «a partir de ahí, plantearse nuevas actuaciones». El país vecino y España determinarán las fórmulas para acotar, proteger y conservar los pecios con visitas periódicas a los restos para garantizar que no se están sometiendo a expolio. «Quizá, en el futuro, haya que plantearse incluso la excavación y puesta en valor de los yacimientos».

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New Survey To Reveal 'Britain's Atlantis'

2008-02-18T17:01:00.001Z

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ScienceDaily
February 18, 2008

The lost city of Dunwich, Britain's own underwater 'Atlantis', which has captured the imagination of people for centuries, could be revealed for the first time with high-tech underwater sonar.

Professor David Sear, of the University of Southampton, and marine archaeologist Stuart Bacon, will explore the ancient sunken city, off the Suffolk coast, in the early summer.

Dunwich, fourteen miles south of Lowestoft, was once a thriving port, and in the 14th century similar in size to London. However, storms, erosion and floods over the past six centuries have almost wiped out this once prosperous city, and the Dunwich of today is a quiet coastal village.

The project will use the latest underwater acoustic imaging technology to assess the existence of any remains from the city that lies between 10ft (3m) and 50ft (15m) down.

Professor Sear comments: 'We will be applying new technology to the investigation of what has become known as "Britain's Atlantis", and making this information publicly available. Technical advances, such as side-scan multibeam sonar have massively improved our ability to create accurate acoustic images of the seafloor, and this survey should greatly enhance our knowledge of the site.'

Diving evidence suggests the site contains debris from at least two churches and a priory, but underwater visibility at the location is very poor, and no one has any idea what remains (if any) exist from the medieval settlement that was lost in the 13th and 14th centuries.

Stuart Bacon, Director of the Suffolk Underwater Studies, first located the lost city in the 1970s and has dived there many times. He and Professor Sear hope to begin exploring the seabed in June.

The city-scale survey of the sea floor will provide information on the location and state of any structures of archaeological interest in relation to historical records. The findings will be presented as a new public display for the Dunwich Museum, documenting the technology used and what the project has revealed of the lost city.

The expedition is being funded by a £20,000 donation from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation. The GeoData Institute, a University of Southampton-based research and consultancy group, is managing the project and dealing with collation and digital capture of the data and interpretation, while EMU Ocean Survey are conducting the actual survey.

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Euro-cash for Wirral U-Boat project

2008-02-18T14:27:00.000Z

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Liverpool Daily Post
By Liam Murphy
February 18, 2008

A SCHEME to rejuvenate Woodside ferry terminal by siting a former German U-Boat there has received a cash boost from the EU.

The plans by Merseytravel would aim to see the Wirral ferry terminal become a major tourist attraction in the £2.5m scheme.

Now the plans have been boosted by a £550,000 grant, and it is expected the U-Boat will be opened to the public this summer.

Work has already started on cutting up the U-534 which will become the centrepiece of the attraction.

Neil Scales, chief executive and director general of Merseytravel, which owns and operates the Mersey Ferries, welcomed the extra cash for the scheme.

He said: “This is a great boost to an exciting project which has a twofold objective.

“It will complement the wider regeneration of the Woodside development and help maintain Mersey Ferries as the premier paid for attraction in the region.”

U-534 was one of the last U-boats to be sunk by the Allies in 1945, around two days before the end of the war in Europe.

It was never involved in active combat but carried out meteorological operations, and was raised in 1993, eventually coming to Birkenhead, where it was part of the historic warship collection.

Engineers using a diamond wire cutter are cutting the sub into four sections, each of which will be moved by floating crane from its present location at Mortar Mill Quay to Woodside.

Each section will take a day to move and the operation will take about a month. The first to be removed will be a 23-metre length of the bow and work will start next month.

The cutting has been designed with such precision that the submarine could be re-assembled into one piece if required.

Preliminary work has also started on the exhibition area at Woodside, which will include artefacts from the sub and other memorabilia portraying the history of undersea warfare.

Richard Nutter, director of the European Objective One programme, said: “Objective One has long been one of the biggest supporters of the Mersey Ferries.”

SEE a video about the project to slice up the U-Boat on the Daily Post website, www. dailypost.co.uk

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Ancient Town 'Sevtopolis', Submerged on a Lake Bottom to be Reconstructed

2008-02-18T08:58:00.001Z

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News.bg
By Kristalina Ilieva
February 18, 2008

Association ‘Preserve the Bulgarian' starts action for the realizing of ‘Sevtopolis' project.

At first the organizators will collect subscription list throughout the whole country, the projects author and major architect Jeko Tilev announced.

Sevtopolis or the City of Tracian King Sevt III is capital of the Odyisian state in the end of IV - beginning of III century before Christ.

It was found and observed in 1948 - 1954 by the construction works of Koprinka dam like and afterwards, however, submerged in the lake waters.

This is the first and best preserved Thracian city in Bulgaria, located 7 km western from the Thracian capital of Bulgaria - Kazanlak and 2 kilometers from the ‘Goliyama Kosmatka' tomb, where the biggest Thracian treasures were found.

The reconstruction of the ancient city, located on the lake bottom was hindered to the moment by undecided judicial matters.

Few foreign companies have already shown interest towards subsidizing the initiative.

According to architect Jeko Tilev the financing of the project won't injure the state subsidizing of other archaeological objects, due to the fact it would depend mainly on public- private partnership and support by EU funds.

The reconstruction of Sevtopolis won't use state budget recourses.

There won't be any ecological harm over the local fauna. It is previewed the reservoir to be drawn out during the city walls' reconstruction but this won't be dangerous for the local environment.

The projects author pointed out the social - economical and scientific significance which the Sevtopolis reconstruction will have. It will attract many tourists and will develop the infrastructure in the region.

The project has the support of many world organizations from Netherlands, USA, Canada, Spain and also lots of state institutions, though haven't still received official answer.

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Skull and remains found in river

2008-02-18T08:01:00.000Z

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EADT24
February 18, 2008

A SKULL and other human remains have been found by a worker from the Environment Agency while dredging the River Lark.

The police were called in but it soon became clear that the remains dated back hundreds of years.

The remains are probably medieval in origin, dating from between AD1066 and 1540, although they could be from an even earlier period, Roman or Saxon.

Ryan Ely, team leader in charge of the dredging operation, said: “Although we had not really expected to find any remains we had taken advice from Suffolk County Council's archaeological service before we started dredging, just in case there was a possibility of turning up something of interest.

“Dragline operator, Simon Wenn, was on the alert and, after his grim discovery, turned to the archaeological service once the police had given us the all-clear. We believe this find to be an excellent example of co-operation and we were more than pleased to oblige when the council's archaeologists, Will Fletcher and Colin Pendleton, asked to undertake more work at the site.”

More bones, including those from a juvenile and a 14th century metal buckle were also recovered during the work.

The circumstances of the adult's death remain unclear - though there was a battle at Fornham in 1173. There have been other finds from Suffolk rivers in the past but this is the first find from the area for several years.

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Last hours of midget sub

2008-02-17T14:38:00.000Z

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The Sydney Morning Herald
By Lisa Carty
February 17, 2008

THE mystery of how the Japanese midget sub that attacked Sydney Harbour in 1942 met its end off Sydney's northern beaches has been solved.

State Government maritime archaeologist Tim Smith led a team which has found M24 came to grief as it was on its way to rendezvous with a mother sub near Broken Bay.

Five massive mother subs - each 110 metres long and carrying 100 crew - had been waiting south of the harbour for M24 and two other midget subs to return from their assault on the night of May 31-June 1.

The other midget subs were blown up in the harbour - one by its own crew after being detected, the other by the Royal Australian Navy. M24, which attacked a ferry being used by the navy, killing 21 and injuring 10, slipped out of the harbour and remained undetected until it was discovered by recreational divers in November 2006.

Mr Smith said a map recovered from one of the bombed subs combined with Australian wartime intelligence records showed the attackers had planned a second rendezvous spot off Broken Bay.

"The historical records show the Japanese had more flexibility in their recovery plans than had been postulated by researchers in the past," he said.

The two men aboard the M24 - Katsuhisa Ban, 23, and Mamoru Ashibe, 24 - had probably decided on the northern rendezvous because they did not want to draw attention to the fleet of mother subs to the south.

While one mother sub did head north, it seems Ban and Ashibe were forced to stay submerged off Bungan Head, new Newport, and died of a lack of oxygen, or fumes.

"I am sure they tried to get to the northern recovery point because the wreck lies on the agreed route but ... they either ran out of battery power or were overcome by bad air, or decided to commit suicide and end the mission," he said.

Naval historian Steve Carruthers said Mr Smith's work showed M24 did not head north by mistake.

"It wasn't on the wrong course, it was supposed to be there," Mr Carruthers said. "Tim's put forward the theory in his preliminary final report, which I have read and totally agree with."

The Japanese submariners' remains and some unexploded weapons remain in the sub, which is protected by a 500-metre exclusion zone, underwater cameras and sound detectors. Planning Minister Frank Sartor has placed a permanent heritage listing on the site, with fines of up to $1.1 million for those breaching the exclusion zone.

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Lake Champlain speaker series to return

2008-02-17T08:41:00.000Z

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The Press Republican
By Jeff Meyers
February 17, 2008

GRAND ISLE, Vt. -- The Lake Champlain Basin Program will again host its popular speaker series on lake-related issues.

The series starts Thursday, Feb. 21, with a look at a recently identified sunken ship.

Adam Kane, a nautical archaeologist from the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, will present new information on the Shoreham Sloop, an 1820s canal sloop that sank in the murky waters of southern Lake Champlain near the Addison County shoreline.

"I believe it was a known shipwreck, but it was documented through the Maritime Museum Underwater Survey," said Colleen Hickey, education and outreach coordinator for the Basin Program.

"Adam has dived on the site several times and will share his findings."

The Underwater Survey, conducted in the late 1990s, was initiated following the discovery of zebra mussels in Lake Champlain to record the presence of shipwrecks throughout the lake before they were covered by mussels.

The Maritime Museum's investigations of the sloop between 2004 and 2007 yielded many new details about Lake Champlain's commercial heyday. Kane's presentation will include images from the dives.

Other talks during the four-week Love the Lake series include discussions on the fossil reefs on Isle la Motte and nesting turtles on Lake Champlain.

A highlight for the series will be a talk by Johnson State College professor Dr. Fred Wiseman on the Abenaki perspective of the 2009 Lake Champlain quadricentennial celebration.

Wiseman will summarize collaboration efforts between Vermont native communities and the Vermont Quadricentennial Commission.

"Fred is very knowledgeable about the history of native peoples and particularly the Abenaki," Hickey said.

Wiseman's presentation will be Thursday, March 6.

The series, entering its fourth year, is held in memory of former Basin Program member and Vermont state legislator Jane Potvin, a lifetime resident of Grand Isle, who died in 2004.

"She always liked to bring local islanders (from Grand Isle and surrounding Lake Champlain islands) together to talk about Lake Champlain," Hickey said.

"This gives us a chance to continue the discussion about the lake in her honor."

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Truck tours to shipwreck site take off

2008-02-15T17:05:00.000Z

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Kcby.com
By Britt Carlson
February 15, 2008

NORTH BEND - If you've tried to access the shipwreck site on the north spit it's further than you think.

Fortunately, Spinreel Dunebuggy Rentals is using their resources to take people to the south coast's latest attraction.

Spinreel Dunebuggy Rentals started running these sand trucks from the parking lot across from the BLM boat ramp to the shipwreck site Friday.

Owner Richard Burkholder says it opens up the experience for everyone, not just ATV riders and four-wheel truck drivers.

"We started hearing how people wanted to get out there and they couldn't and were complaining about the walk and we thought well here's an opportunity. It's the slow season, we run the trucks for the dune tours up near Lakeside, thought we'd get a hold of BLM, give them an offer to take people out to take a look."

The tour will last about an hour, driving the beach route at low tide and the BLM sand road at high tide.

Burkholder says the truck seats ten and they're expecting to fill up as more people venture out to the north spit.

"This actually has rejuvenated a lot of the area, it's brought back a lot of interest, we're getting a lot of people in here earlier in the year and we're starting to see business up and down the coast because of it. It's not just here, it's in town and to the north."

Tours cost $25 for adults, $10 for kids ages 4 to 10, and they'll be running weekdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and weekends from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Call 759-3313 for more information.

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And up she rises

2008-02-15T16:53:00.000Z

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North-West Evening Mail
February 15, 2008

A FIRST World War Barrow submarine commanded by the cousin of Dracula author Bram Stoker, may rise from the dead after 90 years.

The AE2 sub was scuttled off Turkey in April, 1915, after being holed by enemy gunfire while on the surface.

Its voyage proved allied submarines could make it through the narrow, mine-infested Dardanelles straits linking the Bosphorus and the Sea of Marmora.

Her successful voyage to Gallipoli on the Turkish coast helped pave the way for other subs and ships which went on to sink more than 220 Turkish vessels during the disastrous allied troop landings at Gallipoli.

HMAS AE2’s mixed Australian and British crew was commanded by Irishman Henry Stoker.

The AE2 which had a crew of 34, was launched on June 18, 1913. Since being scuttled on April 27, 1915, she lay unseen until found in 73m of water in 1998 largely intact.

BAE shipyard history and heritage representative, Tony Salter-Ellis said: “HMAS AE2 was the second of two E Class submarines built at Barrow for the Royal Australian Navy.

“Yard No 419, AE1, became the first casualty of the First World War when she was lost without trace off German New Guinea on September 14, 1914. A private diving company claimed to have found the AE1 last year but this has yet to be confirmed.”

Mr Salter-Ellis said that in the Dardanelles AE2 faced mines, submarine nets and groundings underwater and searchlights, shelling and ramming by gunboats and shelling from cliff forts whenever they had to surface to recharge batteries.

Mr Salter-Ellis added: “BAE Systems is pleased to hear of the intention of the Submarine Institute of Australia to raise and preserve AE2, so that the key role played by the Vickers Barrow-built submarine and her crew in the Gallipoli Campaign can be honoured.”

The boat is 181ft long, 22ft 6in wide, with a range of 3,225 nautical miles, and a displacement of 800 tons.

Now the Submarine Institute of Australia, where AE2’s exploits are nationally known, and the Turkish Institute of Nautical Archaeology are discussing proposals to raise her.

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El CAS pretende realizar en junio el primer mapa en 3D del fondo de La Caleta

2008-02-13T19:02:00.000Z

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Lavozdigital.es
By Daniel Pérez
February 13, 2008

La aplicación de tecnologías experimentales convertirá la playa en un campo de pruebas internacional para técnicas que «marcarán el futuro de la arqueología subacuática» Dos proyectos complementarios ayudarán a localizar pecios y yacimientos

La playa de La Caleta, gracias a los tres mil años de historia sumergida que sepultan sus aguas, está considerada por los principales expertos en arqueología subacuática de todo el mundo como un campo de pruebas inmejorable. Su situación estratégica y el gran número de yacimientos que guarda, además de su relativa accesibilidad, la convierten en una zona perfecta para experimentar con nuevas tecnologías destinadas a explorar los fondos marinos, localizar restos y pecios, e incluso representarlos en imágenes tridimensionales.

Durante los meses de mayo y junio, dos proyectos pioneros tratarán de desentrañar algunos de los misterios que todavía encierran las aguas gaditanas y que, según la directora del CAS, Carmen García Rivera, «marcarán el futuro de la arqueología subacuática, siempre y cuando logren el grado de perfección necesario».

El primer procedimiento consistirá en la aplicación de técnicas geofísicas de rastreo, utilizadas anteriormente con éxito en tareas industriales -como la búsqueda de petróleo-, sobre el lecho marino de la playa gaditana. El segundo de los dispositivos ha sido ideado por un prestigioso equipo de arqueólogos italianos, que ha decidido verificar en La Caleta la funcionalidad de un invento que «de cumplir con las expectativas generadas, revolucionará todos los procesos actuales de búsqueda y representación de hallazgos, ya que se convertirá en parte imprescindible del protocolo de actuación habitual».

En mayo, gracias a un equipo de ecosondas Multihaz -una especie de variante mejorada del sónar-, que durante 15 días barrerá el fondo de La Caleta arrastrado por un barco, los arqueólogos obtendrán una imagen bastante fiable de la superficie, a partir de la cual se dibujará «un mapa lo más minucioso posible de todo lo que hay bajo el agua».

Técnicas combinadas

«No se trata simplemente de ubicar nuevos restos -puntualiza García Rivera-, ya que hablamos de una zona en general bastante conocida, sino, sobre todo, de comprobar la entidad de la respuesta que esos aparatos ofrecen en yacimientos ya localizados».

La directora adelanta que, en condiciones óptimas, la aplicación de esta técnica pionera sobre determinados pecios «ofrece unos resultados espectaculares». Tras el análisis de esas anomalías detectadas por el Multihaz los historiadores diagnosticarán si los relieves hallados pertenecen a barcos hundidos, restos sin importancia o simples accidentes geológicos, y estudiarán la conveniencia de explorarlos sobre el terreno con buceadores o robots, según la profundidad a la que se encuentren los restos.

En junio, un equipo de investigadores de La Toscana, dirigido por el reconocido técnico Francesco Gravina, completará los resultados del Multihaz con otro proyecto especialmente ideado «para lograr la representación y difusión de yacimientos en tres dimensiones». La complementariedad de ambos procedimientos permitiría obtener «el mapa más completo de La Caleta que hayamos conseguido hasta el momento», concluye la directora del CAS, que no obstante se muestra prudente a la hora de subrayar «tanto una como la otra no dejan de ser tecnologías experimentales, con resultados ya probados pero, como quien dice, en periodo de perfeccionamiento».

Una ayuda extra para afinar las conclusiones últimas de esta singular aventura es la utilización de herramientas clásicas: el empleo del magnetómetro, por ejemplo, actúa como un sofisticado detector de metales que permite a los arqueólogos «desechar algunas teorías casi sobre la marcha».

Estos avances tecnológicos se aplicarán en Cádiz gracias a la integración de la Junta de Andalucía y el CAS en el programa europeo Archeomed, destinado a potenciar la colaboración entre países para garantizar «la protección y el conocimiento de nuestro patrimonio subacuático común».

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Odyssey señala que ya no tiene sentido que España presente cargos en contra

2008-02-13T09:16:00.000Z

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Terra
February 13, 2008

La empresas estadounidense Odyssey afirmó hoy que, dado que el Gobierno español conoce ya las coordenadas exactas del tesoro hallado en mayo pasado, 'carece de sentido' que presente ningún cargo contra la firma de exploración marina.

En un escueto comunicado, la empresa 'cazatesoros' señaló que la información proporcionada a las autoridades españolas sobre el tesoro de monedas de plata y oro confirma lo que siempre había sostenido la firma: que el pecio 'no se encuentra en aguas jurisdiccionales españolas'.

Por ello, y 'a la luz de los hechos', la empresa con sede en Tampa (Florida), insiste en que, dado que el Estado español conoce ya la 'localización específica' del pecio hallado en la operación denominada 'Cisne negro', presentar cargos contra Odyssey sería un sinsentido.

Con esta última declaración, Odyssey sale al paso de informaciones que recoge hoy un medio español en las que se señala que un tribunal de La Línea de la Concepción (Cádiz, sur de España) emitió un auto en el que se cita a declarar al actual presidente de la firma, Greg Stemm.

'Ni (Greg) Stemm ni Odyssey han recibido citación o notificación alguna, ni cargos presentados por ningún tribunal español', apunta el comunicado.

El pasado 25 de enero, Odyssey facilitó a España información precisa sobre el tesoro valorado en más de 500 millones de dólares, después de que un juez estadounidense así lo ordenase en un tribunal de Tampa.

Al día siguiente, Odyssey expresó su satisfacción por que la decisión del juez estuvo acompañada de una 'orden de protección', que resguarda la información específica sobre las coordenadas del tesoro y los objetos extraídos, así como otros datos.

Así, el magistrado aceptó tanto la petición española como la reclamación de la empresa 'cazatesoros' de que el Gobierno español se comprometiera a cumplir una cláusulas de confidencialidad, antes de proceder a revelar información precisa sobre el cargamento rescatado.

Odyssey ha reiterado en numerosas ocasiones que se trata de un tesoro compuesto de monedas de plata y oro y otros objetos de valor que fueron extraídos fuera de las aguas jurisdiccionales de España, en el Atlántico, y que ellos han cumplido con todos los requerimientos legales.

Odyssey fundamenta sus derechos sobre el pecio en que el tribunal federal de Tampa competente en jurisdicción marina le ha concedido el estatus de descubridor y depositario de todos los yacimientos recuperados en la disputa con España.

La denominada ley del Almirantazgo y la Convención del Mar establecen que el 90 por ciento del valor de lo recuperado corresponde a la empresa que llevó a cabo el rescate.

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Investigan en España a un responsable de Odyssey, según ABC

2008-02-13T09:11:00.000Z

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La Voz Digital
February 13, 2008

MADRID — Un juez de instrucción español ha iniciado una investigación contra el co-fundador y consejero delegado de la empresa estadounidense Odyssey, sospechosa, según España, de expoliar un enorme tesoro submarino, afirmó este miércoles el diario español ABC.

Preguntado por AFP, el juzgado de la Línea de la Concepción (Cádiz), que instruye un sumario penal sobre este asunto, no confirmó ni desmintió la información del diario.

Según ABC, el juez español encargado del caso ha convocado al consejero delegado de Odyssey, Greg Stemm, para un interrogatorio a finales de febrero, durante el cual deberá responder de las acusaciones de contrabando y daños al patrimonio histórico.

La empresa cazatesoros Odyssey había anunciado el 18 de mayo de 2007 el descubrimiento "en aguas internacionales del Atlántico" del mayor tesoro submarino jamás encontrado, compuesto por 500.000 monedas de plata y un centenar de objetos de oro.

Odyssey había rápida y discretamente enviado su botín de 17 toneladas desde la colonia británica de Gibraltar a su sede estadounidense en Tampa, en Florida (sudeste de EEUU), manteniendo en secreto el lugar del descubrimiento.

Las autoridades españolas sospecharon inmediatamente que Odyssey podría haber hecho su descubrimiento en aguas territoriales españolas o en un barco hundido español.

La empresa estadounidense siempre ha dicho que descubrió el tesoro en aguas internacionales y no en aguas españolas.

España ha llevado el asunto ante la justicia estadounidense. Un juez federal de Florida ordenó en enero a Odyssey que revelara en dos semanas a las autoridades españolas el lugar exacto del descubrimiento del pecio, aunque sin hacerlo público.

El abogado del Gobierno español estudia actualmente los documentos remitidos por esta empresa especializada en la búsqueda de tesoros submarinos.

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Two tall ships drop anchor in Morro Bay to teach kids and public about maritime history

2008-02-13T08:37:00.000Z

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KSBY 6
February 13, 2008

Local elementary school students get a history lesson at sea.

Morro Bay area students will board the "Lady Washington" and the "Hawaiian Chieftain" for a hands-on history lesson Thursday.

Two tall ships made their only Central Coast stop at Marina Square in Morro Bay.

"What we basically do, we take kids on board and we teach them about 18th century maritime life. Also, what it was like to have traded in that area, the native peoples, what it was like to have been a sailor back in the day," said Sean Dixon-Gumm, steward of the "Lady Washington."

The event is hosted by the nonprofit organization Grays Harbor Historical Seaport Authority. The ships are open to the public until Sunday.

The next stop is San Francisco.

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Replica of ancient boat will float again

2008-02-13T08:34:00.000Z

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Kent News
February 13, 2008

THE OLDEST cross-Channel ferry in the world will set sail again in 2010, giving archaeologists a glimpse into the lives of Bronze Age seafarers.

Based on the 3,550-year-old vessel discovered beneath Dover town centre 16 years ago, the replica boat, lashed together from planks of wood, waterproofed with beeswax and moss, will carry up to ten men to France.

It is being built by the Canterbury Archaeological Trust, and researchers hope the voyage will help them glean invaluable information about how our ancestors conquered the sea.

The venture will also help archaeologists understand how people in Dover lived more than three millennia ago.

Peter Clark, from the Canterbury Archaeology Trust, who is masterminding the project, said: “The boat was made and used by people living three and a half thousand years ago.

“It was to better understand these people, their society and the world they lived in that was as much a focus of the analysis team’s work as the study of the vessel itself.”

The ancient vessel was discovered by accident in 1992 when Keith Parfitt, from the trust, noticed an unusual piece of wood in the trench dug as part of road works in Dover.

It became clear that this was a small part of a much larger boat which had been preserved under the busy port town for thousands of years.

It was hailed by Dr FH Panton, chairman of the Dover Bronze Age Boat Trust, as “one of the most important post-war archaeological finds in Britain”.

The remains of the vessel – buried six metres below ground level – were incomplete, yet the team hope building a reconstruction will help show how the
original looked and how it was propelled.

The boat is almost 10 metres long and two and a half metres wide, made by lashing oak timbers together with cords of yew wood. Moss and beeswax were then stuffed between the joints to make them watertight.

Archaeologists studying the find suspect the ancient boat could have been used to trade across the Channel. Only an experiment can show whether this was possible.

The replica will sail from Folkestone to Wissant in France in 2010, crewed by volunteers from the British Dragon Boat Association.

After arriving in France, it is to become part of a travelling exhibition about the Golden Age of Europe 3,500 years ago.

The venture, overseen by the Dover Bronze Age Boat Trust, will cost about £900,000 including the exhibition. The trust is applying for funding from the European Union, but private donations are also welcomed.

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Students uncover bay's hidden treasures

2008-02-12T22:28:00.000Z

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The Geelong Advertiser
By Michaela Farrington
February 12, 2008

MARITIME archaeology students are diving into Clifton Springs' past to find remnants of the area's heady days as a booming tourist resort.

The students from Adelaide's Flinders University are excavating the former Clifton Springs spa complex, considered one of Victoria's most important heritage sites.

The students are working under the guidance of Heritage Victoria's maritime archaeology team, which has joined Flinders University to run a Maritime Archaeology Field School based at Portarlington.

Member for Western Victoria, Gayle Tierney, was on hand yesterday to see the project get underway and hear about the research project which will focus on the 1890s Long Jetty site.

Ms Tierney said Clifton Springs was Victoria's only seaside mineral springs resort and a booming tourist destination in the 19th century.

``Today, remnants like the Long Jetty piles remind us of the area's fascinating history,'' she said.

``Therefore, it is important that we understand and protect what is left and it's wonderful to see these students developing their skills while helping to build our knowledge of the site.''

The Clifton Springs spa complex archaeological site is included on the Victorian Heritage Register, in recognition of its State heritage significance.

The spa complex operated there from about 1875 to 1920.

The Long Jetty was built about 1890 to service the popular bay steamers that delivered tourists and health-seekers to the resort.

The field school will be based at Portarlington until February 18.

The students will also survey two historic shipwreck sites, the PS Ozone at Indented Head and the four-mast schooner Aneiura at Point Lillias in Corio Bay.

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Undergraduates spend break studying 17th-century shipwreck

2008-02-11T00:00:00.000Z

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UConn Advance

By Cindy Weiss
February 11, 2008

Six students in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences can be counted among the elite of shipwreck archaeology, after spending the winter intersession in an unusual new Study Abroad program.

They were the first undergraduates ever allowed to work on the ‘Cadillac’ of shipwrecks, the nearly intact 1628 wreck of the warship Vasa in Stockholm, Sweden

The Vasa, which was raised from Stockholm Harbor 47 years ago and has its own museum built around it, is the only intact recovered 17th-century shipwreck in the world.

Its recovery was one of three pioneering projects that started the discipline of maritime archaeology. Conservation techniques developed for it set the standards for years to come.

The elaborate warship, covered with more than 500 iconographic wood carvings and once-gilded sculptures, was the royal flagship of Swedish King Gustav II Adolf’s bid for maritime supremacy.

It never made it out of the harbor, though, sinking on its maiden voyage on Aug. 10, 1628.

Researchers from the Vasa Museum, part of the Swedish National Maritime Museums, are now documenting and analyzing the find.

Their results, including the students’ efforts, will be published in a five-volume book series on the wreck and its artifacts.

The students were led by David Robinson, a Ph.D. candidate in anthropology who teaches at Avery Point in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences’ new maritime archaeology minor. Robinson’s former professor in the nautical archaeology master’s degree program at Texas A&M University, Fred Hocker, is now director of research at the Vasa Museum.

Robinson and Hocker designed the program that allowed UConn undergraduates to participate in the Vasa study as a Study Abroad opportunity.

The program was so successful that the Vasa Museum has invited UConn back and plans to expand its collaboration to other universities, Robinson says.

The UConn students faced the challenge of documenting the massive, 200-foot-long ship in just three weeks. They concentrated their work on the 4.5-story stern.

“It was a little bit overwhelming at first,” says Julia Lysaght, a senior majoring in anthropology.

“It was a magnificently beautiful ship. Pictures do not do it justice,” she says.

“It opened a new wing of my interest.” She now plans to work in maritime archaeology, with a focus on the conservation of artifacts.

The Vasa was built as the most heavily armed ship in the Baltic Sea – “the flagship of the king’s fleet and an extraordinary conveyor of the power of the Swedish empire,” says Robinson.

The wreck was well preserved because the shipworm, Teredo navalis, a wormlike mollusk that bores into wood, is not present in the Baltic due to its high freshwater content.

Part of the ship also sank in mud, and the anaerobic environment preserved details and even paint on many of its sculptures.

The ship was built without a blueprint, a common practice at the time.

The UConn students took measurements with Total Station, similar to a surveyor’s transit, and recorded more than 1,200 data points that will be used in creating a plan of the ship.

The Vasa museum is a major tourist attraction in Scandinavia, but visitors are restricted to balconies surrounding it in a seven-story hall.

The students worked on the ship itself, however, where only museum employees and the king of Sweden are allowed.

“Every single day we got to walk on this structure,” says Kaitlin Guardino, a senior majoring in physiology and neurobiology and sociology, who went on the trip. “We researched the broad geometry of it.”

The experience of working on the ship was “pretty unforgettable,” says Eric Heffter, a senior majoring in anthropology with a minor in maritime archaeology. “In three weeks, we really learned a lot.”

Adds Arthur Williams, “We were told that we’d be ‘shipwreck snobs’ now.” Williams is a senior at the Avery Point campus who is majoring in maritime studies with a minor in marine archaeology.

Experiences like the Vasa program are the new face of Study Abroad, says Ross Lewin, director of UConn’s Study Abroad program.

Special programs such as the Vasa research and planned programs to study contemporary art in India, pharmacy in China, and social entrepreneurship in Guatemala let students focus on what it means to be a global citizen, he says.

“We’re really trying to get out in the lead on this at UConn.”

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Park Point shipwreck identified as tug sunk 120 years ago

2008-02-10T23:06:00.000Z

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Duluth News Tribune
By Will Ashenmacher
February 09, 2008

A year after its discovery, shipwreck buffs think they’ve identified “Sophie’s Wreck,” the remains of a wooden ship discovered last winter off Park Point.

But the chance to officially identify Sophie’s Wreck is slipping away as interest in it wanes and the wreck itself sinks deeper into the lake bottom.

Sophie’s Wreck was discovered about 150 feet offshore near the 2600 block of Minnesota Avenue last winter. People walking on the 10 inches of clear ice above the wreck first spotted it Feb. 18. It was dubbed “Sophie’s Wreck” in honor of one of the finders’ daughters.

Several people dove down to the wreck last winter and combed the area with cameras and metal detectors, looking for telltale signs of the ship’s identity, like serial numbers on equipment.

No such identifiers were found, but now, shipwreck historians think the wreck is the Amethyst, a harbor tug that was scuttled in 1888.

Jay Hanson, who dove to the wreck three times last winter, said the remains suggest Sophie’s Wreck was probably about 45 feet long, meaning it was likely a tug. The wreck’s engine and boiler are missing and the connecting rod is cleanly severed and not twisted or broken, indicating the missing items were removed for salvage before the ship was deliberately sunk — a not-uncommon fate for tugs that had outlived their usefulness or were beyond economically viable repair, according to Thom Holden, director of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Lake Superior Maritime Visitors Center.

That leads Hanson and others to think the wreck is the Amethyst, but they freely acknowledge it could be another tug whose demise was not recorded or whose documents have been lost.

Ken Merryman, a board member of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Preservation Society, said the size and salvage indications are all that point to Sophie’s Wreck being the Amethyst.

“We have no other clues other than that. It could be an unrecorded boat of some kind,” he said. “Right now, that’s just the best guess.”

The lack of a definite identifier poses a problem — a hunch doesn’t cut it when trying to get official recognition of a shipwreck, such as a listing on the National Register of Historic Places.

“We have to prove it’s the wreck we think it is to put it on the national historic register and, right now, all we have is the size,” Hanson said.

Hanson said he doesn’t know how it might be proven that Sophie’s Wreck is indeed the Amethyst.

“It might never be proven,” he said. “It might always be a mystery.”

The Great Lakes Shipwreck Preservation Society helps guide shipwrecks on to the National Register of Historic Places. Merryman, who oversees that aspect of the group’s work, said it takes on about one shipwreck per year and is booked up until 2009.

And since the research, exploration and documentation of a wreck costs about $1,000, the group doesn’t want to spend the money on what may be an anonymous harbor tug of little historical value.

“It’s probably lower on our list, let’s put it that way,” Merryman said of Sophie’s Wreck.

Society president Steve Daniel said other wrecks, such as the scow schooner Mayflower, which is sunk off the Lester River, have more to offer, historically speaking. The group is working to get The Moonlight, a schooner-barge that sunk in the Apostle Islands, on the register, for instance, because its wreck still holds china, lanterns, anchors and the original steering wheel.

“A lot of these ships, you don’t see that,” Daniel said. “It’s worth preserving as is.”

Sophie’s Wreck will make it into a diver’s guide Daniel will have published in May by the Minnesota Historical Society Press. Daniel said he spends about three pages discussing Sophie’s Wreck.

But Sophie’s Wreck lies in water that is too shallow for most boaters to enter, which makes it hard for people to visit. That leads Daniel to think it’s not going to become a heavily visited site.

“This one probably won’t make most charts,” he said.

On top of that, Sophie’s Wreck may already have sunk into the lake bottom. Steven Sola, one of the original discoverers, said he visited the site in June and all he could see were two blades of the propeller. Daniel said he visited the site in August and couldn’t see anything.

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Rafael Azuar: ´Los tesoros del Odyssey pueden ir a Cartagena´

2008-02-10T11:51:00.000Z

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La Ópinion de Murcia
February 10, 2008

El director del Museo Nacional de Arqueología Subacuática ha sido elegido por una amplia mayoría presidente del comité español del Consejo Internacional de Museos El director del Museo Nacional de Arqueología Subacuática, Rafael Azuar, ha sido elegido por una amplia mayoría presidente del Comité Español del Consejo Internacional de Museos (Icom), un organismo en el que están representados los principales centros museísticos del mundo. La elección se produce cuando en este centro que se abrirá el próximo mes de junio en Cartagena se está llevando a cabo el traslado de fondos desde la antigua sede, en el Faro de Navidad.

Azuar manifestó su satisfacción por este nombramiento, "sobre todo, porque está respaldado por más de doscientos votos de expertos" y recordó que tendrá repercusiones en el Museo Nacional de Arqueología Subacuática, (Arqua). "Como presidente del Icom español puedo asegurar que Cartagena y el museo tendrán una presencia importante dentro de esta institución, así como las propuestas culturales que se hagan en esta ciudad". Los museos españoles están, según Azuar, "a la altura de los europeos, aunque España tiene sus peculiaridades".

La difusión del patrimonio sumergido será uno de los objetivos del Arqua. Esta labor se llevará a cabo con los proyectos expositivos y desde el Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Subacuáticas, que también se encuentra en este edificio de Guillermo Vázquez Consuegra.

En este sentido, Azuar destaca que el museo albergará parte de los tesoros del galeón hundido que rescató la empresa estadounidense 'Odyssey', si el juez de Tampa (Florida) decide finalmente que se devuelvan a España, como ha reclamado el gobierno. "El juez ha dado un plazo para que la empresa informe, y el tesoro no se ha vendido. En el caso de que se devuelva, lo cual esperamos, parte de ese material tendría que venir aquí, y nos alegraremos mucho no solo por el propio museo, sino por el orgullo de recuperar un patrimonio que es español".

El Museo Nacional de Arqueología tendrá dos salas, una para exposiciones permanentes que ha sido diseñada para albergar piezas de gran tamaño y otra para exposiciones temporales. Los fondos del Arqua serán los mismos que forman parte de las colecciones del antiguo centro en el Faro de Navidad de Cartagena, pero además aumentarán con otros que todavía no han sido expuestos al público. Este material nuevo representa el sesenta por cien de todo el contenido del museo. Para Rafael Azuar, la prioridad una vez que el centro abra sus puertas es que pase a formar parte de la identidad cultural de los cartageneros. Por ese motivo, los equipos de arqueólogos, historiadores y restauradores trabajan desde hace meses en el diseño de una programación de actividades. "Queremos que sea parte viva de la historia de esta ciudad que se está convirtiendo en uno de los más importantes destinos culturales", dijo Azuar.

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Researchers narrow identity of mystery shipwreck

2008-02-10T00:03:00.000Z

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The World Link
By Elise Hamner
February 09, 2008

BLM’s cultural resource coordinator, Steve Samuels, was at the Coos Historical and Maritime Museum on Friday comparing pictures of old ships with photos of the recently uncovered shipwreck.

Museum staff has an archive packed with photos of ships and shipwrecks dating back a century. One vessel they were studying was the C.A. Smith. The wood-hulled schooner was built in North Bend at the Kruse and Banks shipyard in 1917, said Hannah Contino, a research assistant at the museum.

There is a good selection of photos of the vessel before it ran aground at the North Jetty in 1923. Contino said researchers think the remains on the North Spit are from a vessel similar in style.

For the curious, the museum is displaying photos of old ships. There also are other shipwreck photos and a map of wrecks around Coos Bay.

Some people have speculated the mystery shipwreck might be that of the C.W. Wetmore that ran aground a mile north of the jetty in 1892. Not so, said Capt. George Livingstone, who’s on the museum’s Maritime Acquisition Committee. The Wetmore was iron-hulled, he said.

Others have speculated the bow could be from the wrecked schooner Novelty, but historic photos show it without masts and it ran aground miles north of the jetty. Still, there are dozens of other shipwrecks to consider.

“We definitely think we’ll get the answer on this,” Livingstone said.

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Patrimonio hará una prospección submarina en Xove tras el hallazgo casual de restos arqueológicos del siglo XV

2008-02-09T10:08:00.000Z

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La Voz de Galicia
February 06, 2008

La costa del municipio de Xove, en A Mariña lucense, podría ocultar más restos arqueológicos que los hallados casualmente durante un dragado realizado antes del pasado verano. Datados entre los siglos XV y XVI, hasta el momento se han recuperado piezas de vajillas y armas. Para tratar de averiguar de dónde proceden y, sobre todo, si hay más, la dirección autonómica de Patrimonio ultima los preparativos de una prospección subacuática.

Como otros muchos hallazgos de vestigios de interés histórico, en el caso de Xove todo empezó por azar. Una draga extraía restos del fondo marino frente a la playa de Lago, en la ensenada natural conocida como A Coba, ahora ampliada de modo artificial por los diques del puerto donde opera la multinacional del aluminio Alcoa. La tripulación de la barcaza se llevó una gran sorpresa al comprobar que entre los restos de arena y lodo aparecían armas y vajillas.

Aunque muy cerca, en la vecina localidad de San Cibrao, se encuentra el Museo Provincial do Mar de Lugo, fueron trasladadas al Museo do Mar de Vigo, considerado «máis idóneo» porque allí están siendo sometidas a un tratamiento para conservarlas y se intenta datarlas.

Vestigios ya recuperados
Una cureña (armazón con rueda) para ballesta, en parte de madera, recubierta en su extremo de bronce y con apliques de bronce en forma de lis, así como con dos placas de hueso paralelas en su superficie superior. Un falconete (pieza de artillería) datado en el siglo XV, de hierro, alterado por la sal marina. Una caña de bombarda (pieza de artillería), construida en hierro forjado y aparentemente «bastante antiga». Una jarra de estaño, con pie, muy estilizada y que conserva la tapa. Varios platos de una vajilla elaborados con una aleación que incluye estaño, así como un gran plato o fuente, del mismo material. Estos son, según fuentes de la Consellería de Cultura, los vestigios ya recuperados.

Por ahora aún no han trascendido más datos sobre ese hallazgo arqueológico submarino. A la espera de las conclusiones del informe oficial, otras fuentes consultadas apuntaron la posibilidad de que pudiesen formar parte de una embarcación que se habría ido a pique en esa zona de la costa lucense entre los siglos XV y XVI.

La investigación
Con el objetivo primordial de comprobar si en la zona hay más vestigios y, también, con el de intentar aclarar si están vinculados con algún barco, la Consellería de Cultura tiene todo preparado para la investigación submarina. Fuentes de ese departamento no apuntaron fechas, aunque prevén que pueda hacerse durante este mismo mes o a principios del próximo. Todos los gastos corren a cuenta del erario autonómico.

Sin que signifique que haya una vigilancia permanente, desde el departamento autonómico de Cultura aseguraron que sí se ha intensificado el control en la zona del hallazgo. Especialmente con el objetivo de evitar posibles expolios del patrimonio histórico que pudiera encontrarse en el fondo marino. Y, sobre todo porque, aunque está situada frente al pequeño puerto pesquero de Morás y en el entorno están instaladas diferentes empresas, se trata de una zona deshabitada.

El destino final
A tenor de las informaciones obtenidas, los restos ya recuperados habrían aparecido relativamente cerca de la costa, frente a la playa de Lago, en un área delimitada por la ensenada de A Coba y punta Muneiro.

A la espera de la prospección submarina y de sus resultados, parece que tampoco está decidido definitivamente dónde se conservarán y expondrán las piezas de armamento y de vajilla halladas hasta el momento.

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'Super-scope' shines on Mary Rose

2008-02-08T19:37:00.000Z

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BBC
By Rebecca Morelle
February 08, 2008

Scientists are using a "synchroton" to study the Mary Rose's timbers

The research is taking place at the Diamond synchrotron, a beam-generating machine that covers the area of five football pitches.

Scientists are using the facility in a bid to fine-tune the conservation of the historic vessel's timbers.

The Mary Rose, pride of Henry VIII's English fleet, sank in 1545 and lay on the sea bed until being raised in 1982.

The work carried out at Diamond will help conservators understand more about the sulphur compounds buried deep within the ship's timbers.

Researchers aim to find out how stable they are, as these can be converted to sulphuric acid when oxygen is present - threatening preservation efforts.

After sinking in the 16th Century, the Mary Rose lay on the bottom of the Solent for the next 400 years.

Thanks to a protective covering of sea-bed sediment, many of her timbers and artefacts remained intact when she was raised from the salty depths in 1982.

Since then, scientists have been endeavouring to ensure the preservation of the historic vessel, which is housed at Portsmouth's Historic Dockyard.

From 1994, her hull timbers have been continuously sprayed with a water-soluble wax called polyethylene glycol.

Dr Mark Jones, from the Mary Rose Trust, who is leading the research project, said: "It prevents the wood from distorting, shrinking, splitting, cracking or collapsing.

"But, in addition to that you have to remove some of the salts that have occurred over the many centuries - chlorides, which are easy to wash out, and the iron and sulphur compounds, which in the presence of oxygen can be converted into sulphuric acid."

The biochemist said that over the last 15 years, researchers had successfully neutralised all of the acids in the wood and had removed the vast majority of the troublesome compounds.

Dr Jones told the BBC News website: "What we are now trying to do using Diamond technology is to investigate any remaining compounds that could present a threat in 20, or 30, or even 500 years time."

Silver doughnut
The scientists, from the Mary Rose Trust, the National Museum of Scotland, Daresbury Laboratory and the University of Kent, have been placing thin slivers of the ship's timber into the "microfocus beamline" at the Oxfordshire-based synchrotron.

The facility - sometimes described as a super-microscope - works by speeding electrons around a huge doughnut-shaped chamber until they are travelling so fast that they begin to emit light.

These intense rays are then channelled off into beamlines and focused on to samples of material, like the Mary Rose timbers, allowing their fine structure to be analysed.

By observing the wood at the cellular level, the team has been able to look at compounds of sulphur and iron buried deep within the timbers.

Dr Jones said: "Over time, sulphur has bonded with the cell walls in the wood, producing a compound that is extremely stable and impossible to remove because it is so deep in the timber.

"With the help of Diamond and university research, we want to make sure that these compounds will remain stable over long, long periods of time under different display conditions."

He added: "Essentially, what we are trying to do is to fine-tune the conservation process so that it lasts for many, many more centuries."

Charles Barker, managing director of Mary Rose Archaeological Services, added: "It is all about looking at potential problems that might crop up that we don't know about now."

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A graveyard for ships

2008-02-07T09:54:00.000Z

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The Gazette
By Craig Fleming
February 05, 2008

NOTORIOUS for its westerly gales, the northern part of the Fylde coast has seen a variety of ships cast ashore over the years. Rarely has a decade gone by without the sight of some storm-tossed bundle at high water mark, or a find, half-buried in the sand.

One of the most dramatic incidents in recent memory was back in August 1981, when strong winds and mountainous seas left the £5m Anchorsholme sewage pipe project in ruins.

The giant Holland XXIV dredging platform and two supply platforms were beached and wreckage was scattered for half a mile along the Cleveleys shore.

The seven-man crew had moved the 150-ton dredger half a mile north in a bid to stop the other non-powered rigs from going ashore.

Engineers and council officials counted the cost of the destruction and the launching of the giant pipeline, replacing a 40-year-old outfall, and designed to stop raw sewage being washed up on Fylde beaches, was postponed until the end of the month.

Going back almost a century earlier, the Norwegian ship The Abana got into trouble in a storm on her way from Liverpool to Florida.

The three-masted ship mistook the recently-built Blackpool Tower for a lighthouse when she was sailing in the Irish Sea in a storm on December 22, 1894.

The Abana was spotted floundering off North Pier, her sails torn to shreds.

Blackpool lifeboat crew was alerted but a rescue attempt was delayed for a few hours as the lifeboat, the Samuel Fletcher, had to be towed from Blackpool to Bispham by horse.

By the time it was launched at Little Bispham, the Abana had already been wrecked off Shell Wharf.

The lifeboat crew rowed through the surf to the stricken vessel and rescued the men, only to become stuck on a sandbank.

The gallant boatmen pushed her clear and reached the shore to the cheers of about 100 people.

Rescuers and rescued were given a party at the Red Lion Hotel, Bispham.

It's a testament to Victorian shipbuilding that part of the wreckage can still be seen at low water on the beach at Norbreck. The bell hangs in Cleveleys Parish Church to this day.

On the same day as the Abana hit the pier, Fleetwood fishing boat Petrel was also driven ashore by the same storm close to Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Storm conditions also brought the end of trawler Commandant Bultinck which was driven ashore at Rossall on October 2, 1929.

A 60mph wind, hail, rain, thunder and lightning battered the vessel and three crewmen died as they tried to swim ashore. Nine of their colleagues survived.

One of them, a deckhand named Pierre Luyens, was washed ashore on Preesall Beach on November 1 and has his grave in Fleetwood cemetery.

Commandant Bultinck, a Dutch-owned trawler, was on her way home after fishing off the Isle of Man. She was eventually broken up where she lay on the beach.

She had previously been a Fleetwood vessel but was sold and renamed in 1926.

Two years before the Abana disaster, in 1892, Fleetwood to Florida was the intended route of the Sirene – but instead the giant Norwegian ship only got as far as Blackpool and became another of the resort's most well-known shipwrecks.

The 667-ton boat smashed into the North Pier in a hurricane on October 9, 1892, destroying part of the structure. Incredibly the 11 crew members jumped on to the pier to safety. Its wheel is in Blackpool lifeboat house.

But perhaps the Fylde coast's most celebrated shipwreck has to be Nelson's former flagship, the Foudroyant, which went down in a storm off Blackpool on June 16, 1897.

Launched in Plymouth in 1798, the Foudroyant was Nelson's flagship for two years until 1800.

At 219ft long, 50ft wide, and weighing 2,000 tons, it housed 80 guns and 713 crew.

Nelson described her as "the most perfect ship that ever swam on salt water".

After ending service, the Foudroyant became a tourist attraction. It came to Blackpool from Southport on June 4, 1897, and anchored two miles out to sea between North and Central piers.

Just before 6am on June 16, a hurricane force storm caused the ship to break anchor. Drifting towards land, she just missed the North Pier jetty and hit the shore 600 yards up from Cocker Square.

The 28 crew members were saved by 16 lifeboatmen aboard the Blackpool lifeboat Samuel Fletcher.

The ship was bought by a local syndicate who – in typical Blackpool fashion – made souvenirs from the wood.

But most of the massive ship remained intact until a November storm broke it up and took it to its final resting place at the bottom of the irish Sea.

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Ship model may sell for £7,000

2008-02-07T09:50:00.000Z

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Sunderland Echo
February 06, 2008

An intricate model of one of the shortest-lived ships in Sunderland's marine history is expected to fetch up to £7,000 at auction this month.

The 4ft 5in long model, with brass fittings, is of the ill-fated steamship Barnby.

The vessel was built by Short Brothers of Pallion, engined by George Clark Ltd of Crown Road, Southwick, and launched in December 1940.

It was torpedoed by German U-boat 111 off the Icelandic coast on May 22, 1942, in one of the most bizarre nautical incidents of the Second World War.

The Barnby did not sink immediately. It was on its way back from Canada heavily laden with flour, which swelled up and kept it afloat. No one knows where it lies.

Lionel Willis, marine models expert at auctioneers Bonhams ,who are selling the Barnby model in their marine sale at Knightsbridge, London, on February 20, said: "Builders' models of this period are particularly sought-after, because they are very attractive.

"Early models have fine metal fittings, often silver or silver gilt and gun metal or brass. The complex derricks and davits, open bridgework and detailing all add to the value of the Barnby model.

"Models such as this were made to be presented to the owners by the shipbuilder, usually. They would then have been displayed in the owner's offices or initially in the boardroom."

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Marine mystery like a magnet

2008-02-07T09:45:00.000Z

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Cape Cod Times
By Doug Fraser
February 97, 2008

WELLFLEET — The scavengers have already been at work. Despite signs placed by the National Park Service warning of $10,000 fines for taking anything from the shipwreck's remains, there are wood chips and the shadows left by removed planking.

The bones of a ship that washed up or were exposed on Newcomb Hollow Beach in the late-January storm are still on the beach, a larger-than-life mystery from the Cape's past. It's tempting for onlookers to want just a small piece to call their own.

It's not the first time the wreck has been assaulted. Straight cuts across one 6-inch-thick plank betray where, years ago, someone sawed off a piece of wood.

But that scar is the only evidence of a saw Ian Ellison could find yesterday. A specialist in large timber construction methods and building history, the Brewster man believes the wreck is from the late 1700s. Yesterday, he pointed to the marks left by shipyard workers who shaped the large ribs and planks of the ship using special axes.

"It would have been a large crew," Ellison said. He supposes that from idiosyncrasies in the scars left by those swinging the axes, one man was left-handed and that some stood on the beam, others to the side as they worked.

The absence of a keel and the fact that the large ribs curve then run flat has led Ellison and schooner expert Douglas Lee from Rockland, Maine, to think the vessel may have been a flat-bottomed barge.

Although local marine historian Bill Quinn thought the vessel could have been the wreck of the Logan, a schooner converted into a coal-carrying barge, the absence of a keel makes Lee doubt that. Lee also thinks the timbers are too uniform to be hand-hewn.

"It is amazing to see something like this so completely exposed," said Nathan Lipfert, the curator at the Maine Maritime Museum. Lipfert believes the vessel is from the 1800s. After examining a set of photos of the wreck, he thought it was a coastal schooner, common in these waters, possibly with two or three masts, and a little over 100 feet long.

All of the experts agreed the wreck is actually lying on one side. Lipfert suggested that the ribs are actually the sides and supports for a lower deck, and that a keel was below the current timbers at one time, but has been lost.

Shortened ribs around one portion of the wreck could mean that the ship had a large centerboard that would have been retracted in shallow waters. Several other features point to a late-1800s vessel, including grooves in the wood that indicate openings where rock salt would have been poured into the space between the inner and outer hull as a preservative.

"That's typical of 19th-century ship construction of a better quality vessel," said Lipfert, cautioning that his assumptions were based on photographs rather than first-hand observations.

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Nanhai one´s in underwater archaeology

2008-02-06T09:49:00.000Z

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CCTV.com
February 05, 2008

Nanhai one(Xinhua photo)

There's been much hype surrounding the sunken ancient Chinese merchant boat, which was raised from the depths of South China Sea in December. But there's more to it than the public storm.

And over the weekend, they also showcased some of the earliest finds from the vessel.

Archeologists say the Nanhai One, or "South China Sea One," China's first underwater archeological find, is also the most important one so far. China launched its underwater archaeology campaign in 1987, the year Nanhai One was discovered.

After twenty years of development, China is now a leader in this field in Asia. Archaeologists give a lot of credit to the discovery of Nanhai One.

Prof. Zhang Wei, Underwater Archaeology Research Center, said, "The discovery provided us a lot of valuable experience in underwater archaeology. It's something of a blessing for us, as a young team then, to find this cultural relic, recognized as one of the oldest and biggest merchant boat sunk in South China Sea."

The merchant ship was loaded with porcelain when it sank 800 years ago.

Archaeologists have recovered more than four thousand containers made of gold, silver and porcelain, as well as about six thousand copper coins of the Song Dynasty, when the Nanhai was built.

The Song Dynasty was the first peak of the China's porcelain industry. Products were exported to east, south and west Asia, as well as the east coast of Africa, and the use of porcelain was seen as a status symbol.

The 30-meter-long vessel was lifted from two-meter-thick silt in December. Experts say the Nanhai One might confirm the existence of an ancient maritime trade route linking China and the West.

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In Pictures: U-boat operation

2008-02-06T09:01:00.000Z

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BBC
February 06, 2008

U-534, the UK's only full-size World War II German U-boat, is being split into four sections to be moved to a new location.

The rusting vessel, one of only four left in the world, was originally sunk by RAF depth charges near Denmark in 1945.

Engineers are using diamond cutters to break up the submarine. It will then be moved in sections by floating crane down the water.

Merseytravel is to create a new tourist attraction at its Woodside terminal which will allow visitors to walk through the sections of the U-boat.

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