4/29/09: Another weapon in the treasure hunters armory...
Expert Says Satellite Images from Space Reveal Sunken Treasure Ships
Salem-News.com
It may be the final frontier, but satellites in space are allowing treasure hunters unexpected opportunities; how will the world deal with this?
(HOUSTON, Tx.) - Master Merchant Marine and salvage consultant, Captain Tom Williams pens tense tale of lost sunken treasure and asks the forbidden questions: how are all the lost and ancient shipwreck sites suddenly being found?
And should any international laws apply to deep water salvage?
Odyssey, a deep-sea exploration team based in Tampa Florida announced in May 2007 that they had found the shipwreck of a Spanish Galleon. The “Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes y las Animas” which sank near the Portuguese coast in 1804, has reportedly yielded 17 tons of salvaged silver from the Atlantic Ocean seafloor.
The British warship HMS Victory was reported found by the same Odyssey group in February 2009, after sinking with all hands in 1744. This lost shipwreck is expected to yield 4 tons of gold from 330 feet below the English Channel.
Greg Stemm, co-founder of the Odyssey Marine Exploration team announced there is a secret warehouse somewhere in Florida that contains an undisclosed amount of recovered lost treasure.
With the discovery of the Spanish Galleon in 2007, and the subsequent find of HMS Victory, a simple question has surfaced; asked by the author of the breakout novel Lost and Found.
“Lost and Found” is an exciting new novel by Tom Williams that has been receiving many incredible reviews and national acclaim, but has someone really used a geological survey satellite and found all the lost shipwrecks that still contain silver or gold?
Does the ultimate treasure map now exist? Are all the lost treasure fleets undiscovered for centuries now identified and located with specific GPS coordinates? Can these wreck sites be salvaged legally, or can a US Judge make a ruling on undersea artifacts as in the pending case of the Titanic.
Some in the Spanish government have called the Florida based treasure hunters “21st Century Pirates,” but no one is asking the pertinent questions: How are these lost ships being found? Moreover, how many more have already been found and scheduled for salvage and will these continuing undersea operations be deemed legal.
Can the recent find of the Spanish Galleon worth 500 million, and HMS Victory with four tons of gold onboard be linked to a new and highly secret technology? Have all the other lost treasure ships around the world already been found by an orbiting satellite? Could the price of precious metals plummet if suddenly every lost treasure ship undiscovered for centuries was available for instant salvage?
Could Captain Tom Williams’ novel Lost and Found be the fictitious thriller that has turned to fact? It certainly sounds like it.
4/21/09: Nothing like a bit of sunken bullion to get the juices flowing. looks like this one is headed to court...
BUENOS AIRES -(Dow Jones)- Salvage operations to recover over nine tons of gold and silver that went down in a shipwreck off the Argentine coast earlier this year have been suspended amid a confusing dispute between insurance underwriter Ascot Lloyd and the crew of the recovery ship.
A flotilla of salvage boats led by the Skandi Patagonia was ready to set sail for the wreck site on April 14 to begin the job of bringing up the bullion, but a dispute with union members over compensation held up the launch, according to local press reports.
Faced with high costs each day to maintain the idle fleet of rescue ships, Ascot Lloyd filed criminal charges against the crew of the Skandi Patagonia, leading them to be briefly "detained" aboard ship, according to local daily La Nacion.
When the detention order was lifted, the Skandi Patagonia crew decided that they'd had enough of the rescue operation, weighed anchor and returned to duty at the Total Austral offshore petroleum platforms, according to La Nacion.
Meanwhile, the owner of the precious cargo is facing severe cash flow problems and is pressing Ascot Lloyd to pay up on their insurance claim. But Ascot Lloyd continues to classify the cargo as "in transit," Cerro Vanguardia General Manager Jorge Palmes said recently.
The mysterious circumstances surrounding the sinking of the multi-million-dollar cargo have been fueling suspicions, and investigations are under way in both Argentina and Chile.
On Jan. 14, a fishing vessel, the Polar Mist, departed from Punta Quilla, Argentina, bound for Punta Arenas, Chile. The vessel was loaded with gold and silver bullion with a value of at least $16.4 million. The bulk of the cargo came from the Cerro Vanguardia mine in Argentina's Santa Cruz province, owned by South African mining giant AngloGold Ashanti (AU). In addition, the Polar Mist was carrying about two tons of bullion belonging to Minera Triton, a subsidiary of Canada's Pan American Silver Corp (PAA).
The vessel was battered by a storm in the Strait of Magellan, and its crew called for help and was airlifted by an Argentine coast guard helicopter.
A Chilean tug, the Beagle, came across the abandoned ship and towed it toward Chilean waters. The Beagle's crew claimed they were trying to help, but was then ordered by the Argentine coast guard to drag the storm-damaged vessel back to Argentine waters nearer the coast.
The Polar Mist then began to list, and on Jan. 19 it sunk about 22 nautical miles out to sea.
4/19/09: Another piece of titanic history goes on the block...
London, April 19 (RIA Novosti) A key to a first class cabin on the legendary Titanic ocean liner, which sank nearly a century ago on its inaugural voyage, was sold for 60,000 British pounds ($88,000), the auction house Henry Aldridge & Son said.
Henry Aldridge & Son auctions items associated with the shipwreck twice a year in Wiltshire county in England. The latest auction held Saturday, included about 130 lots with Titanic memorabilia.
Other items included a collection of belongings of Millvina Dean, the last living survivor from the Titanic disaster.
The 97-year-old woman, who was just two months old when she was rescued from the sinking ship, is trying to raise money to pay her fees at a nursing home in Southampton.
The ship, carrying 2,200 people, sank in 1912 in the Atlantic Ocean during its maiden voyage between the British port of Southampton and New York, after it struck an iceberg. At least 1,496 people were killed in the world’s greatest maritime tragedy, and some 306 bodies were recovered.
4/18/09: This could be something to keep an eye on if the hunter's hunch is correct...
Portlander Files Claim to Sunken Treasure
A shipwreck hunter in Portland, Maine has filed a claim to unearth what he says may be the world’s most valuable sunken treasure.
Greg Brooks and his partners at Sub Sea Research filed a claim to a World-War II wreck in U.S. District Court in Portland, and plan to start salvaging the platinum and diamond cargo off Cape Cod in a few weeks, according to the Portland Press Herald.
The Port Nicholson British merchant steamer was sunk by a torpedo off the coast of Cape Cod in 1942, and while it was thought to only carry automobile parts and supplies, Brooks claims his research has uncovered federal documents proving that the ship was secretly transporting industrial diamonds, platinum ingots and, possibly, gold.
4/17/09: I came across this article today. An interesting read for all concerned with the war of 1812.
Divers hope to prove Lake Ontario shipwreck is flagship of War of 1812
Kingston - A Queen’s University Psychiatry professor who studies how disease affects quality of life will be doing research of a very different sort this summer, in the murky depths of Lake Ontario.
Along with other volunteer divers, Dianne Groll hopes to resolve once and for all whether the remains of a 200-year-old shipwreck off the coast of Kingston is a flagship from the War of 1812. One of the project’s organizers, Dr. Groll will join nautical historians from throughout Ontario in surveying remains of what may be the Wolfe, the infamous warship of Captain Yeo.
The preparation work will begin the first weekend in May, when marine archaeologists from Parks Canada's Underwater Archaeology Service will run a course for Preserve our Wrecks Kingston to certify divers that could then go on to help in the survey.
“It’s delicate work,” says Dr.Groll, a member of Preserve our Wrecks Kingston “but it will be very exciting to finally identify this ship -- especially if it turns out to be the flagship of the War of 1812, as we hope.”
Divers who complete the course in May will receive their Nautical Archaeology Society Level One certification. In early June, they’ll help other certified divers take measurements, drawings and photographs of the shipwreck.
The shipwreck is lying in about 50 feet of water in the mouth of Navy Bay. Organizers expect that about three weeks of people diving almost daily will be required to accurately survey the wreck.
Once the survey work is complete, marine archeologists will comb through archives at Queen’s and in Toronto and Ottawa to compare data and determine the identity of the ancient vessel. The group is looking for a variety of volunteers who would like to be part of the historical hunt.
“We need boats, and people to coordinate on-shore activities and take videos,” says Dr. Groll. “There are a number of opportunities to get involved.” And with the bicentennial anniversary of the War of 1812 quickly approaching, this identification could play a significant part of the celebrations.
4/6/09: A commitment to find the hospital ship Centaur. Another WWII wreck off the Australian coast. Read on...
A British shipwreck hunter says he wants to find answers for the loved ones of those killed when the World War II hospital ship the Centaur sank off the Queensland coast.
The Centaur was torpedoed and sunk by a Japanese submarine off south-east Queensland in 1943, with the loss of 268 lives.
Martin Pash, 87, was on board the Centaur the night it went down. Of the 268 people who were killed, only 64 returned home, and Mr Pash is one of three survivors that are still alive.
"I was the last one out the quarters and I got sucked back into the ship's hull," he said.
"We tried to get the life boats away and couldn't get them away.
"I left and I said, 'grab something safe until the ship's gone under' and I left and went up to grab the rail on the side of the ship, and before I had a chance to do it, the suction took me down number one hatch.
"And with the lights on the red crosses illuminating the water, I found my way out from there."
Shipwreck expert David Mearns discovered HMAS Sydney off the Western Australian coast last year and has been given the task of finding the Centaur.
Mr Mearns flew to Australia to gather information to prepare for the search, and spent yesterday combing through the archives of the War Memorial in Canberra.
"[I'm looking for] anything to do with the sinking of Centaur, anything that gives me a clue about where she may have sunk," he said.
"There's lots of information in the archives about the history of Centaur and the people on board, and while all of that is very interesting, my absolute focus is on any obscure or direct piece of information which will help me assess where I believe it may have sunk."
'A lot of grief'
There have been a number of false findings over the years, but the families of those killed hope this new expedition will find the Centaur.
Richard Jones lost his uncle in the attack.
"For me personally, I really do feel it's an important event in Australian history, a very difficult thing to talk about now, even after all these years, and in the family of course at the time it caused a lot of grief," he said.
"Mind you, many other people had the same grief to deal with at the end of World War II, but it doesn't make it any easier."
Jan Thomas was a young girl when her father, who was a doctor on the ship, was killed.
She says claims that the Centaur had been found in 1995 led to further grief when the claims turned out to be incorrect.
"Families had been casting wreathes and scattering ashes over something totally unrelated," she said.
"So it will be a huge help in the healing process for those whose lives were affected to find out exactly where it is, to know that it can be adequately protected, and there can be no further false claims."
Solving questions
Mr Mearns has been given $4 million from the Federal and Queensland Governments to conduct the search.
He says a large part of the project is helping those left behind.
"You can't really get a stronger argument or a stronger incentive to try to find a shipwreck," he said.
"This is what I do, I'm a shipwreck hunter, but in an instance where a relation is requesting your help to give them that knowledge they haven't had, and you fill that void in their life or solve a question, I don't need much more than that, really."
Those like Jan Thomas who are still wondering where the Centaur lies on the ocean floor hope Mr Mearns can finally help close the door on a part of history they wish never occurred.
"In a sense, those of us who were children, our fathers went off to war and didn't come home," she said.
"So we spent our lives looking for them.
"And if we at least know where they ended up, it will in a sense, figuratively speaking, be bringing them home."
This released today, a little bit of history discovered off the Australian coast...
April 1, 2009 - 3:58am
MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - The rusting wreck of the first American vessel sunk during World War II has been found off Australia's southeastern coast, ocean researchers said Thursday.
The MV City of Rayville, a freighter carrying a cargo of lead, wool and copper from Australia to New York, sank in the Bass Strait after striking a German mine on Nov. 8, 1940, a year before the United States entered the war.
One seaman drowned while trying to recover personal items from the sinking vessel but the 37 other crew survived.
The approximate location of the wreck _ about 8.5 miles from Cape Otway in the strait that separates mainland Australia from the island state of Tasmania _ had been known since 2002 but it was too deep to be precisely located.
Researchers at Deakin University found the vessel 230 feet underwater by using state-of-the-art sonar equipment during a research project to map the seabed off the state of Victoria.
"It was very exciting to see the City of Rayville for the first time," research leader Daniel Ierodiaconou said in a statement.
The merchant vessel, owned by the International Mercantile Marine Company in New York, was under charter to the United States Maritime Commission during its journey to Australia.
The freighter was found upright on its keel, with a slight list, and has become an artificial reef for marine life, researchers said.
Maritime archaeologist Cassandra Philippou of Heritage Victoria, which oversees historic sites in Victoria state, said that a hatch cover near the stern was missing, consistent with reports that covers were blown off by the explosion.
Heritage Victoria was not involved in the research but provided the vessel's approximate coordinates to the Deakin team and said the discovery will help develop a plan for maintaining the wreck site.
The Rayville was the second ship to be sunk by one of 100 German mines laid in Bass Strait. The British steamer SS Cambridge was destroyed nearby a day earlier.
