Posted on 06/17/2017 7:58:47 AM PDT by MtnClimber
One hundred years ago this week, the Coast Guard cutter McCulloch, a world-traveled vessel stationed in San Francisco, collided with a passenger ship in the fog and sank to the ocean floor off the coast of Southern California. For almost a century, the ship was lost.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Coast Guard and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced that the McCulloch had been found, four miles off Pt. Conception, west of Santa Barbara.
Searching in the Deep
“It’s been decades in the works,” says Robert Schwemmer, the West Coast Regional Maritime Heritage Coordinator for NOAA. “To put the first eyes on the ship on the eve of its 100-year anniversary was very moving.”
A historian and archeologist, Schwemmer has been studying the McCulloch for three decades and always hoped to find the remains.
In 2013, maritime historian and shipwreck researcher Gary Fabian located a mass on the ocean floor using sonar. Suspecting that it might be the lost wreck, Fabian contacted Schwemmer with his hunch.
Years later, Schwemmer took the research vessel Shearwater over the potential wreck site. Using sonar, he saw high-relief images of the sea floor and a mass that could potentially be a wreck — but more importantly, he saw lots of fish.
“Fish are an indicator of habitat, and shipwrecks are great habitat,” he said......
Finally, in October 2016, Schwemmer, along with a NOAA research team and a local branch of the Coast Guard, devoted an annual reconnaissance cruise to looking for the McCulloch......
When the ROV footage revealed a 14-foot bronze torpedo launcher mounted on the bow of the vessel — a feature unique to the McCulloch — Schwemmer was sure that the long-lost cutter was found.
(Excerpt) Read more at ww2.kqed.org ...
You’re right there in Hatteras Village, the ferry landing is not far at all, cool. Make sure to set a day aside for a free ferry ride over to Ocracoke. I like Howard Street, just an oyster shell lane through the live oaks lined with houses, some nice, some decrepit, a lot of old family graveyards. I like the “real” part of the banks and tend to wander there. In Hatteras it would be back behind the old weather service building, that fairly elaborate red brick structure. Priscilla Curve Road is nice toward the sound. To get a real feel for the place you need a 4x4 though, to get onto the beach. They can be rented but not particularly cheap. Air down your tires, 15 psi or you might be paying for a tow on top of it, lol, but the kindness of strangers usually gets you pulled out.
Well, not red brick, there’s red brick on it but it’s lapstrake siding, pale yellow now.
I think it’s going be a free for all. Maybe 14 family members
spending time between beach, ocean, fishing and exploring.
The home is very nice. The ferry to Ocrakoke will be used more than once and I will personally take the ferry back to Swanquarter on the last day. I understand my fisher BIL already has his salt-water rigs ready to go. It’s gonna be nice to get up early and watch that sunrise.
Sounds as if this won’t be your first time out, then. One note of caution that will add to your outdoor enjoyment, if you are on one of the islands with wild horses, biting flies come along with them so a good insect repellent and even insect repellent clothing might be a good bet, if you’re going to be wandering on the sound side away from the sea breeze. Also, when the breeze switches at night and starts coming off the marshes and sound, mosquitos will still be an issue in September. If your house is direct oceanfront you’ll barely notice that but the further off the beach you are, the more it becomes a consideration as far as outings.
Also, I’m very fond of the Diamond Shoals Restaurant in Buxton, not far away. Very old school Hatteras. And, no trip out there would be complete without a breakfast at the Pony Island on Ocracoke.
Yes, thanks for the link, as it corrects my year error.
1923 not 27.
It will be Oceanfront but your advice is very well taken.
If I can take the ferry to breakfast, I will be marking the entire day as most outstanding. I was there once before in 1975. These homes did not exist.
Neither of those restaurants qualify as fancy, just old, established “institutions” where you’d be just as likely to rub elbows with locals as tourists. The accent out there is fun.
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