Mystery wreck discovered in the Baltic Sea!

UPI ^ | Published 10/8/2002 3:06 PM | (Reported by Charles Choi, UPI Science News, in New York)

[vannrox]

Mystery wreck discovered in the Baltic Sea

UPI Science News

From the

Science & Technology

Desk

Published 10/8/2002 3:06 PM

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Oct. 8 (UPI) -- The Royal Swedish Navy said Tuesday it has discovered an underwater mystery shipwreck with skulls littering its centuries-old wooden decks.

The sailing ship, which marine archaeologists think is more than 200 years old, was found standing upright on the bottom of the Baltic Sea. The reason for why it sank is so far an enigma, because its hull and masts remain perfectly intact.

"We don't have any clues whatsoever right now on what made it sink. We don't have any hints whatsoever," marine archaeologist Bert Westenberg of the Swedish National Maritime Museum in Stockholm told United Press International.

The Swedish rescue ship HMS Belos was searching for a lost dredger in the middle of the Baltic Sea when a sonar sweep picked up signs of a wreck more than 300 feet down in early 2002. The crew then deployed a remote controlled robot Sjöugglan -- Swedish for "sea owl" -- to check out the murky sea floor.

Their TV monitors revealed a beautifully preserved 85-foot-long ship, with twin 65-foot-tall masts standing upright and a gilded seahorse on its prow -- a pony's head with human hands instead of front hooves clasped under its belly and instead of rear legs, a fish's tail.

"Everything's in mint condition," Westenberg said. "It must have went down very fast. Everything looked the way it did when it was sailing. Perhaps it met some bad weather, or it started leaking and then went down very fast."

In an unusual detail, skulls are lying on the ship's deck from at least two crewmen. Normally, casualties float away as their ships sink into the deep. "They could have been trapped," Westenberg speculated.

What appear to be gunports are visible on each side. No guns, however, are seen. "We're not sure they're gunports. They could be decorations to make this ship to look like a naval vessel, maybe to fool pirates and keep them away," Westenberg said.

Researchers at the Swedish National Maritime Museum said that judging by its rigging, the twin-masted vessel appears to be a snow brig, a type of fast sailing vessel from the 18th century. Westenberg said the low salinity of the Baltic Sea, coupled with its far-off, deep-down location, have helped preserve the ship.

"What a wonderful find. It's a great discovery," said marine archaeologist Kevin Crisman at Texas A&M University in College Station. "It's pretty rare to find 18th century wrecks with the masts still standing and the carvings still preserved. You get that in few parts of the world, and the Baltic's one of them."

The identity of the ship is a mystery, researchers said. The ship appears to be a naval or postal ship and is not any known Swedish vessel. It could be from Russia or elsewhere, Westernberg added. The researchers hope archive searches will reveal more about the ship's history.

"We haven't been able to go down and look in the cargo holds and see if there's any post that are late for delivery by several hundred years," Westenberg said.

At present, neither the Swedish National Maritime Museum nor the Royal Swedish Navy has the money for an investigation.

"I hope they can do more with it," Crisman said. "This is a magnificent find. A wreck like this offers a great window to life in the 18th century. We can research it in libraries, but there's no substitute for an actual ship like this."

(Reported by Charles Choi, UPI Science News, in New York)

Copyright © 2002 United Press International

[philman_36]

The logs are in excelent shape, and worth quite a bit of money.
And they make great sounding musical instruments out of it.

[APBaer]

"with skulls littering its centuries-old wooden decks."



See stanza three of:
A Ballad of John Silver by Poet Laureate - John Masefield

We were schooner-rigged and rakish,
with a long and lissome hull,
And we flew the pretty colours of the crossbones and the skull;
We'd a big black Jolly Roger flapping grimly at the fore,
And we sailed the Spanish Water in the happy days of yore.

We'd a long brass gun amidships, like a well-conducted ship,
We had each a brace of pistols and a cutlass at the hip;
It's a point which tells against us, and a fact to be deplored,
But we chased the goodly merchant-men and laid their ships aboard.

Then the dead men fouled the scuppers and the wounded filled the chains,
And the paint-work all was spatter dashed with other peoples brains,
She was boarded, she was looted, she was scuttled till she sank.
And the pale survivors left us by the medium of the plank.

O! then it was (while standing by the taffrail on the poop)
We could hear the drowning folk lament the absent chicken coop;
Then, having washed the blood away, we'd little else to do
Than to dance a quiet hornpipe as the old salts taught us to.

O! the fiddle on the fo'c'sle, and the slapping naked soles,
And the genial "Down the middle, Jake, and curtsey when she rolls!"
With the silver seas around us and the pale moon overhead,
And the look-out not a-looking and his pipe-bowl glowing red.

Ah! the pig-tailed, quidding pirates and the pretty pranks we played,
All have since been put a stop to by the naughty Board of Trade;
The schooners and the merry crews are laid away to rest,
A little south the sunset in the islands of the Blest.

[Notforprophet]

Don't know if you saw this one... pretty interesting.

[RaceBannon]

Yes, but skulls?? How did they survive this long time period, with all the bacteria and scum eating fishes and such, there are never human remains fond in ships older than a year I thought! Just clothes and such, not body parts!

[Fiddlstix]

Bump

[ContentiousObjector]

there are human remains on the empress of ireland in Canadian waters, and it sunk like 90 years ago

[Hank Rearden]

The identity of the ship is a mystery, researchers said. The ship appears to be a naval or postal ship and is not any known Swedish vessel.

This goes a long ways to help explain the eternal mystery of why Express Mail isn't. There must be more, loaded with important shipments (like Christmas cookies) that never made it.

[jackbill]

There must be more, loaded with important shipments (like Christmas cookies) that never made it.

And fruit cake, which was really the reason why it sank.

[Hank Rearden]

ROTFLMAO!

[Rebelbase]

"Could be a Viking submarine that somehow got runed. "

Har-har-har matey!....Good one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Pharmboy]

Thought you would be interested...

[tjg]

Really? Is it just because it's good wood or is there something about sitting around in the water that improves it?

[aculeus]

Thought you would be interested...

Yes! Many thanks.

[TomB]

You've been waiting YEARS to use that one, haven't you?

[Endeavor]

Nice one. You've got a sense of swedish/norwegian/danish humor!

[philman_36]

Is it just because it's good wood or is there something about sitting around in the water that improves it?
Timeless Timber: Resonance
Debra Powers’ violin is made of spruce and maple—not especially rare trees, but this wood is special. It came from logs that were retrieved from the bottom of Lake Superior, where they had sunk during logging operations in the 1800s.
“There’s something about wood that’s been submerged in water that enlarges the cells of the wood and it helps it capture the sound. It’s exactly how Antonio Stradivarius made his violins and his violins are the best in the world. He never made a violin out of wood that had not been submerged for over 50 years.”
Snip...“What happens when you soak the wood for a period of years is the starchy, gummy matters that is in the cell walls of the wood is leached out over a period of time and it’s replaced by water. When dried, you have a zillion hollowed-out cell walls that act like speaker cabinets that resonate the wood.”

[tjg]

Wow. Thanks for the link.

Who would have thought it was the secret (or one) of Stradivarius?