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From Science Museum of Minnesota

Carpathia, one of the most famous ships in the Cunard line, was 58 miles from Titanic when its crew received the distress call.

In response, Carpathia raced through the icy waters of the North Atlantic to help. It arrived on the scene after Titanic had foundered, but the crew managed to rescue the 705 survivors of the disaster and carry them to their New York destination.

After the historic rescue, Carpathia returned to transatlantic service and was sunk by a German torpedo during World War I. Her wreckage was discovered in September 1999, approximately 185 miles off the southwestern coast of England.

The world premiere Carpathia artifacts will be displayed in a brand new Rescue Gallery within the Titanic exhibition. Dramatically retelling the story of Carpathia's heroic crew, this specially designed gallery will contain nearly half of all artifacts that were recovered from the ship's wreck site.

In addition, the gallery will highlight many elements of Titanic's rescue, including historic photographs, wireless telegraph messages, and the stories that led to Carpathia's moniker "The Ship of Widows."

Highlights of the Carpathia Rescue Gallery include:

- A flask, one of only five personal items found during the recovery efforts. Made of sterling silver and glass, this flask was recovered with a protective leather covering. The leather did not survive the conservation process, but its loss revealed an engraved stag's head and wine glass on the metal surface.
- A porthole, which weighs over 50 pounds and has its original glass and wood still intact. Visitors will also see two clamps/locks that would have kept the porthole closed during rough weather.
- A telegraph top which, because of its size and position, proved to be the most difficult item to recover from Carpathia's wreckage.
- A tiny cosmetics jar from the United Kingdom's Boots Pharmacy. Measuring at just 3 inches tall, this jar was recovered with its contents -- a yellow cream -- still intact. Floor tiles, glassware, china, and more.

From the Canadian Press

The storm set in suddenly, darkening the midmorning sky. Winds reached 100 kilometres an hour. Waves towered over the refitted fishing trawler, with swells as high as eight metres.

The eight people aboard the Polar Mist radioed for help, then donned survival wet suits and flung themselves into the frigid waters. In a daring operation, rescuers dangling from a helicopter harnessed the survivors and pulled them to safety.

Two days later, a Chilean tugboat caught up with the abandoned trawler. But as it was being tugged to dry land, the Polar Mist unexpectedly sank 40 kilometres off the Argentine coast, near the mouth of the Straits of Magellan, on Jan. 18.

The owners of its cargo say nearly $22 million US in unrefined gold and silver went down with it, and they're asking insurer Lloyd's of London to foot the bill for the costly recovery operation.

But Argentine news media and maritime experts are asking whether the precious metals were aboard at all.

They ask why the crew members ditched the craft when it would have been safer to stay aboard, why they left the engine on full so the ship was left spinning in circles, and why a trawler built in 1979 was being used to transport gold and silver in the first place.

By Meg Purtell

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.

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From VietNam Net Bridge

Everyday for 20 years Ha Cong Ao and Hoang Dinh Dang have risked their lives diving to the bottom of the Red River in search of discarded valuable materials.

When they discovered a sunken 19th century ship they thought they’d come up trumps but now they’re not so sure.

On the banks of the Red River in Khoai Chau district, Hung Yen province sits a recently salvaged boat that was built sometime in the 19th century. Now broken in two the boat was once 30m long and 5m wide.

The bronze steam-engine and screw-propeller are intact, however, so there is enough evidence to suggest that this ship was a real beauty in its day.

But the divers, who discovered the boat, are now staring at the shipwreck and wondering if dredging up the past was such a good idea. At first, of course, they thought they’d struck gold.

“People say we hit the jackpot but in fact we are sitting on a land-mine,” says 53-year old Ha Cong Ao. “We emptied our own pockets and borrowed a lot of money to fish out the wreck. Now we don’t know when we will be able to pay off our debts.”

Initially, Ao along with his son Ha Cong Chuom and his friend Hoang Dinh Dang estimated it would take a week and cost VND10m to pull the wreck out and that they could sell wood and iron for VND70m.

In the end it took a whole month. They hired nine divers and two crane boats at a cost of VND124 million. There was an additional VND100m spent on oil.

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From Times & Star

The world’s most famous shipwreck is helping to keep Maryport’s Maritime Museum afloat.

More than 400 people visited a Titanic exhibition in the Lifeboat Inn, next to the Shipping Brow museum, on Sunday and Monday and around 60 adults and 45 children watched the only working steam model of the ship as it sailed on the Ellen River on Monday morning.

The exhibition was put together by Cliff Ismay, a descendant of Thomas Ismay, the Maryport-born founder of the White Star Line, which owned the Titanic.

Ismay’s son, Bruce, was the chairman of the White Star Line when the Titanic was launched and was one of those who survived its sinking.

Howard Nelson, of the Titanic Heritage Trust in Coventry, brought memorabilia from the blockbuster movie Titanic.

Mr Nelson also brought a book of remembrance for people to fill in, not only to mark the lives lost on the ship but also those whose continuing lives were affected by the tragedy.

On Sunday local sea cadets helped at the exhibition handing out ‘boarding passes’ to visitors.

Tony Johnston, of Scotton, brought his four-and-a-half-foot steam-powered model of the Titanic, which he said he built in two weeks out of sheer irritation.

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By Mark Yost

A small band of pirates operating off the coast of Somalia garnered headlines recently. But if you want to learn about life when pirates dominated both the seas and the news, then I'd suggest a visit to the Field Museum's "Real Pirates" (here through Oct. 25).

The exhibit tells the somewhat familiar story of the Golden Age of Piracy, circa 1650-1720, when rowdy bands of men (and sometimes women) sailed from port to port, wantonly looting, lusting, and -- ultimately -- losing the small fortunes they sometimes managed to amass.

What makes the show engaging and worthwhile is the fact that other stories are told within this collection of artifacts, dioramas and interpretive panels.

The centerpiece of the "Real Pirates" story is the Whydah, a ship that engaged in piracy for such a short time that when it went down off Cape Cod in April 1717 it still had most of its treasure on board.

That loot is, according to the curators, the only documented pirate treasure ever found. The Whydah was originally built for the lucrative slave trade, a story that's told here too.

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From Ground Views

Marine archaeologists have just discovered evidence of a large submerged landmass southeast of Sri Lanka. They believe it could be a legendary lost island closely linked to the culture and history of Sri Lankan people.

The discovery was made by a team of Dutch and Sri Lankan scientists based on satellite maps and underwater sample extractions from the deep sea. Preliminary data need to be verified by a deep sea submersible expedition during 2009 - 2010, according to a member of the research team who did not want to be identified.

The landmass is estimated to be between 450,000 and 475,000 square kilometres, which is about seven times the total land area of Sri Lanka.

“This could well be the long lost island of Irisiyawa, which is euphemistically mentioned in our chronicles and hinted at in the writings of Greek historians,” said Dr Godwin Samarawickrama, a maritime historian at the Indian Ocean Institute based in Melacca, Malaysia.

He added: “The existence of such an island has been speculated and talked in hush-hush terms among divers and archaeologists for decades. This is the Indian Ocean’s own version of Atlantis !”

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From Reuters

The wreck of the first American ship sunk during World War II has been located off Australia's southern coast, ocean researchers said on Wednesday.

The freighter MS City of Rayville, carrying a cargo of lead, wool and copper from South Australia to New York, hit a German mine and was lost on November 8, 1940, a year before the United States entered the war.

One sailor died in the sinking off Cape Otway in southeast Victoria state while 38 other crew were rescued in lifeboats. The United States entered the war on December 8, 1941, the day after a surprise Japanese attack on the Pearl Harbour naval base.

Researchers mapping the seabed for Australia's Deakin University said they located the wreck almost 69 years after its sinking, lying upright on its keel and forming an artificial reef covered in marine life.

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