HOT NEWS !

By Bruce Smith - Boston
 

It could be one of the nation's oldest cold case files: What happened to eight Confederate sailors aboard the H.L. Hunley after it became the first submarine in history to sink an enemy warship ?

Their hand-cranked sub rammed a spar with black powder into the Union blockade ship Housatonic off Charleston on a chilly winter night in 1864 but never returned.

Its fate has been the subject of almost 150 years of conjecture and almost a decade of scientific research since the Hunley was raised back in 2000. But the submarine has been agonizingly slow surrendering her secrets.

"She was a mystery when she was built.

She was a mystery as to how she looked and how she was constructed for many years and she is still a mystery as to why she didn't come home," said state Sen. Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston and chairman of the South Carolina Hunley Commission, which raised the sub and is charged with conserving and displaying it.
 

Full story...

By Darren Nelson

A scientific expedition from the Australian Maritime Museum (AMM) will leave Cairns tomorrow attempting to solve one of Queensland's greatest maritime mysteries. 

In 1829, a ship called 'The Mermaid' sank after striking an uncharted reef while carrying supplies from Sydney to the Northern Territory.

The wreck is historically significant as the ship was used by maritime explorer Phillip Parker King to map Australia's coast.

Project leader Kieran Hosty believes the treacherous reef that claimed the ship is located off the far north coast.

"We believe that reef lies off the Frankland Islands, south of Cairns," he said.

Over the next two weeks, 28 scientists will survey the area with underwater metal detectors.

"They're highly sensitive, they can find small amounts of iron," Mr Hosty said.

Mr Hosty believes the wreck will be found within two weeks.

"We'll pass that information on to the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and the Museum of Tropical Queensland," he said.

"They're the two government agencies that look after historic shipwrecks on the Great Barrier Reef.

"They'll be developing management plans and so on to actually manage the wreck if there is significant material left behind."

From the Jakarta Post

While sailing to catch fish, 10 fishermen discovered the remains of an aeroplane in waters around Thousand Islands on Friday. 

The fishermen were still being questioned as witnesses by the local police Friday. Police suspect the plane was a U.S. Navy battle plane manufactured in 1915. 

The beach patrol was still searching for other parts in the waters between Monyet Island and Tala Island. 

The patrol started diving at 10 a.m. They will take any additional remains to the nearby port before further investigation, said to beach patrol police chief Adj. Sr. Comr.

By Martin Rigby

The Titanic disaster is THE major shipping disaster of all time. More lives have been lost in other shipwrecks/sinkings but the Titanic remains the iconic disaster.

There were of course plenty of links to Liverpool at the time of Titanic’s fateful maiden voyage in April 1912 and the documentary evidence that can be accessed relating to her crew and families is a huge bonus for genealogists interested in Titanic links.

Millions of words have been written about the disaster and a new exhibition at the Merseyside Maritime Museum is helping to rekindle interest in the fateful day when the ‘unsinkable’ leviathan went down into the icy depths of the Atlantic after striking an iceberg.

Some 1,500 lives were lost while the survivors were plucked from flimsy lifeboats as they were tossed around in the ocean.

Objects salvaged from around the wreck and recently put on display at the museum include a wrist watch, spectacles, a White Star Line cup, a lead ventilation grille, a gold wristwatch, five tie pins and a five dollar bank note.

The items are on display after the Titanic’s salvors presented them to the Liverpool and London Steamship Protection and Indemnity Association, which in turn loaned them to the museum.

Read more...

By Kevin Lollar

A group of modern-day explorers is preparing to search the Gulf of Mexico for underwater wreck sites of historical value - they also hope to have a documentary about their 2008 adventures ready by the end of the year.

Last year, Tim Wicburg, Brian Ulman, Tom O'Brien and Jon "Hammerhead" Hazelbaker TBT&J (which stands for Tim, Brian, Tom and Jon) launched an expedition to find a pile of gold bullion.

They ended up solving a 66-year-old mystery and created Underwater Historical Explorations to continue their work.

TBT&J's journey actually began Nov. 16, 1942, when a B-26 Marauder flying a training mission out of Fort Myers Army Airbase (now known as Page Field) crashed 30 miles south of the Sanibel Lighthouse.

Search teams recovered the bodies of the pilot and co-pilot; the other four crew members were never found.

Read more...

From Salem News

The sub was found a mile down, resting on the slope of an underwater volcano 12 miles north of Kiska Island at the western tip of Alaska's Aleutian Islands.

Three brothers who worked tirelessly to locate the missing WWII submarine that contains the remains of their father, had a significant breakthrough with the location of the missing U.S. Navy Grunion.

Sometimes, thanks largely in part to today's technology, the most amazing and elusive mysteries are solved.

This spectacular find off the tip of the Aleutian Chain brings closure to over 70 American families who lost someone aboard the Grunion when it was lost August 16th, 1942.

NBC's Bob Dotson presented the story in a way that only he can; it is published below.

He explains that Lt. Cmdr. Jim Abele was the commander the Navy USS Grunion that disappeared off the coast of Alaska during World War II.

Read more...

From Telegraph.co.uk

The last Nazi E-boat, which took part in an infamous raid during the Second World War, has been saved by a British military enthusiast.

Schnellboot-130, once the fastest vessel in the world, helped attack an Allied convoy off Slapton Sands, in Devon, in a battle in which nearly 1,000 Allied soldiers were killed.

On the night of April 27, 1944, the boat was one of nine German vessels patrolling the English Channel when they stumbled upon Operation Tiger, which was the rehearsal for the D-Day landings.

The convoy launched a raid and killed 946 Allied soldiers. Allied chiefs initially covered up the loss, keen to avoid the enemy becoming aware of what it had achieved or getting wind of any planned invasion of Europe.

After the war the Schnellboot was seized by the British and used to land spies behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War but was then left in a dockyard and eventually began to disintegrate.

Enthusiast Kevin Wheatcroft has now come to the rescue of the vessel.

Read more...

From Venture Beat

Between my computer and my iPhone, I use Google Maps to find just about everything these days. But I never thought about using it to find buried treasure — but Nathan Smith did.

The 39-year-old musician supposedly used Google Maps to help find a buried treasure along the Texas Gulf coast, according to the Houston Chronicle.

That’s what he told a court yesterday which is investigating his claim to the find, which may contain a boat lost in 1822 during a hurricane that was filled with silver and gold.

That, in and of itself would be a great story, but that’s hardly the most interesting part. First of all, Smith, who is also a filmmaker that makes documentaries about conspiracy theories surround the terrorist attacks of 9/11, says he hasn’t made a profit from his artistic endeavors since 1990.

Instead, he looks for investors to fund his treasure hunting, which would in turn fund his life as an artist.

Second, he got the idea to become a treasure hunter after seeing the movie National Treasure.

Third, Smith says that half of the crew died in the shipwreck, while the other half were eaten by the local cannibal tribe.

Fourth, Smith estimates that there is $3 billion in buried treasure in the spot that he’s trying to claim.

I bet you didn’t think finding a buried treasure on Google Maps would be the normal part of the story.

But something tells me Smith is just trying to get his story sold as the plot for National Treasure 3.