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From International Business Times

What links the RMS Titanic and the Cambodian jungle temple of Angkor Wat ? Author Helen Churchill Candee survived the infamous maritime disaster to write Angkor the Magnificent, history's most captivating account of Southeast Asia's mysterious Khmer Empire.

Her book just reached new heights in Cambodia when publisher Kent Davis unveiled an expanded modern edition of her classic literally on top of Angkor Wat.

Balanced precariously atop a metal scaffold 20 stories above the Cambodian jungle, publisher Kent Davis unveiled Angkor the Magnificent, an expanded edition of Helen Churchill Candee's 1924 Asian travel classic featuring the first published biography of the 20th century adventuress.

"It's astounding to think of ancient Khmer stone masons experiencing this view 1,000 years ago.

This is the type of travel adventure Helen Churchill Candee lived for...her spirit is certainly here today !" said Davis at the top of the temple's central tower on a temporary metal framework erected for restoration of the complex pinecone-shaped structure.

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 Reuters

Argentine builders stumbled across the wreck of an 18th century Spanish galleon while digging the foundations for a riverside high-rise building in Buenos Aires, archeologists said on Tuesday.

Experts combing the remains of the ship said they did not expect it to contain treasure, but so far they have discovered several canons and well-preserved earthenware jars that were probably used to store olive oil.

The remains of the galleon were found on a building site close to the shores of the River Plate and archeologists from Buenos Aires city government think the boat was probably shipwrecked some 300 years ago.

"You can see it's very old and we think it dates from the 1700s, although it's also possible that it's from the 1600s," said archeologist Marcelo Waissel.

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From Goldcoast

More than 130,000 inflatable breasts have been lost at sea en route to Australia. Men's magazine Ralph was planning to include the boobs as a free gift with its January issue. 

The cargo is worth about $200,000, which is another blow for publisher ACP's parent company PBL, which is already in $4.3 billion of debt.

A spokeswoman for Ralph said the container left docks in Beijing two weeks ago but turned up empty in Sydney this week.

The magazine has put out an alert to shipping authorities to see if they have the container, but if they don't turn up in the next 48 hours it will be too late for the next issue, she said.

Ralph editor Santi Pintado urged anyone who has any information to contact the magazine.

"Unless Somali pirates have stolen them its difficult to explain where they are," Pintado told AAP.

"If anyone finds any washed up on a beach, please let us know."

From Liverpool Echo

Undoubtedly the most famous ship in history – may have been built in Belfast and made her ill-fated maiden voyage from Southampton, but it is with Liverpool that she has her strongest and most lasting emotional ties.

The liner was registered here, and bore the inscription ‘Liverpool’: a graphic image captured in the subsequent great movies of the disaster, after the ‘unsinkable’ liner collided with an iceberg in the Atlantic in April 1912, with the loss of 1,500 lives.

As Titanic finally tilted towards her watery grave, and then slid beneath the glassy ocean, it was the word Liverpool, in huge lettering on her stern, which provided the final glimpse of the liner for 73 years, until her wreck was discovered in 1985.

But the local links don’t end there.

Around 100 of the ship’s crew, as well as 17 passengers, came from Merseyside; her captain, Edward John Smith, lived at Waterloo, and Bruce Ismay, chairman of owners White Star Line, had two houses here.
 

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From Merine

Scuba diver of Orissa, Sabir Bux, is going to explore the hidden details of the 133-year-old sunken French ship that was sunk in the Bay of Bengal near Hukitola. The French ship ‘Veleda’ is older than ‘Titanic’ but few people know about it.

The international acclaimed scuba diver of Orissa, Sabir Bux, who had recorded a five-minute music album filmed by him under water in Mahanadi in Orissa to wish luck to the Indian cricket team for World Cup-2007, besides filming underwater video album celebrating India’s Independence Day in Saudi Arabia aired in the India Festival-2005, is going to explore the hidden facts of the 133-years-old sunken French ship, which was sunk in the Bay of Bengal near Hukitola, by diving into the sea.

To explore and study the mysterious details of the sunken ship, Sabir Bux is scheduled to visit Kendrapara on December 30. He holds a rescue diver card issued by the Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI) of the UK, besides the professional license, certificate for open water, advance open water, underwater photography and videography, search and recovery and Medic First Aid.

The then collector of Cuttack, John Beames, who served as collector and district magistrate in Balesore from 1869 to 1873 and in Cuttack from 1875 to 1878, in his autobiography, ‘Memories of a Bengal Civilian’ has described about the sunken ship, which is of about 250-feet-long whereas its width is about 50 feet.

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By Andrew Bushe

A hi-tech sonar ship will undertake a seabed survey next year for a World War Two bomber that sank after ditching in the Atlantic Ocean north-west of Donegal.

The four-engined Halifax - number LW170 - was forced to ditch in August 1945 after it sprang a fuel leak while on patrol from a base in Scotland. 

The aircraft remained afloat for seven hours before eventually sinking an estimated 1.6km to the bottom of the ocean. The crew took to a life raft and were rescued by a passing freighter.

The Canadian sonar ship will search the seabed for the plane as part of efforts to recover the iconic aircraft.

"This is the big break and opportunity we were looking for these past three years," said Karl Kjarsgaard, an Ottawa-based airline pilot who is manager of the 'Halifax 57 Rescue' project.

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From Record Eagle

The state of Michigan says it has seen no additional evidence to support a claim that a famous 17th century ship is buried in northern Lake Michigan.

Divers at the site in October found nothing besides a timber protruding from the lake bottom, a piece of wood that was photographed in 2003 or 2004, Assistant Attorney General Louis Reinwasser said.

The disclosure was made in documents filed this week in federal court in Grand Rapids.

A group called Great Lakes Exploration discovered the timber in 2001 and believes it may be the wreck of the Griffin, a vessel built by French explorer La Salle. It sank in 1679.

La Salle's other ship, La Belle, was discovered in the mid-1990s off the Texas coast. With approval from France, state archaeologists there recovered nearly 1 million artifacts, from human bones to muskets, and publicly displayed many of them.

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