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From The Scotsman

A British ship which sank after being accidentally rammed by its own side during the First World War has been seen for the first time in 90 years.

The wreck of the destroyer HMS Nessus had lain undiscovered off the coast of Wick in Caithness since 1918 until it was found by a team from an Orkney dive boat last week.

Wreck researcher Kevin Heath of Stromness, Orkney, pinpointed its location using naval records and the dive-boat skipper, Andy Cuthbertson, led divers to it.

The Nessus was returning to Rosyth naval base with another destroyer, HMS Maenad, when the vessels hit a fog bank. The Maenad rammed the Nessus while attempting to avoid German submarines, holing it in the engine room.

As the ship was towed to harbour, the weather worsened and it sank. All its crew survived.

By Michael Jordan

Question: When is history like gymnastics ? Answer: When you have to bend over backwards to explain connections and make them matter to people today.

Around 1999 or so, I started my journey with the CSS Georgia, a Civil War warship sunk in the Savannah River adjacent to Old Fort Jackson.

The Georgia served as the genesis for countless stories at WSAV-TV 3 when I worked there as a reporter and anchor, as the subject of a cover article I wrote for this newspaper several years ago, and as the focus of my masters thesis at Armstrong Atlantic State University.

Now, more than eight years later, the ship is still telling me secrets and daring me to tell its stories to the Savannahians of today. There’s another ship trying to horn its way into the story, too. But I’ll tell you more about that later.

The Georgia’s story begins in Spring 1862, when the ironclad CSS Virginia smashed its way through the Union blockading fleet in Hampton Roads, Va.

The Virginia’s near-victory (it was checked by the Union ironclad USS Monitor before it could completely destroy the Yankee fleet) heralded the end of the age of wooden warships.

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By Giles Tremlett
 

Deep sea treasure hunters have located two potentially valuable wrecks lying off the west coast of Ireland, opening the way for a legal battle over who owns treasure deposited on the seabed in international waters.

Shipwreck company Odyssey Marine has filed claims on two wreck sites found after months of scouring the seabed in and around the English Channel with what it said was advanced new search equipment.

The sites lie under between 400 and 600 metres of water about 100 miles to the west of Dingle, Co Kerry. 

The Florida-based company said the sites, which are 37 miles apart, appeared to contain the remains of steel-hulled vessels.

"Odyssey believes that valuable cargo may be located at or near both sites," said the company.

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By Randy Garsee
 

A few years ago, what looked like a pile of wood surfaced in the Red River near Fort Towson but was more than a pile of wood... a lot more. KTEN's Randy Garsee traveled to the remote location to see what attraction historians and archaeologists alike.

This is it: a pile of wood.

If you didn't look closely, you might think it was just another dead tree, like this one, dragged into the Red River by a flood. But it's no tree.

John Davis says, "This is the only example of that type of craftsmanship that is known to have been archaeologically excavated."

John Davis is with the Oklahoma Historical Society at Fort Towson. He says these waterlogged remains attracted himself and archaeologists from Texas A&M.

"It's part of our history. It's one of the minute details of the part transportation played in the evolution of Oklahoma."

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By Gary Davis

Lincoln Tribune and other sources are reporting on the mysterious sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald in Lake Superior. Their article, "Profile America: Edmund Fitzgerald Sinks," reminds us of the largest ship on the lake November 10, 1975, sinking only a few miles from safety in apparent cyclonic conditions. When the Edmund Fitzgerald went down she was carrying 26,000 tons of iron ore. 

The sinking of the ship is a mystery for several reasons. The ship was a state of the art vessel. Captain Earnest Mcsorley, a very experienced seaman, piloted the ship.

However, perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the tragedy was there was absolutely no communication. There was not an SOS or any sign of trouble; the ship just disappeared.

The anniversary has sparked a documentary by Mark Gumbinger who has chronicled 31 documentaries about Great Lakes' phenomenon.

His suggestions for the event include water hatches that were faulty and the long ship breaking in two from the weather. Further, the possibility of hitting an object or shoals followed by a quick sinking is examined.

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From Conn Post

S. Ford Weiskittel, president of the U.S. Trireme Trust, which supported a Greek initiative to test a replica of a fifth century BCE warship, will present a slide lecture on the adventure at Fairfield University on Tuesday, Nov. 11, at 7:30 p.m. in the Multimedia Room of the DiMenna-Nyselius Library. The lecture is free.

A remarkable technological achievement, the Greek trireme was designed to ram other ships. Powered by both sail and oar, with a crew numbering 120, the warships are credited with saving Greek civilization from Persian conquest because of their role in the Athenian victory over the Persian fleet at the battle of Salamis.

About 30 years ago, several British scholars undertook to establish definitively just what a trireme looked like and how it was rowed. Their task was made difficult because nobody had ever found a trireme.

While archaeologists had found numerous wrecks of ancient merchant vessels on the bottom of the Mediterranean, it is thought that the trireme ships, built of light wood, probably broke up in the surf, decomposed or were towed away by victorious enemies.

By Peggy Walsh-Sarnecki

Monday marks the 33rd anniversary of the often-chronicled sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald in Lake Superior. But this month also marks a landmark 50th anniversary of another famous Great Lakes shipwreck -- the Carl D. Bradley in Lake Michigan.

The Detroit Historical Society is holding its annual remembrance for Great Lakes mariners lost at sea on the Fitzgerald anniversary, but this year, the activities will focus on the Bradley and include newly displayed artifacts from the lost ship.

"It's a reminder of the storms of November," said local lake historian Mac McAdam of Dearborn. "Everybody is trying to make their last run before the winter locks them in. They're running fast and hard now."

No one knows exactly how many ships have gone down in the Great Lakes.

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By Bret Christians

A public quarrel has erupted over who really located the long-lost wreck of HMAS Sydney.

The row was sparked this week by a request from the high-powered Cole Commission of Inquiry being held in Sydney for information about the wreck.

Two University of WA academics, who say they have been air-brushed out of the history of the search, have documented their claim to have provided the location of the wreck 10 years ago.

They have also revealed that an earlier group of researchers sent the navy on a secret wild goose chase which wasted $1 million and delayed the finding of the wreck for a decade.