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The wreck of the World War II aircraft carrier USS Hornet (CV-8) has been discovered off the Solomon Islands by a research organization set up by the late billionaire Paul Allen.

The carrier was located in late January by the crew of the Research Vessel Petrel resting on the floor of the South Pacific, according to a statement released by Allen’s Vulcan organization on Tuesday. Vulcan oversees Allen’s network of organizations and initiatives, which includes R/V Petrel’s research.

Researchers used information from national and naval archives to find the ship, as well as action reports from other vessels involved in the fateful Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands in 1942. The wreck was found at a depth of nearly 17,500 feet.


https://www.foxnews.com/science/wre...er-uss-hornet-discovered-in-the-south-pacific

(It looks very well preserved - I'm guessing very little of anything can grow on it 5km down)
 
Now that Franklin's shipwrecks have been discovered in the Arctic, there's interest in locating Shackleton's shipwreck at the other end of the planet ...

Update ... The search has been terminated with no success ...
Search for Shackleton's lost Endurance ship called off
The attempt this week to find Sir Ernest Shackleton's missing ship, the Endurance, has ended - without success.

A UK-led expedition to the Weddell Sea sent a sub to the ocean floor to look for the sunken polar yacht, but this robot was itself lost in the process.

The team has now withdrawn from the area because of deteriorating weather and sea-ice conditions. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47227657
 
Update ...

There's now no question the South Korean authorities are treating the situation as an entry point to (e.g.) fraud.



FULL STORY: https://www.livescience.com/63327-russian-warship-cryptocurrency-scam.html

And we have a guilty verdict.

A South Korean court has sentenced three business executives to prison after finding them guilty of falsely claiming they had found a long-lost treasure-laden shipwreck.

Shinil Group said in July it had found the Russian cruiser Dmitrii Donskoi, which sank in 1905 and was rumoured to hold gold worth billions of dollars. The company attracted 8.9bn won ($7.6m; £5.8m) from thousands of investors. But suspicion spread that it might have been a scam. The group did not comment. The Shinil Group claimed that the Donskoi contained around 200 tonnes of gold but a Seoul court on Wednesday found this to be a lie.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia...news/world&link_location=live-reporting-story
 
An untouched Roman shipwreck.

Archaeologists diving off the southeastern coast of Cyprus just discovered an ancient treasure: the first known "undisturbed Roman shipwreck" in the country's history, according to a statement put out by the Cyprus Department of Antiquities.

The divers found the ship's remains off the coast of Protaras, a resort town known for its beaches. Not too far from sunbathing tourists rest the remains of the ancient ship's cargo — transport amphorae, or ancient jugs that have handles and narrow necks and often held precious liquids, such as oil and wine.

These amphorae are most likely from Syria and Cilicia, an early Roman province that is now part of southern Turkey's Mediterranean coast, the Department of Antiquities reported. [Mayday! 17 Mysterious Shipwrecks You Can See on Google Earth]

https://www.livescience.com/65818-r...witter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dlvr.it
 
The last of four military submarines mysteriously lost in 1968 - the French La Minerve - has finally been found.
U.S. explorers, French navy find submarine missing for 51 years

U.S. seabed explorers and the French navy have located a submarine that's been missing for more than 50 years, after decades of prior searches were never able to track down the vessel and its lost 52-man crew.

Officials said Houston-based Ocean Infinity found the La Minerve sub off the coast of Toulon in the Mediterranean Sea, the area in which it sunk in January 1968. The search stemmed from renewed efforts this year by the French navy to find the lost vessel. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-...submarine-missing-for-51-years/1101563810906/

NOTE: La Minerve was one of 4 military submarines to mysteriously disappear or sink in 1968. The others were K-129 (USSR), USS Scorpion, and INS Dakar (Israel).
 
A remarkably well-preserved 15th or 16th century vessel has been found at the bottom of the Baltic off the Swedish coast. It's being touted as the most complete specimen of a ship from that (Columbus') era seen in circa 500 years.
Renaissance-era ship found mostly intact at bottom of Baltic Sea

Scientists said they have found a shipwreck at the bottom of the Baltic Sea that's remained largely intact after five centuries.

Archaeologists discovered the vessel at a depth of more than 393 feet, some 100 miles southeast of Stockholm. Its masts still stand and two swivel guns are in firing positions -- suggesting it may have been sunk in a previously unknown naval battle. Scientists said the ship is about 52-60 feet long and was located in waters between Sweden and Estonia.

Because the vessel is in such good shape, experts date it to the Renaissance era -- around the 15th or early 16th century, the time of explorer Christopher Columbus and painter Leonardo da Vinci. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-...intact-at-bottom-of-Baltic-Sea/4981563893760/
 
Marine archaeologists hit the jackpot in exploring the waters around the Aegean island of Levitha.
Divers Find 2,000-Year-Old Shipwreck Graveyard Near Tiny Greek Island

Ancient sailors courted adventure and risked death on the Aegean Sea. And now divers have discovered five of their approximately 2,000-year-old shipwrecks and a giant, granite anchor pole near the tiny Greek island of Levitha.

These ships were laden with goods — largely amphorae, which are ancient jugs with slender handles and narrow necks that usually held valuable liquids, such as oil and wine. The amphorae came from the cities of Knidos, Kos, Rhodes, Phoenicia and Carthage, according to the Hellenic Ministry of Culture and Sports.

Dating to just before the middle of the third century B.C., the goods were made during a time when the Ptolemaic and Hellenistic Antigonid dynasties ruled maritime trade in the Aegean, the ministry reported. ...

Among the findings was a 880-lb.(400 kilograms) granite anchor pole, spotted nearly 150 feet (45 meters) underwater, that dates to the sixth century B.C. The anchor is so enormous, it likely came from a "colossal" ship," the ministry said. (The statement was translated from Greek with Google translate.)

In addition to the five shipwrecks, the divers found other sunken vessels. One wreck had amphorae from the ancient Greek city of Knidos, located in what is now Turkey, that also dated to the third century B.C. Three other shipwrecks found nearby were carrying cargo that included cone (pointy-bottomed) amphorae. These wrecks dated to the second and first centuries B.C. and the second century A.D. ...

The last three newly discovered shipwrecks consisted of a first-century-B.C. vessel toting amphorae from the northern Aegean, a first-century-A.D. wreck with amphorae from Rhodes and a shipwreck with amphorae that dated to the early Christian period.

SOURCE: https://www.livescience.com/ancient-shipwrecks-found-in-aegean.html
 
You don't want to be sailing around when this lot goes up
Fears grow that WW2 wreck could explode on Kent coast
Experts divided over risk from US munitions ship that sank 75 years ago near Sheerness
Jamie Doward and Chris Bradford
Sat 17 Aug 2019 17.00 BST

It is 75 years this Tuesday since the SS Richard Montgomery sank off the Kent coast on its way to allied-occupied France. But the remains of the US cargo vessel, which went down on 20 August 1944, with more than 6,000 tonnes of munitions on board, continue to haunt the Thames estuary.
With politicians and salvage experts divided over the extent of the threat that the most monitored wreck in British waters poses beneath the waves, there are fresh fears that the ship is breaking up, leading to concerns its potentially explosive cargo could be scattered across the seabed.
Two surveys, from November 2017 and April 2018, indicate that the wreck is stable overall but is showing accelerated levels of deterioration.
etc
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...gomery-wartime-wreck-kent-explosive-munitions
 
A former classmate works for MMT. She helped find that discovery era ship mentioned earlier.
 
The hunt for one of Zheng He's enormous treasure ships is ramped up.
The Ming dynasty 9-masted ships with a length well in excess of 100 metres were amongst the greatest wooden ships ever built.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp....ty-admiral-zheng-hes-lost-treasure-ship-heats

If the estimated upper limit of Zhang He's flagship is accurate, here is an illustration of it alongside Columbus' Santa Maria.

zhang_he.jpg
 
I know how a junk rig works so Im signing up for the next Treasure fleet.

None of these petty European tubs for me. I want to sail in style.
 
It looks as if they're zeroing in on Captain Cook's famed vessel (or what's left of it) ...

The effort to make a positive identification of the possible Endeavour remains continues ...
Captain Cook's 'Endeavour' Shipwreck Possibly Discovered Off Rhode Island

One of the most famous science research ships in history — the Endeavour, commanded by Lieut. James Cook on his first voyage around the world — is now thought to lie at the bottom of Newport Harbor in Rhode Island. But it could still be months or even years before the shipwreck can be positively identified.

Maritime archaeologists have spent decades hunting down the ship ...

Principal investigator Kathy Abbass, of the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP), said the positive identification of the wreck would probably depend on several things, rather than a single archaeological find. ...

"We do not think we are going to find something that says 'Captain Cook slept here' — that is not likely," Abbass told Live Science. "But if we find some of the smaller stuff that is consistent with how we know she was used — as a transport and as a prison ship in Newport, then we know we have got her."

Samples of wood from the keel of the shipwreck in Newport Harbor, taken during underwater excavations over the last three weeks, are now being sent to a laboratory for testing. The results expected later this year could show that elm wood was used in its construction — another indicator that it could be Cook's Endeavour, which is thought to have an elm keel.

"Everything we see this year is consistent with it being the Endeavour, and we have seen nothing that says it can't be," Abbass said. ...

SOURCE: https://www.livescience.com/captain-cook-endeavour-shipwreck-possibly-discovered.html
 
At a depth of 20,400 feet, the recently discovered wreck of a WW2 American Fletcher-class destroyer is the deepest shipwreck discovery to date. This wreck is suspected to be the USS Johnston - legendary for its gallantry and tenacity in the October 1944 Battle of Samar. There remains some uncertainty as to whether this is the Johnston rather than another destroyer sunk during the battle.
Wreck of Famed WWII Destroyer USS Johnston May Have Been Found

A few days past the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Samar, researchers from Vulcan Inc.’s research vessel R/V Petrel believe they’ve found wreckage from the engagement’s famed Fletcher-class destroyer, USS Johnston (DD-557).

Images of twisted metal, a destroyed deck gun, a propeller shaft and other less recognizable debris were posted to Petrel’s Facebook page Wednesday, with a video narrated by Rob Kraft, Vulcan’s director of subsea operations, and Paul Mayer a submersible pilot with the team started by the late billionaire and philanthropist Paul Allen.

“This wreck is completely decimated,” Kraft says in the video. “It is just debris. There is no hull structure.” ...

Petrel’s crew found the wreckage about 20,400 feet below the water’s surface, just at the edge of a steep undersea precipice and at a depth that pushes the limit of their underwater search equipment.
FULL STORY: https://news.usni.org/2019/10/30/wreck-of-famed-wwii-destroyer-uss-johnston-may-have-been-found

The USS Johnston's story:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Johnston_(DD-557)
 
Without the historical context, this discovery of a 94-foot-long wooden vessel buried inland might seem quite Fortean.

The remains of a vessel found buried in coastal North Caroline are believed to be a floating dredger used by a gold mine in marshy territory. (Yes - there were actual gold mines in eastern North Carolina ... )

Century-old ship found buried in North Carolina

A North Carolina father and son hunting for treasure on their land made a startling a discovery -- a buried ship from more than 100 years ago.

Tim and Ross Fisher said drought conditions in early October left their land dry enough that they spotted pieces of wood and steel sticking up through the ground.

"I just sampled a spot right here because it was completely dried up," Tim Fisher told WTVD-TV. "There was no water running and I hit some wood seven feet down and knew stamp mills weren't built quite like that."

Fisher said he and his son bought the 14 acres of land about six years ago so they could search for treasure on the former gold mine site.

"This whole area was part of the Portis Gold Mine," he said. ...

The ship discovered by the duo is believed to be the Robinson Gold Dredge, which was built in New York in the early 1900s and shipped to North Carolina in pieces for use in gold dredging.

"This vessel, what books say. It's 94 feet long, 32 feet wide and the hull is 7 feet deep," Fisher said. "So, you can walk the hull. It is taller than you are, so you can walk around the lower end of it. It's all wood. It's a rare thing to find a wooden hull dredge in all our documents we are reading. It's very rare."

Fisher said he is working with the Army Corps of Engineers on plans to preserve the vessel and remove it from the ground without damaging the local environment. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2019/1...-buried-in-North-Carolina/2841572625786/?sl=5
 
A WW2 American submarine went missing in 1944. Only now has its wreck been discovered, owing to a mis-translation of Japanese records.
A World War II submarine that was missing for 75 years has been found off Okinawa, Japan

It's been 75 years since the USS Grayback went missing with 80 sailors aboard. Now, an organization that searches for sunken World War II submarines has solved the mystery of where it went down.

On Sunday, undersea explorer Tim Taylor and his team at the Lost 52 Project announced that they had located the long-lost submarine on June 5 about 1,427 feet underwater off Okinawa, Japan.

Last year, researcher Yutaka Iwasaki found that the Navy had originally made an error in translating the Japanese war records that detailed where the Grayback had likely sunk. All this time, the Navy's historical records had listed an incorrect longitude for the submarine's location.

Armed with that information, as well as newly discovered and translated Japanese mission logs, Taylor told CNN that his team set out on an expedition to search for the Grayback, this time searching in the area southwest of Okinawa.

With the help of autonomous underwater vehicles, remotely operated vehicles and advanced imaging technology, the team discovered the Grayback about 100 miles from the area where it was originally thought to have gone down.

The discovery was officially confirmed by the Navy, Robert S. Neyland, the head of the Naval History and Heritage Command's Underwater Archaeology Branch, said in a news release. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/11/us/uss-grayback-wwii-submarine-discovery-trnd/index.html
 
German WWI wreck Scharnhorst discovered off Falklands
  • 1 hour ago
The wreck of a World War One German battle cruiser has been located off the Falkland Islands, where it was sunk by the British navy 105 years ago.
SMS Scharnhorst was the flagship of German Vice-Admiral Maximilian Graf von Spee's East Asia Squadron.
It was sunk on 8 December 1914 with more than 800 men on board, including Vice-Adm von Spee himself.
The leader of the search for the wreckage said the moment of discovery was "extraordinary".
etc

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-50670743
 
The wreck of a USN submarine lost as the result of an accident during an exercise (without fatalities) has been located off Oahu.
Explorers find Cold War-era submarine wreck off the coast of Oahu

A team of explorers have found the wreck of a United States Navy submarine that sank more than 60 years ago in deep water near the Hawaiian island of Oahu.

USS Stickleback, a Balao-class submarine with the hull number SS-415, sank on May 28, 1958, after an accidental collision with another U.S. Navy ship, the USS Silverstein. Both the Stickleback and the Silverstein were taking part in an antisubmarine warfare exercise at the time.

The Stickleback is the sixth submarine wreck found by the Lost 52 Project, a private group based in New York that hopes to find all 52 of the missing U.S. submarines that sank during World War II, and all four U.S. submarines that sank during the Cold War.

The wreck of the Stickleback was found resting on the seafloor under about 11,000 feet (3,350 meters) of water, according to a statement from Lost 52 Project founder Tim Turner. The wreckage was near the location of the collision, about 19 miles (30 kilometers) from Barbers Point on Oahu, according to the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) of the U.S. Navy. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.livescience.com/cold-war-submarine-wreck-hawaii-coast.html
 
Now that Franklin's shipwrecks have been discovered in the Arctic, there's interest in locating Shackleton's shipwreck at the other end of the planet ...


FULL STORY: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47000896
Unfortunately this expedition was unsuccessful and the UAV vanished. Must have been gutting. They reckon it is going to be very difficult, if not impossible to find the wreck. I should imagine from the armchair enthusiasts point of view the first photographs would be a bit disappointing anyway as it would just be mainly matchsticks and not really a thing of ethereal beauty like the Titanic!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-52376090

It's going to take a monumental effort to locate the iconic ship of Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton.

This is the conclusion of scientists who tried and failed last year to find the Endurance, which sank in 3,000m of water in the Weddell Sea in 1915.

The team says the sea-ice in the area above the wreck site is nearly always thick and extensive.

It means most expeditions would struggle even to get close enough to begin a search.
 
WW2 mystery solved.

A mystery has been solved with the discovery of a World War Two wreck - more than 100 miles from where it was thought to have sunk.

The Mk III Landing Craft Tank LCT 326 disappeared on its way from Troon to Devon in 1943 with the loss of 14 crew. The Admiralty thought it had sunk near the Isle of Man, but it has now been discovered off the Welsh coast. The discovery was part of a project to identify hundreds of wrecks in Welsh waters.

Designed to land armoured vehicles during amphibious operations, of the type used extensively in the D-Day landings in June 1944, the vessel was built in Middlesbrough.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-52561209
 
As the Titanic is a shipwreck, here's some semi-interesting news.

Photograph Of Iceberg 'Most Likely' To Have Sunk The Titanic Has Surfaced 108 Years Later

titanic.jpg


A remarkable photograph of the iceberg 'most likely' to have sunk the Titanic has surfaced 108 years after the disaster.
The black and white picture was taken by pure coincidence two days before the sinking by the captain of another passenger liner crossing the Atlantic.
https://www.ladbible.com/news/uk-photograph-of-iceberg-that-sank-the-titanic-has-surfaced-20200615
 
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