A Perfect Wreck

[marion]

In early 2002, the Swedish Navy submarine rescue ship HMS Belos was on a routine exercise* in the middle of the Baltic Sea, when the side scan sonar caught a strange-looking wreck. The on-board ROV Sjöugglan – Swedish for sea owl – was sent down 100 metres to the bottom.

Despite bad visibility near the bottom, the crew got a spectacular sight on their TV monitors – an old ship standing upright with its two masts standing and bowsprit, perfectly intact. The reason for sinking is a mystery, since both hull and rigging are intact.

A beautiful intact ship just sitting on the floor of the ocean. I love the gilded seahorse figurehead. Full story here. and another article here.

 

[Mythopoeika]

It'd be really exciting to see that brought up and preserved. What a find.

 

[rjmrjmrjm]

Thats really cool and creepy. Wow, i'd love to see it close up.

 

[Twin_Star]

A possible explanation

Was reading something similar on holiday recently, and this seemed to fit the bill rather nicely.

The whole article can be foundhere



Another place where high pressures accompany water near the freezing point is in ocean depths. At a depth of 500m, the pressure is about 50 atmospheres, and the temperature 4 - 5 °C, ideal for gas hydrate formation. Wherever suitable gases, usually hydrocarbons, are released from sediments, these hydrates have been found to exist, and in relatively huge amounts. Hydrates are known not only in Arctic regions, such as the Alaska north slope, but also off places like South Carolina. Hydrates also exist in permafrost regions near the surface, as well as in sedimentary formations where hydrocarbons, water, and low temperatures are found. Enthusiasts have proposed that there are great reserves of methane in such hydrates. Production would be extremely difficult, however.

The wreck of a steam trawler has recently been discovered at the bottom of the North Sea, 150 km northeast of Aberdeen, Scotland, apparently in a crater. It is suspected that a release of methane produced a water-methane bubble mixture of low density, in which the trawler sank when it lost buoyancy. This region, called Witch's Hole, is known to be pockmarked with such craters. It is mentioned that certain sulphur-oxidizing bacteria produce methane, so this may be another source than petroleum for the methane. Hydrates seem a better source of catastrophic releases than simple bubbles of methane in the sediments (which have not been observed otherwise).

here

 

[Anonymous]

Re: A possible explanation

The wreck of a steam trawler has recently been discovered at the bottom of the North Sea, 150 km northeast of Aberdeen, Scotland, apparently in a crater. It is suspected that a release of methane produced a water-methane bubble mixture of low density, in which the trawler sank when it lost buoyancy. This region, called Witch's Hole, is known to be pockmarked with such craters. It is mentioned that certain sulphur-oxidizing bacteria produce methane, so this may be another source than petroleum for the methane. Hydrates seem a better source of catastrophic releases than simple bubbles of methane in the sediments (which have not been observed otherwise).


here

I recall watching a documentary which was about this wreck, I'm pretty sure it was on the Discovery channel about a year ago. Fasinating stuff, they started to speculate that a large number of ships might have been sunk due to this process.

 

[Min Bannister]

Re: Re: A possible explanation

I recall watching a documentary which was about this wreck, I'm pretty sure it was on the Discovery channel about a year ago. Fasinating stuff, they started to speculate that a large number of ships might have been sunk due to this process.

Yes, I've seen a documentary about this as well. I think they gave it as a possible explantion for "Bermuda Triangle" disappearances as well.

Good find Marion, the ship is stunning!

 

[EnolaGaia]

A beautiful intact ship just sitting on the floor of the ocean. I love the gilded seahorse figurehead. Full story here. and another article here.

The second link is dead, and has been dead for some time.

The URL was: http://www.divernet.com/wrecks/0802baltic.htm

Here is the full text archived at the Wayback Machine ...

Baltic wreck poses mystery
A finely preserved historic shipwreck, complete with human remains, has been found by a Swedish naval survey team in the Baltic.
The ship was located by accident as the Belos, a diving and submarine rescue vessel, was engaged in a bottom-search training exercise in northern Baltic waters, writes Millis Keegan.
Even though the ship's officers were used to strange finds, great excitement greeted the first pictures relayed back by the ROV deployed from Belos.
Standing masts, still with sails set, filled the TV screen, and the ROV descended further to establish that this was a fairy-tale ship: a beautifully preserved wooden vessel, sitting upright on a mud bottom at a depth of 107m.
The ship was armed, with four or five gunports visible on each side. On deck lay a large amount of blocks and tackle - and a number of human skulls.
Much would have floated off and away as the ship made its long descent to the seabed, but these skulls could have been those of crewmen trapped under some falling rigging as the ship went down.
When the ROV arrived at the ship's bow it found an intact figurehead depicting a pony's head with big eyes, curly mane and legs folded across its stomach. Towards its bottom, the carving blended into a fish or dragon's tail.
The findings were passed to Stockholm's Museum of Maritime History, where research has indicated that this twin-mastedarmed carrier is a snaubrigg from the 17th or 18th centuries.
In addition, the fine figurehead - a rarity among such vessels and unlike anything the museum staff had seen before - indicated that the ship might have carried out an important role, perhaps as a government ship or mail-carrier.
Here and there, shiny glimpses can be seen on the figurehead, indicating that this and other decorations may have been been gilded.
A second visit to the wreck has yielded more filmed evidence of the ship; and the museum continues to research records to establish the identity of this beguiling, perhaps historically valuable find.

https://web.archive.org/web/20060901142322/http://www.divernet.com/wrecks/0802baltic.htm

 

[EnolaGaia]

A beautiful intact ship just sitting on the floor of the ocean. I love the gilded seahorse figurehead. Full story here. and another article here.

The first link is still workable. Here is an edited version of the text ...

The Mystery Snow Brig
Some years have now past since this unique and mysterious find, and no investigation is planned. If nothing is done soon, this ship may be wiped out by one of the many trawler fishers of the Baltic Sea.


In early 2002, the Swedish Navy submarine rescue ship HMS Belos was on a routine exercise* in the middle of the Baltic Sea, when the side scan sonar caught a strange-looking wreck. The on-board ROVSjöugglan – Swedish for sea owl – was sent down 100 metres to the bottom.

Despite bad visibility near the bottom, the crew got a spectacular sight on their TV monitors – an old ship standing upright with its two masts standing and bowsprit, perfectly intact. The reason for sinking is a mystery, since both hull and rigging are intact. ...

The ship is 26 m long and the masts rise about 20 m, with perfectly-preserved tops (platforms) about halfway. The rigging is clearly a brig, with yard sails on both masts and a gaff sail behind the rear mast. It is specifically a snow brig (Swedish: snaubrigg), since there is a separate minor mast for the gaff sail, just behind the rear mast.

The snow brig was a common rigging for minor ships during the entire 18th century. One of the earliest snow brigs was “Mjöhunden”, built for the Swedish Navy by Charles Sheldon in 1698 and sunk in battle off Arkangelsk in 1701. Mjöhunden was 21 m long and carried six 3-pound guns.

Later on, in the 19th century, the snow brig was gradually replaced by the regular brig, where the gaff sail is attached directly to the rear mast. ...

The figurehead on the wreck is a fantastic gilded horse with (human) hands clasped under its belly and a fish tail.

The gunwales (shipsides) have deck-level gunports and at least one gunport seems to have been decorated. But there are no guns to be seen. Several planks and possible decorations of the sterncastle have fallen off, perhaps because they were attached with (now rusted) nails, while other planks are attached with wooden pegs.

The ship seems to be a minor naval or postal ship, or maybe a private or Royal yacht. Skulls from at least two crewmen lie on the deck, which is unusual, since casualties usually float away during sinking. Perhaps those men were trapped. ...

SOURCE: https://www.abc.se/~m10354/mar/snowbrig.htm