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From Dominican Today

The maritime salvage company Deep Blue Marine, Inc. announced today that under the auspices and existing contract that Puntacana foundation has with the Dominican Government’s Culture Ministry and working under the supervision of the Dominican Navy and an inspector from the Office of the Submerged Patrimony, Deep Blue signed a subcontract agreement to provide services in the area of survey and recovery of artifacts for an undisclosed permitted area. 

The company- owned dive and recovery vessel "Kerri Lynn" will be on site within days to begin work. Management hopes the boat will be on site for approximately 20 days per month weather permitting.

Deep Blue Marine, Inc. has been in the recovery business now since January 2006 and has recovered airplanes, modern sunken vessels, industrial equipment and historic ship wrecks.

The company houses many of its artifacts in a company owned museum located in Samana, Dominican Republic and plans to open similar venues in the country in the near future.

This is the second contract of this type that the company has entered into. Deep Blue Marine, Inc. remains committed to recovery of historical artifacts and is pleased to be allowed to work in this area.

By Matt Neal - The Standard

Two men have claimed to have found the fabled Mahogany Ship on the same day - in two different locations. 

Ross Poulter, a Warrnambool chef, spoke to The Standard last week to detail his theory about the wreck's resting place. Less than an hour after that interview took place, Rob Simpson, of Boronia, contacted The Standard suggesting that he too had found the lost ship.

Both men have used Google Earth to help them find their locations for the legendary wreck, which has been suggested to have been everything from a Portuguese caravel to a Chinese junk to a colonial-era English vessel.

Mr Poulter's research began with the "Stewart position" - a longitude and latitude reputedly found in a religious book many years ago that is well-known to previous Mahogany Ship hunters.

But while many people have been looking for the wreck in the dunes, to account for the shifting sands of time, Mr Poulter believes the wreck lies "two to two and a half miles east of Gormans Road ... and roughly a cricket pitch length out to sea".

"It's about three feet under the sea but the hull outline is as plain as day," Mr Poulter said.

Some wooden beams he found in the nearby dunes, just metres away from where he said the submerged ship's hull lies, were tested and turned out to be messmate or eucalypt, but Mr Poulter is undeterred.

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Hoyes Arte

La ministra de Cultura, Ángeles González-Sinde, ha presentado hoy en el Museo Nacional de Arqueología Subacuática de Cartagena (ARQUA) el Libro Verde del Plan Nacional de Protección del Patrimonio Cultural Subacuático, fruto de dos años de trabajo de una comisión de expertos formada por representantes de Cultura, a través del ARQUA, comunidades autónomas y universidades para mejorar la gestión de nuestro rico patrimonio sumergido.

El Libro Verde ofrece las herramientas para el cumplimiento de los objetivos del Plan Nacional que prevé un decálogo de medidas que van desde la documentación e inventario de este patrimonio arqueológico a la protección física y jurídica de las zonas arqueológicas más importantes de nuestro litoral, pasando por la formación en este campo, y acuerdos de colaboración con los Ministerios de Defensa, Interior y Exteriores.

Cultura ya ha puesto en marcha algunas de estas medidas en colaboración con las comunidades y se está tramitando un convenio de colaboración con cada una de ellas cuyo objetivo principal es realizar cartas arqueológicas.

Igualmente, ha suscrito un acuerdo con el Ministerio de Defensa con objeto de optimizar los recursos de ambos departamentos para la protección del patrimonio subacuático.

En cuanto a la financiación de las medidas para la protección de este patrimonio, la cifra ha pasado de los 800.000 euros de 2009 a los 1.275.000 de este año.

Farodevigo

La riqueza arqueológica no sólo se mide por los yacimientos en tierra sino también por otros menos conocidos, los sumergidos bajo el mar.

Estas joyas submarinas del pasado contarán en breve con mayor protección, al menos sobre el papel.

La ministra de Cultura anunció en Cartagena que solicitará a la Guardia Civil que vigile este patrimonio. Sólo en Galicia, expertos en la materia estiman que existen más de medio millar de estos restos bajo las olas.

La vigilancia por parte de la Benemérita sobre el patrimonio subacuático en toda España –para impedir expolios– dará comienzo una vez el Ministerio de Cultura y la Guardia Civil firmen un convenio.

Desde Galicia, expertos como el arqueólogo submarino Miguel Sanclaudio aprueban la propuesta. “La Guardia Civil tiene que tomar más conciencia de la proteccicón del patrimonio subacuático, sin duda”, señala.

Para proteger los restos submarinos (barcos y cargas de interés localizados en el fondo del mar), primero hay que conocer dónde se encuentran dichos “tesoros”. A día de hoy, España carece de una carta de patrimonio subacuático que señale zonas, pecios y características.

Cada comunidad ha ido realizado su trabajo, con distintas velocidades. En el caso de Galicia, se comenzó en el actual siglo, aunque los trabajos aún no se han finalizado y desde la Consellería de Cultura no se ha publicado información detallada al respecto.

Miguel Sanclaudio, que ha colaborado con la Consellería de Cultura en la elaboración del mapa del patrimonio subacuático gallego, confía en que, desde la Administración gallega, se impulse la realización de las catas bajo el mar para rematar el inventario lo antes posible.

Los arqueólogos submarinos no son los únicos que solicitan que se agilicen las tareas. Con el anterior ministro de Cultura, César Antonio Molina, se había aprobado el Plan Nacional de Protección del Patrimonio Arqueológico Subacuático.

El plan presentaba como principal punto elaborar las cartas arqueológicas de todo el Estado. Casi dos años después del mandato, Cultura ha presentado ayer el Libro Verde del Plan que vuelve a incidir en lo mismo, subrayado por la ministra, Ángeles González-Sinde.

“Esperamos –apunta Sanclaudio– que con la publicación de este libro aceleren los trabajos desde la Xunta. Para lograrlo, se deberían aplicar más medios económicos”.

Mas...

By Meg Jones - Journal Sentinel

For the first time, Christopher Ring glimpsed the deck where his great-grandfather had earned his livelihood.

He looked through the open hatches to see where his ancestor's last cargo still lies. And he saw the rudder, turned hard to port, which his namesake would have ordered moved to turn his great steamship around in a brutal gale.

Ring, 64, was awe-struck.

He heard tales of his great-grandfather, whose body was never found, whose shipwreck was lying somewhere unknown and unseen at the bottom of Lake Michigan. But not until last month when the Salem, Ore., man was surfing the Internet did he learn that his great-grandfather's ship, the L.R. Doty, had finally been discovered 20 miles off Oak Creek in 320 feet of cold water.

So he and his wife booked a trip to Milwaukee and visited Discovery World-Pier Wisconsin on Sunday to see underwater video shot by John Janzen and photographs taken by John Scoles in June, when scuba divers discovered the 291-foot-long wooden steamship, the largest wreck unaccounted for in the Great Lakes.

Capt. Christopher Smith and 16 other crew members were lost when the L.R. Doty, loaded down with 107,000 bushels of corn and towing the schooner Olive Jeanette, disappeared on Oct. 25, 1898, after the tow line between the two ships broke during a ferocious storm.

Historians believe Smith was turning his football field-sized ship around to rescue the schooner when it foundered. When the crew of the Olive Jeanette, named after Smith's daughters, lost sight of the L.R. Doty in the huge swells, it was never seen again.

Ring's grandfather Walter, the oldest of Smith's children, was 15 when his father died on Lake Michigan. Walter Smith had also worked on the L.R. Doty as a wheelsman during summer breaks from school.

"I always heard the stories about the Doty," said Ring, whose grandfather raised him. "My great-grandfather complained that the Doty was always overloaded. They knew he would have turned around to go back for the Olive Jeanette."

Before the video was shown during a presentation at Discovery World, Great Lakes maritime historian Brendon Baillod recounted the history of the steamship and said he could find news clippings of only two bodies washing ashore. The remains of the other crew members are probably still below decks on the ship, whose hull is intact.

One of the 1898 news clippings reported that the captain's body had been found. But later it was learned that Smith had only one arm and could not be the body that was recovered.

"When he was a little bitty boy he was in a cotton gin accident in Scotland, that's where he grew up," Ring said about how his great-grandfather lost his arm. "Then when he was about 15, he stowed away on a sailing vessel to New York."

Smith eventually found his way to Detroit and worked for many years on the Great Lakes.

Baillod, who spearheaded the discovery of the shipwreck, read to the audience a gripping account by the cook of the Olive Jeanette who recalled the sailors pumping water from the slowly sinking schooner for two days before the ship was rescued.

Frances Browne, who had worked as a cook for many years on Great Lakes ships, recalled water flowing through the cabin as she diligently brewed hot coffee to fortify the soaked and exhausted crew.

By Don Winner - Panama Guide.com

On Tuesday, 29 June 2010, 61 year old Bo Kjaer-Olsen, who held citizenship from both the United States and Denmark, was shot and killed on his 70 foot sailboat the "Altares" while at anchor near Bajo Pipon in the Republic of Panama.

The bullet hit an artery in his leg and he bled to death. In the attack Bo's son Zacharias Kjaer-Olsen was also shot. Zach remains hospitalized in David and has undergone surgery to repair the damage done however a bullet remains lodged near his spine and he might require further surgery.

Zach's 27 year old wife Sujey Rodríguez from Chiriqui was also attacked and severely beaten in the face. When the news first broke of this incident I spoke to some people from the boating community near Pedregal. Not too long ago Bo decided to move his boat further away from Pedregal and he was anchored in front of Bajo Pipon.

The Platanal and Chiriqui rivers merge just below Pedregal, and Bajo Pipon is just outside of the mouth of the river. The point being - he was anchored about 7.7 miles downstream from the docks in Pedregal - further away from assistance as well as any kind of police protection. Bo Kjaer-Olsen was a famous salvage diver and treasure hunter who probably had about $200,000 dollars worth of 17th Century Spanish gold on his boat, enough to lure the five men who attacked his family and killed him.

Bo's passion was for scuba diving and searching for and recovering sunken treasure - really. Once I got the correct spelling of his last name it was easy to find more information about him on the Internet. For example, this article entitled "The Skeleton Holds Billions !"

In Bo Kjaer-Olsen's estimation, there are over 2000 sunken ships, from the 15th century to the early 1800's, which wrecked from the Skeleton Coast down to Cape Town, South Africa. All are laden with, specie (monies).

Olsen says that this is one of the main graveyards for treasure ships in the world as they were forced to round the Cape in the days when there was no Suez Canal.

He estimates that salvageable treasure is in the billions of dollars. And who is Bo Kjaer-Olsen ? A credible man with an incredible background. 

Olsen was born in Denmark fifty years ago June 1. He immigrated with his parents to South Africa in 1952, was raised and schooled in Cape Town where he lived for twenty-seven years. During his boarding school days, two fathers of his schoolmates were game wardens, so he began spending the three months of summer vacation with them.

Olsen went in the wardens' Jeeps, helping with anti-poaching enforcement and with ministering to sick and wounded animals (e.g. lions with abscessing teeth and elephants with festering wounds from hunters). His early adventures were mainly in the 400 by 300 miles of the Kruger National Park and the Okavango Swamps on the northern - border of Nambia (the source of the Kunini River).

Bo Kjaer-Olsen also became well known as a salvage diver and leader of salvage and exploration expeditions. Included in these were rock climbing and caving (going into deep caves for up to seven days); the caving expeditions were motivated by old stories of hidden treasure and by needed mapping of many unlogged caverns.

More to read...

Look at "The Skeleton Holds Billions !"

By Craig Brown - Scotsman

The Duke of Edinburgh said the plight of the 145-year-old City of Adelaide, currently resting on a slipway on the west coast of Scotland, is "hideous" and appealed for help to restore it to its former glory.

The Sunderland-built ship, which predates the Cutty Sark, took people and wool between Australia and Britain on 28 round trips.

Built from teak and iron in 1864, the clipper once completed the Britain to Australia route in a record 65 days, cutting 35 days off the normal journey.

Later known as the Carrick, it subsequently fulfilled many roles, including acting as a floating isolation hospital, a Royal Navy drill ship and finally, during the Second World War, as a floating clubhouse for the Royal Navy Reserve.

After its final decomission, it has been left to the elements at Irvine, North Ayrshire, and could still face being dismantled for display in a museum.

The Scottish Government is considering a number of options for the future of the ship, with campaigners hoping to refloat the vessel and take it to Australia or back to Sunderland.

In a rare interview, the duke lamented the difficulties in securing money to restore old ships like the Adelaide.

He said: "As long as I've been alive, there's never been a good moment to raise money.

"Mind you, the sums back then looked smaller, because no-one seems to know anything about inflation, least of all the Treasury.

"People had got it into their heads that we are looking after historic buildings, but it was a completely new concept that we should look after historic ships.

"The National Trust was there for old buildings, but there was no-one there for old ships.

"We've still got a hideous problem with the City of Adelaide, which belongs to the Scottish Maritime Museum but is caught in a trap. Because it was falling to bits, they pulled it out of the water and it's now become a listed building.

"But they can't raise the money to do anything about it. You can't seem to concentrate the interest. It's a great pity."

His comments came as Scottish culture minister Fiona Hyslop yesterday met campaigners who want to save the clipper.

Earlier this year, Ms Hyslop announced that Historic Scotland had commissioned real estate advisers DTZ to review options for the category A-listed ship.

Those under consideration include moving the ship to Sunderland, to Adelaide in South Australia, or moving it to a different location in Scotland.

By Amy Bartner - Indy Star

In the world of on-screen heartthrobs, seductive vampires have replaced third-class Titanic passengers like the one played by Leonardo DiCaprio. Yet in the 13 years since "Titanic" premiered -- and in the 98 years since that unsinkable ship sank -- the tragedy still captivates the world.

Now, artifacts from the most famous shipwreck in history will come to the Indiana State Museum on Sept. 25 as part of "Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition," museum officials announced today.

"There are 240 artifacts, ranging from china, personal objects carried by passengers, up to actual parts of the ship that have been recovered from the seafloor," said Rex Garniewicz, vice president of programs at the museum.

"One of the great things about the exhibit is that it really tells the whole story.

"It really is a comprehensive exhibit."

Visitors will get the opportunity to feel what it was like to be a Titanic passenger.

"At the entrance of the exhibit, they'll receive a boarding pass with a passenger's name, and they'll go through this exhibit as that passenger," Garniewicz said. "Most of these passengers will be third-class passengers, not first-class."

As they walk through the 7,000-square-foot exhibit, they'll experience the Titanic from construction to everyday life among the different social classes on board, in re-created cabins and hallways.

When visitors reach the point of impact with the iceberg that sank the Titanic, they'll be able to touch a chunk of ice set at 28 degrees, the water temperature April 14, 1912, the night of the collision.

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