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By Walaa Hawari - Arab News

The Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities has started work to haul out a sunken ship dating back to World War I at Qunfudah port on the Red Sea coast.

SCTA Vice President Ali Al-Ghabban visited the port to supervise the operation and ensure that necessary measures are taken to recover all parts of the ship.

According to an official at the SCTA, the ship will be divided into parts and showcased on land owned by the commission’s branch in Qunfudah.

The decision to fish out the sunken ship, the first operation of its kind in the Kingdom, was taken after it was found obstructing planned work on Qunfudah docks initiated by the Ministry of Agriculture.

The ship was sunk in an air raid by Italian warplanes during World War I, which resulted in the destruction of a number of Ottoman ships in the area.

The company in charge of salvaging the wreckage is using specially trained SCTA divers.

According to a source, the ship is 56 meters long and will be recovered in parts and stored in a suitable location. Visitors will be able to visit the ship and its contents and listen to the story behind it.

The company in charge of the Qunfudah dock project has built a sand dock parallel to where the ship is located for the use of a special crane to recover the wreckage.

The whole project is supervised by a joint committee comprising representatives of the SCTA, the Border Guards and Ministry of Agriculture, with team members registering and documenting all recovered parts.

The team will also fish out a 28-meter long boat found underneath the ship, and this will also be showcased.

There are other sunken ships near Qunfudah port away from the project location and SCTA is working on a project to construct an underwater museum with a glass tunnel enabling visitors to view the wreckage.

From UPI

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's Black Sea archaeological find this summer was staged, his spokesman disclosed Wednesday.

Dmitry Peskov said it was obvious his boss had help discovering the two ancient Greek jugs he pulled from the watery depths in August, The Moscow Times reported.

"I was on vacation, and I could not think this up," Peskov said.

Peskov's assertion that archaeologists had put the amphorae where the Russian prime minister could find them drew a rebuke from Vladimir Kuznetsov, who led the archaeological team Putin visited.

"I did not order anyone to put amphorae there … and no member of my expedition made such an initiative," he told the BBC.

By T.W.Paterson - The Citizen

Thiepval Channel, between Turret and Turtle Islands in The Broken Group, Barkley Sound, honours this First World Battle Class trawler, lost in the line of duty in 1930.

E ighty years after the fact, the Dept. of National Defence is taking renewed interest in the wreck of HMCS Thiepval, long a target of recreational skindivers but now thought to be a hazard because of unrecovered live artillery shells and rifle bullets.

One of 12 Battle Class trawlers built late in the First World War, she was commissioned in the Royal Service (forerunner to the Royal Canadian Navy) in July 1918. Assigned to the West Coast with sisters Givenchy and Armentieres, she served for three years as a fisheries patrol vessel.

As a signatory to the Pelagic Sealing Treaty with Russia, Japan and the U.S.A., Canada offered the Thiepval as part of her contribution to the impossible task of trying to canvass thousands of square miles of open sea.

The idea was to restrict the hunting of fur seals to aboriginals, who were denied the use of firearms and power boats. Even if the treaty nations had had the ships and manpower, a bullet hole in a seal's pelt was easily enlarged to make it appear the work of a spear-tip.

With a maximum speed (when new) of 10 knots, and armed with a single 12-pound quick-firing gun on her forecastle, the 130foot-long Thiepval rejoined the RCN in 1923.

The following year she steamed all the way to Hakodate, Japan to establish fuel dumps for Maj. Stuart McLaren's ill-fated attempt to fly around the world.

Upon returning home after recovering what was left of McLaren's crashed aircraft from Russian territory, Thiepval had completed an 11,000-mile round trip.

She was then assigned to the Bamfield Patrol.

Simply, this was a token attempt at a Canadian Coast Guard at a time when Barkley Sound continued to earn its sobriquet, Graveyard of the Pacific.

In February 1926, Thiepval's commanding officer, Lieut. V.S. Godfrey, was alerted that the Chapultepec, a large Mexican schooner, was being driven towards the Sea Lion Rocks, off Carmanah Point.

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By Daniel Frank Sedwick - Coin News

The coin lots for this auction will be available for viewing at the A.N.A.’s National Money Show in Pittsburgh, PA, October 13-15, with private viewing at Sedwick’s office in Winter Park (by appointment only) before and after the show.

Of the 1400+ lots in Sedwick’s latest auction, more than 240 lots are gold coins from around the world. Over 100 of these are gold cobs, most of them comprising The Santa Fe Collection of dated Bogotá cob 2 escudos, a landmark reference collection of over 50 different dates, showing changes of styles and assayers over the 130 years of their production, including several "first and finest knowns."

"The Santa Fe Collection was carefully formed within the past decade with an emphasis on clearly visible dates," says firm owner Daniel Sedwick. "Misreading partial dates has created much confusion in this series, which this educational collection will serve to clear up."

But the single most important gold item in the sale is a Brazilian gold monetized ingot of 1832, cast at the Serro Frio foundry under Emperor Pedro II, a very late and exceptionally rare example with its original foundry certificate (known as a guia).

"Every time one of these Brazilian ingots comes up for sale it is a major numismatic event, and ours has reason to be even more so," says Sedwick’s assistant Agustín (Augi) García, emphasizing that less than 10% of the known ingots still have their original guias.

Other significant pieces of gold in the auction include: a gold bar from the "Tumbaga" wreck (ca. 1528), one of only a handful known, cast from the first spoils of New World conquest; a high-grade emerald cross from the Spanish 1715 Fleet; a filigree devotional scapular from a ca.-1800 wreck (unidentified); and the ornate gold ring embedded in debris from the Spanish 1733 Fleet that was featured on the cover of Flash of Gold, a classic treasure-huntingbook written by Marty Meylach in 1971.

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By Markus Junianto Sihaloho - Jakarta Globe

The government has launched an investigation into alleged looting by shipwreck salvage diver Michael Hatcher, who has a long history with Indonesia and is believed to be operating on a new discovery.

Aji Sularso, an official with the National Committee for the Salvage and Utilization of Valuable Objects from Sunken Ships (Pannas BMKT), said on Wednesday it had established a joint investigation team comprising related government institutions. “We are investigating the case,” Aji said.

He was responding to complaints by the Consortium for Rescuing National Assets (KPAB), which alleged the government had not responded to its report regarding Hatcher, who may hold both British and Australian passports.

Endro Soebekti Sadjilman, from the KPAB, said he had solid evidence of the alleged looting.

“We’ve heard he’s in Blanakan waters near Pamanukan in Subang [West Java],” he said. “The government must arrest him.”

Daniel Nafis, from the Institute for Strategic Interest and Development (INSIDe), a member of the consortium, claims Hatcher’s illegal salvage missions in Indonesia began with the discovery of the wreck of the Vec De Geldermalsen in East Bintan, Riau Islands, from which he recovered Chinese porcelain that was auctioned for $20 million.

That mission prompted the Indonesian government to establish Pannas BMKT, to monitor all salvage missions.
In 1999, Hatcher raised 365,000 porcelain items from the wreck of the Chinese junk Tek Sing, which ran aground off southern Sumatra in 1822, constituting the biggest find of its type ever.

On that mission, Nafis said, Hatcher worked with local operator PT Pratama Cakra Dirga.

“The government only found out about it from Australian customs officials,” he said. “They said 43 containers of porcelain were ready to be sent to Germany.”

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Photo Al Behrman

By Mandy Zajac - ahwatukee

As a kid growing up in Massachusetts, Barry Clifford was familiar with the old tale of a pirate ship wrecked just off the coast in one of the worst Nor’easters on record.

As an adult, he went out and found it.

The Whydah, a slave ship seized by pirates and used to plunder some 53 other vessels, was said to be laden with stolen treasure when it sank in a storm in 1717. Nearly 300 years later, it became the first pirate ship ever discovered in North America, when underwater explorer Clifford found the Whydah’s bell, inscribed with the name of the ship and the year she was built, 1716.

That impressive artifact — still encased in a chamber of briny water to protect it from decay — is one of more than 200 objects on view in “Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship.” A touring exhibition organized by National Geographic, it opens Sunday at Arizona Science Center.

“For anyone who’s ever dreamed of finding pirate treasure, anyone who’s ever read Robert Louis Stevenson’s ‘Treasure Island,’ this is the only pirate treasure ever discovered. The only certified, documented pirate treasure in the world is here,” says Clifford.

Spanish coins, jewelry, dinnerware, silk ribbon and smoking pipes are on display. So are cannon and roundshot, sword handles, fancy pistols and pikes — long spears with double-edged blades that pirates would use for close combat when boarding ships.

The items, dragged up from the sea floor by Clifford and his team over nearly 30 years, offer an authentic glimpse into piracy’s golden age — 1680 to 1725.

“On board the ship, at least a third of the crew were of African origin, and everyone had an equal vote, and everyone had an equal share of the treasure. They had their own type of social security. If a man lost an arm or a leg, he would be given so much money. If he was killed, his family would receive almost a type of insurance.

Prior to us finding the ship, I didn’t really understand any of that. They were actually experimenting in democracy, (these) outlaws and former slaves,” says Clifford.

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By Jeannette Pippin - JD News

A four-week fall expedition at the Queen Anne’s Revenge shipwreck site is under way, and the first look at the wreck site since Hurricane Irene brought good news.

The hurricane swept the North Carolina coast in late August without causing major disruption to the shipwreck site, said QAR Project Director Mark Wilde-Ramsing.

A sand berm placed near the site several years ago seems to be helping protect the site from storm damage, including minimizing scour, where sand is washed away and exposes artifacts.

“Last week we did a check of the site. We were very concerned after Hurricane Irene, but the site seems to have weathered the storm pretty well,” Wilde-Ramsing said. “It was not scoured out and, also, it was not completely covered up (by sand).”

After the one-day dive last week to take a preliminary look at the site and begin preparations, the QAR project team kicked off the four-week expedition Monday and will be further assessing the site’s condition, stabilizing areas where it’s needed and continuing the excavation and recovery of artifacts.

The excavation of artifacts will focus on a previously known scour area in the area of the vessel’s foremast and galley area.

“We’re not to the bow but we’re getting up there,” Wilde-Ramsing said.

A highlight of the expedition is the planned recovery of cannon C23, one of the ship’s largest guns, at the close of the expedition.

And surrounding the cannon are a kettle, wooden deadeyes, a pewter plate, cannon balls and other unidentified artifacts to be recovered.

Also during the expedition, the QAR team will continue “in situ” conservation monitoring. Aluminum rods called sacrificial anodes have been attached to all but three remaining cannons to change the electrochemical process that corrodes iron in saltwater, reducing or even reversing the amount of salts absorbed by the iron objects.

“We’re seeing really good results,” Wilde-Ramsing said.

The process will help reduce the amount of conservation time in the lab once the artifacts are raised.

The N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries’ R/V Shell Point will be used as the principle recovery vessel.

Wilde-Ramsing said that due to budget cuts the vessel will only be available for two of the four weeks, and as much excavation as possible we be done during that time.

East Carolina University will be providing volunteers and the use of its barge. NOAA’s Marine Sanctuary Program will provide the vessel for raising the cannon.

By Alix Spiegel - NPR.org

In November 1941, two ships crossed paths off the coast of Australia. One was the German raider HSK Kormoran. The other: an Australian warship called the HMAS Sydney. Guns were fired, the ships were damaged, and both sank to the bottom of the ocean.

The loss of the Sydney in World War II was a national tragedy for the Australians, particularly because none of the 645 men onboard survived. In the years that followed, there was intense interest in finding the wrecks, particularly the wreck of the Sydney. The idea was that doing this might give the families of the lost sailors some measure of peace, a sense of closure and certainty.

The problem was that the only witnesses to the battle and the sinking were about 300 German sailors who had abandoned their ship after it had been hit. They were eventually picked up by the Australian military.

After their capture, most of these Germans were interrogated and asked to identify where the ships had gone down. But the Germans seemed quite fuzzy on this point.

Bob Trotter, a former director of the Finding Sydney Foundation, a nonprofit group established to help find the Sydney, says their ignorance isn't all that surprising.

"Particularly in a wartime situation, the position of the ship is really kept in the bridge area," Trotter says. "It would not be normal that the rest of the ship's company would be told."

Still, in the course of their interrogations, about 70 Germans did come up with a location. But those locations, taken together, didn't make much sense — the positions were spread out, smeared over hundreds of miles. One survivor even placed the sinking almost halfway to Antarctica.

So most Australians concluded that the Germans must be lying, their conflicting accounts part of a ploy to throw the Australians off the scent. When Sydney hunters went out looking for the boat — and many did — they either completely disregarded the accounts from the Germans, or, in a couple of cases, focused exclusively on the captain's version of the story.

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