HOT NEWS !

By Chris Lloyd
 

There’s been much talk of pirates this week after a Saudi-owned tanker was hijacked with Britons aboard. Chris Lloyd looks at the history and romance surrounding swashbucklers and buccaneers.

Ahoy, me hearties ! Shiver me timbers ! There be booty on the Indian Ocean. Arrrr, there be supertankers sailin’ ’boot laden to the gunnels with treasure – thick, black oozy treasure. Liquid gold, avast ye! I ain’t never – no, nay, ne’er – seen owt to match that Sirius Starrrr… 

Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. The Sirius Star is one of the biggest ships on the seven seas: 332 metres (1,090ft) long, carrying two million barrels of crude oil – a quarter of Saudi Arabia’s daily output – worth £70m. 

And now she’s been captured by pirates.

These are Somalian pirates using motherships and global positioning satellites as opposed to swashbuckling pirates who sailed in galleons, glugged rum and said “arrrr” a lot.

From Mail Online

A sailor who survived two massive shipwrecks including the Titanic, finally died when a third vessel sunk, it emerged today.

Tragic Archie Jewell's bad luck has been uncovered in two letters up for auction at Sothebys.

Archibald 'Archie' Jewell, who was born in 1888, was a lookout on the Titanic on the night she hit an iceberg in the North Atlantic and went down, taking 1,523 lives with her, in April 1912.  

Remarkably, he was also serving on Britannic, which was being used as a hospital ship, when it was hit by a mine that killed 30 in 1916.

In an evocative letter to one of his sisters in Cornwall, just 11 days after the Titanic disaster, 23-year-old Mr Jewell describes the sinking of the liner and the immediate aftermath.

Read more...

From Investors

Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc. (OMEX), the world leader in the field of deep-ocean shipwreck exploration, today filed a quarterly report with the Securities and Exchange Commission detailing results of the Company's third quarter 2008.

For the third quarter of 2008, Odyssey reported revenue of $2.2 million, compared to $1.3 million in the third quarter 2007.

The Company also reported a net loss of $6.5 million, compared to a net loss of $5.4 million in the third quarter 2007. The net loss per share for the third quarter 2008 was $.13, compared to a net loss of $.11 per share in the third quarter 2007...

...An agreement was negotiated during third quarter 2008 with Arqueonautas Worldwide for the exclusive worldwide marketing rights to the collectible quality coins from their SAGBPo Jose shipwreck project.

These coins have not been available for sale previously and we are marketing them through our authorized distributors.

This project is expected to generate revenue through sales commissions beginning in the fourth quarter 2008 and has allowed us to expand our distribution network with new product to prepare for future Odyssey shipwreck products and stories....

By Fiona Magennis

A local diver has found a priceless piece of ancient silver jewelry whilst taking part in a search for a missing person.

Pat Treanor a member of the Boyne Fishermans Rescue and Recovery Service (BFRRS) found what is believed to be a Viking artefact dating back up to 2,000 years during a search of the River Lee.

It is currently being examined by the National Museum of Ireland but is believed to be at least 1,500 years old.

The piece, which is circular with a bulbous end and is thought to be either a bracelet or brooch, was found on the river bed sitting on top of stones in ten feet of water.

He originally thought the silver trinket, which was discoloured and blackened, was an ordinary piece of women's jewellery.

From BBC News

Forgotten by many and unheard of by most. Yet the sister-ship of the Titanic is starting to escape from the shadow of the iconic shipwreck.

HMHS Britannic was completed at Belfast's Harland and Wolff shipyard two years after Titanic was lost in 1912. But she in turn went to the bottom, the victim of enemy action in the First World War.

BBC News correspondent Mike McKimm joined a Greek scientific expedition and dived to the Britannic to bring back dramatic footage of one of the world's biggest wrecks.

And the expedition also set out to try to discover what sank the vessel. Was it a torpedo or a mine ?

Read more...

By Jack Fichter

Did pirate Captain Kidd bury treasure somewhere near Lake Lily in Cape May Point ?

I was told that story from the time I was child, a story passed down by my family members who lived in Cape May Point starting in 1905.

The Web site: New Jersey History Mysteries tells the story of Kidd’s final months before being hanged following a spree of attacking ships for their valuables. In 1697, Kidd discovered he had been deemed a pirate and was wanted by the British government.

He had abandoned a ship that he had captured and looted, the Quedagh Merchant, then bought a small sloop and set off for Boston where he hoped he could clear his name. 

I was watching a program about Kidd on the National Geographic Channel documenting a group that believes they have discovered the remains of the Quedagh Merchant off a tiny island in the Dominican Republic.

The documentary noted he removed the treasure from the ship and then burned the vessel. He must have been carrying that treasure on his way to Boston as he sailed past New Jersey, a place he knew well.

Kidd is believed to have made stops along our state’s coast on that journey. He sent landing parties to New York with bribe money for public officials and hid some of his treasure on Gardiner’s Island, off Long Island, before sailing on to Boston, where he was arrested, sent back to England and hanged.

Kidd claimed he had hidden 40,000 British pounds somewhere, but others said it was more like 400,000. Only 10,000 pounds was recovered from the Gardiner’s Island location.

Read more...

By Kimberly Cutter

When diver Jacques Cousteau died, he left behind a legacy of ocean exploration. But as his grandsons Fabien and Philippe look to seize his nautical throne, another tragic, troubled legacy has resurfaced.

Is there enough ocean for all the Cousteaus to share, asks Kimberly Cutter

Not long ago, it must have seemed to Fabien Cousteau that the end of his troubles was in sight. After decades of struggling in the shadow of his ocean-exploring father, Jean-Michel Cousteau, and his iconic grandfather, Jacques Cousteau, Fabien was coming into his own. 

He had completed his first self-produced film, a controversial shark documentary, Mind of a Demon; he had a starring role in his father's hit series, Jean-Michel Cousteau's Ocean Adventures; he had a deal with a cable network to create his own series.

Most important, the legal battles that had plagued the Cousteaus for the past decade seemed to be coming to an end.

Read more...

From the New Zealand Herald

The two-seat Taiwanese fighter jet disappeared last week during a routine training mission over the Taiwan Strait.

Debris and body parts were found the next day, but authorities are at a loss to explain what happened.

The Oct. 20 crash revived decades-old speculation: Are Taiwan's Penghu islands the Bermuda Triangle of Asia?

"The Bermuda terror," boomed a headline in the United Evening News, a Taiwanese newspaper. "Three hundred dead or missing in 40 years over here."

Cable news stations aired grisly images of earlier plane crashes in the area, sparking debate in internet chat rooms.

The reports prompted Penghu officials to issue a statement disputing the Bermuda Triangle comparison, which they fear might scare away investors in a casino resort and other projects.

Most experts dismiss the idea and speculation that an irregular magnetic field disrupts navigation instruments. Scientists have found nothing abnormal in the area, says geologist Chen Wen-shan at National Taiwan University.