Hardcore fishing team makes quite a discovery

Hardcore fishing team makes quite a discovery
Bradenton, Florida-- Have you ever been curious as to what lies below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico?

When moving from spot to spot, how many secrets could possibly be passed below, resting at the bottom of the Gulf floor?

I wonder this every time I run west from Bean Point or Longboat Pass, with the GPS set on one of my go-to spots I’ve fished countless times. I know what those spots hold -- but there is a seemingly infinite amount of secrets that have yet to be discovered.


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Now, most of the time I find myself fishing inside 30 miles. There are few secrets, and nearly every wreck, reef and large piece of structure will have boats on it when the weather allows. Finding a new fishing spot that no one knows about seems harder than finding a needle in a haystack.

So what happens when you go, say, 120 miles or more into the Gulf of Mexico, where fishing boats rarely venture. For anglers Justin Hey, Danny Pool, Brian Beukema and Jay Travis, who comprise the hardcore fishing team Seaveeche, a needle in a haystack was found resting in 412 feet of water -- but the anglers were unaware of the extent of their discovery.

“We found a spot while trolling a few years ago,” Hey said. “We had two numbers in the general area that we fished. On one trip we were trolling when our depth finder alarmed us of something very large on the bottom. We knew it was a wreck of some type. We had fished it three or four times, catching amberjack to 90 pounds, Warsaw and gag grouper, and large red snapper.”

Keeping such a discovery a secret is hard to do, especially with undiscovered shipwrecks still haunting the Gulf of Mexico. So, when curiosity built within the anglers about the possibilities of their discovery, they made contact with Michael C. Barnette, an accomplished diver, author and photographer. Barnette has helped in identifying more than 30 unknown shipwrecks in the past 20 years.

“I was contacted by these hardcore anglers, curious about deepwater shipwrecks in the Gulf of Mexico off Southwest Florida,” Barnette said. “Brian gave me a rough position of their site to see if I had any shipwreck coordinates in the area in the off-chance the site might already be identified. ... Eventually, it was clear to me that their site was different and undocumented.”

With their curiosity climaxing, the anglers planned a trip with Barnette, dive partner Joe Citelli and support diver Michael Muscato to make the extreme plunge 400 feet down into the Gulf of Mexico. With every safety precaution taken, they left on a Friday night in September to calm seas. The crew arrived after running all night to see the mystery below light up their Furuno 585 depth finder on Saturday morning.

The divers made their way along the anchor line, passing huge schools of amberjack that the anglers knew would be present.

At 400 feet, there was no room for error. The divers had about 20 minutes of bottom time to take it all in, while also trying to comprehend what they had discovered. Equipped with a scooter and camera, Barnette worked his way around the wreck, documenting as much as he could. After a lengthy decompression, the divers surfaced and the journey was reset back for home.

“We discussed the wreck but ultimately could not answer the one inevitable question: What was the identity of the shipwreck?” Barnette recalled. “That would have to wait until I could get home to compare my notes and photographs from the dive with information archived in my shipwreck files.”

The discovery was compared with numerous reports, before Barnette pieced it all together.

“That mystery wreck is the 346-foot, 42-foot wide Whaleback steamer The City of Everette, built in 1894. This wreck is loaded with significant historical value. Originally built in Everett, Wash., by Pacific Steel, this was the first and last vessel built by them, as well as the only West Coast Whaleback vessel ever built.

“It was the first U.S. Steamship to pass through the Suez Canal, as well as the first to circumnavigate the globe. The ship was sunk during a storm on Oct. 12, 1923, while on a trip from Cuba to New Orleans. All 26 crewmen were lost after the radio operator relayed an S.O.S. and report the ship was going down stern first.”

So, the mystery has been solved for the curious anglers and divers, but they aren’t quite done with it yet.

“We are going to go back and see if we can recover any additional items on the wreck. On the first visit many pieces of antique china and portholes could be seen laying in the sand,” Hey said.

And in case you’re wondering, its location is still a secret known only to these select few.

If you’re interested in reading more in depth about Barnette’s dive on The City of Everette and the history of the wreck, check out the most recent Wreck Diving Magazine, available on most major newsstands with the cover story titled “A Whale of a Tale.”

Capt. Jon Chapman, who writes about Outdoors for the Herald, can be reached through his website at www.captainchappy.com.