6 Uncharted Shipwrecks Discovered in Caribbean

Our Amazing Planet: 6 Uncharted Shipwrecks Discovered in Caribbean By

OurAmazingPlanet Staff

A mission to the Caribbean to map the seafloor uncovered more than just rare corals — a crew of robots and researchers also discovered six shipwrecks.

Little is known about the shipwrecks' history, and experts are currently reviewing their underwater footage to learn more.

The three-week mission deployed robotic subs and seafloor imagers to examine coral reefs and explore areas where fish spawn so that scientists can create detailed maps of the bottom of the sea and learn more about the ecosystem and how to protect it. Themission ended last month and the collected data have revealed plenty of interesting seafloor habitats and fish, but it is the collection of shipwrecks that has everyone buzzing.

"What we saw was truly exciting. Finding one shipwreck would have been great, but locating six was a total surprise," said study team leader Tim Battista, an oceanographer with the Center for Coastal Monitoring. "The wrecks seemed to serve as a refuge for fish and other marine life. In several instances we saw schools of fish, sharks and turtles."

Scientists logged nearly 400 hours at sea, mapping over 56 square miles (145 square kilometers) of seafloor off the southern coasts of the U.S. Virgin Islands of St. John and St. Thomas and off eastern Puerto Rico.

The mission found derelict fishing traps and spotted more than 30 invasive lionfish. Increasingly rare colonies of staghorn coral (Acropora cervicornis) were also observed. Staghorn coral once were one of the most abundant coral species in the Caribbean but are now listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

The researchers plan to continue analyzing the data in the coming months and create seamless images of the seafloor.