Ocean One: June 1943

Jacques Cousteau's book, The Silent World, (first published in 1953) opens with this paragraph:

One morning in June, 1943, I went to the railway station at Bandol on the French Riviera and received a wooden case expressed from Paris. In it was a new and promising device, the result of years of struggle and dreams, an automatic compressed-air diving lung conceived by Emile Gagnan and myself.

I rushed it to Villa Barry where mu diving comrades, Philippe Tailliez and Frederic Dumas waited. No children ever opened a Christmas present with more excitement than ours when we unpacked the first "aqualung." If it worked, diving could be revoluionized.

First, some political histoyr. In June, 1943, what was the state of France?

Vichy France, Vichy Regime, Vichy Government, or simply Vichy are common terms used to describe the government of France which collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944, during the Second World War. It officially called itself the French State (État Français) and was headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain, who proclaimed the government following the military defeat of France by Germany.

The Vichy regime maintained some legal authority in the northern zone of France (the Zone occupée), which was occupied by the German Wehrmacht, but was most powerful in the unoccupied southern "free zone", where its administrative centre of Vichy was located. In November 1942 the southern zone was also occupied and fully subjected to German rule.

Pétain collaborated with the German occupying forces in exchange for an agreement to not divide France between the Axis Powers. Vichy authorities aided in the rounding-up of Jews and other "undesirables", and at times, Vichy French military forces actively opposed the Allies. Much of the French public initially supported the new government despite its pro-Nazi policies, seeing it as necessary to maintain a degree of French autonomy and territorial integrity.

The legitimacy of Vichy France and Pétain's leadership was constantly challenged by the exiled General Charles de Gaulle, who claimed to represent the legitimacy and continuity of the French government. Public opinion turned against the Vichy regime and the occupying German forces over time, and resistance to them grew within France. Following the Allied invasion of France in June 1944, de Gaulle proclaimed the Provisional Government of the French Republic (GPRF).

Most of the Vichy regime's leaders were later put on trial by the GPRF, and a number of them were executed. Pétain was sentenced to death for treason, but his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.

The Free French, led by De Gaulle, were based in North Africa.

What about the French Riviera in 1943?

The Côte d'Azur (Azure (blue)Coast), often known in English as the French Riviera , is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France, also including the sovereign state of Monaco. There is no official boundary, but it is usually considered to extend from the Italian border in the east to Saint Tropez, Hyères or Cassis in the west.

The French Riviera coastline covers 560 miles and consists of both sand and shingle beaches.

[WIkipedia doesn't say anything specifically about how the average French person lived, on the French Riviera, during this time, but does mention:
The Second World War

When Germany invaded France in June 1940, the remaining British colony was evacuated to Gibraltar and eventually to Britain. American Jewish groups helped some of the Jewish artists living in the south of France, such as Marc Chagall, to escape to the United States. In August 1942, 600 Jews from Nice were rounded up by French police and sent to Drancy, and eventually to death camps. In all about 5,000 French Jews from Nice perished during the war.

On August 15, 1944, American parachute troops landed near Fréjus, and a fleet landed 60,000 troops of the American Seventh Army and French First Army between Cavalaire and Agay, east of Saint-Raphaël. German resistance crumbled in days.

Saint-Tropez was badly damaged by German mines at the time of the liberation. The novelist Colette organized an effort to assure the town was rebuilt in its original style.

When the war ended, artists Marc Chagall and Pablo Picasso returned to live and work.

Cousteau, a Navy man, was out of work after the Armistice of 1940, and did not join the Free French. However, as evidenced in the Wikipedia article below, he did do work for his country against the Nazis:

After the armistice of 1940, the family of Simone and Jacques-Yves Cousteau took refuge in Megève, where he became a friend of the Ichac family who also lived there. Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Marcel Ichac shared the same desire to reveal to the general public unknown and inaccessible places — for Cousteau the underwater world and for Ichac the high mountains. The two neighbors took the first ex-aequo prize of the Congress of Documentary Film in 1943, for the first French underwater film: Par dix-huit mètres de fond (18 meters deep), made without breathing apparatus the previous year in the Embiez islands (Var) with Philippe Tailliez and Frédéric Dumas, using a depth-pressure-proof camera case developed by mechanical engineer Léon Vèche (engineer of Arts and Métiers and the Naval College).

In 1943, they made the film Épaves (Shipwrecks), in which they used two of the very first Aqua-Lung prototypes. These prototypes were made in Boulogne-Billancourt by the Air Liquide company, following instructions from Cousteau and Émile Gagnan. When making Épaves, Cousteau could not find the necessary blank reels of movie film, but had to buy hundreds of small still camera film reels the same width, intended for a make of child's camera, and cemented them together to make long reels.

Having kept bonds with the English speakers (he spent part of his childhood in the United States and usually spoke English) and with French soldiers in North Africa (under Admiral Lemonnier), Jacques-Yves Cousteau (whose villa "Baobab" at Sanary (Var) was opposite Admiral Darlan's villa "Reine"), helped the French Navy to join again with the Allies; he assembled a commando operation against the Italian espionage services in France, and received several military decorations for his deeds. At that time, he kept his distance from his brother Pierre-Antoine Cousteau, a "pen anti-semite" who wrote the collaborationist newspaper Je suis partout (I am everywhere)

Begin a notebook for Ocean One, if you have not already done so. It should be a loose-leaf notebook, so that you can take out and insert pages as needed.

Write each name below on its own sheet of paper. Keep track of their activities in chronological fashion as we go through This Silent World.

* Jacques Cousteau
* Simone Cousteau
* Emile Gagnan
* Philippe Tailliez
* Frederic Dumas

UW's Tony Irving is the go-to man in the red-hot world of meteorites

From the Seattle Times: UW's Tony Irving is the go-to man in the red-hot world of meteorites
A chance meeting between a pair of treasure-hunting brothers and a geology professor affiliated with University of Washington has led to the discovery of some the most extraordinary and valuable meteorites in history.

Long before he met the wealthy brothers, before he traveled to Morocco and received extraterrestrial nuggets in FedEx packages, Tony Irving got to touch the moon.

The Australian-born geochemist affiliated with the University of Washington spent his early career working with lunar fragments from the Apollo missions. Then, life being what it is, he returned to studying earthly matters — rocks that rise from the planet's mantle during volcanic eruptions. But a chance meeting brought him full-circle.

In the late 1990s, two adventurous computer entrepreneurs with a passion for metal-detecting and gold-panning brought Irving a strange rock. They thought they'd stumbled upon material from space.

They hadn't, but Irving and brothers Adam and Greg Hupé, of Everett, hit it off. The trio grew into an unorthodox team, becoming central players in a thriving international subculture — an obscure band of treasure hunters who scour the planet collecting, buying, selling and studying meteorites.

In this Byzantine world, geology is king. The brothers travel and barter to obtain uber-valuable celestial rocks. They mail pieces of the cosmos to Irving, who is now a leading expert at distinguishing real meteorites from their mundane terrestrial cousins, what he calls "meteor-wrongs."

"None of us realized what a bonanza it would be," Irving said.

It's a marriage that has given Irving a rare glimpse of far-flung corners of the universe, especially Mars.

"He's probably looked at more Martian meteorites than anyone in the world," said Irving's colleague, UW astronomer Don Brownlee, lead investigator for NASA's recent $212 million mission to study comet dust.

Lately such skills have been in high demand.

The market for meteorites exploded in the past dozen years, leading to ever more amazing discoveries — and some shenanigans. In January, a meteorite trader returned a 4.6 billion-year-old asteroid fragment he purchased from a thief who'd stolen it from a New Mexico museum. A dealer in Colorado was recently arrested, accused of selling lunar fakes.

But the number of documented meteorites from Mars also has doubled in less than a decade. This year, Irving helped confirm a fireball that streaked across the North African sky last July was a Mars meteorite. He did so by analyzing pieces of the rock gathered and sold by nomads in Morocco.

The find is only the 61st documented meteorite from the red planet, the first witnessed Martian meteorite to fall in 50 years, and the fifth such fall ever recorded. "Tissint," named for a village near where it landed, enthralled geologists around the world.

"This is actually the most exciting meteorite that I've come across so far in my career," the curator of London's Museum of Natural History told the BBC after examining a fist-size chunk. "Possibly it will be the most exciting meteorite that I will ever come across."

But for Irving and the Hupés, Tissint is one of many extraordinary finds.

Bonding over treasures

In fact, the brothers and Irving meeting each other may be their top discovery.

Adam and Greg, now both in their late 40s, ran a company called Computer Performance, but had bonded over their love of treasure hunting. They'd received a metal detector as a gift from their father in 1976. Over time it got so easy to find lost jewelry that they started panning for gold instead.

After stumbling on their weird fragment while prospecting — it turned out to be chromite — they talked to Irving about meteorites.

"I was just fascinated," said Adam Hupé, who now lives in Nevada. "This was a form of treasure-hunting, but a lot more rewarding than just going after gold. We could hunt for something with scientific value."

Tens of thousands of meteorites have been found on Earth. Most are fragments of asteroids, but a few are the result of "ejection by impact" — when an asteroid hits a moon or a planet hard enough to blast rocky specimens into space. The atmospheric gases trapped in rocks from the moon or Mars are unique and can be compared with gas samples gathered by NASA.

By the late 1990s, rising wealth and the Internet made it easier for people around the world to buy and sell obscure merchandise, including meteorites. While governments in Antarctica scoured the white snow for celestial rocks, a booming private market developed for rocks discovered in North Africa, where gray-black fragments stood out against hot-orange sand.

After decades of working 14-hour days, the Hupés sold their business and used their proceeds to buy meteorites online. Eventually, they financially backed meteorite-hunting trips. Irving evaluated their finds.

"We've got many different objects in the solar system, and there are only two ways to find them," Irving said. "Either you go there, or they come here. Luckily, with meteorites, you've got a delivery service."

For Irving, who had worked decades earlier with moon rocks at the University of Chicago and NASA's Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, the brothers' enthusiasm was infectious. The brothers liked the hunt — the thrill of collecting something unique with scientific value. Irving liked applying forensic expertise to understanding exotic pieces.

"I'm not saying it's not cool to hold in your hand a piece of something that is from Mars — it is," Irving said. "But ... I don't collect things, I document them. But I can't document them without someone else collecting them."

The Hupés introduced Irving to more collectors, but it didn't hurt that the Hupés also were very good at collecting.

"Planetary pieces"

"As a team, I'd say we've put together more planetary pieces than anybody else on Earth," Adam Hupé said.

Greg, the more adventurous of the two, splits his time between meteorites, diving in Florida rivers for fossils or hunting gold doubloons from Spanish shipwrecks. The brothers, especially Greg, began making dozens of trips to Morocco, primarily to buy meteorites from nomads and villagers. Some of the fragments were worth thousands of dollars a gram.

"I'd receive samples from Moroccan partners and make a judgment call," Greg Hupé said from Florida, where he now lives. "That graduated, in time, to sending the samples directly to the UW and paying for them to analyze them for us. Over the years we got to know exactly what to look for."

In late 2000, an expedition they helped finance purchased a large lunar chunk, known as NWA 482. Irving believes the rock is at least 4.4 billion years old.

"It was one of the crown jewels," Greg Hupé said. "It was just like, 'Wow.' "

A few years later, the brothers tracked down a Mars meteorite and, in 2007, pulled out their ultimate treasure — NWA 5000, a 26-pound lunar piece so precious Adam Hupé constantly moves it around to keep it safe.

"It appraised at $14.5 million," Adam Hupé said, adding that he's not in it for the money. He'd like to keep the rock intact and someday sell it to a museum.

"Hundreds of years from now, I don't want to be remembered as the jerk who cut the thing up into a million pieces for money," he said.

Figuring out what to do with that piece has put Adam's adventures on hold, but just last week Greg announced the discovery of another new meteorite type.

Meanwhile, Irving this week is scheduled to give a talk in Houston about Tissint. But he's also hoping to confirm soon that existence of two more meteorites from Mars.

Relic hunter Ric Savage finds his Navy Pier souvenir

From Chicago Sun-Time: Relic hunter Ric Savage finds his Navy Pier souvenir

Ric Savage is strolling by the Navy Pier Ferris wheel on a historically warm spring day.

The modern-day relic hunter is dressed in black with beige alligator-skin boots. He does not look like a Ferris wheel type. Savage is 6-foot-5 and 410 pounds.

He carries the sophisticated White’s MXT Pro Metal Detector, a four-foot device that looks as if it came off an airport walk-through.

Savage stops at a patch of brown grass not far from the 150-feet tall Ferris wheel. He puts on a pair of headphones. Savage begins moving around the detector. He hears a sound that resembles a dentist’s drill.

“I’ve got a hit right here!” he shouts. Passersby stare at him. Savage swings the detector in a circular motion over a clump of dirt. Tucked inside the dirt is a penny.

In a perfect world it would be a
1916 penny, from the year Navy Pier was built.

Savage holds the dusty penny up against a clear blue sky and says, “It’s from 2010.”

No matter.

It is the thrill of the chase for the host of Spike TV’s “American Digger,” which premieres at 9 p.m. Wednesday. The 13-episode series travels to a different city each week searching for high-value relics in Detroit, Brooklyn and Chicago (where a gangster-era segment will be aired later in the season).

“The ground never stops collecting,” Savage says. “I might find something from 1820, 1920 and 2012 all in the same spot.”

The 42-year-old Savage has redefined the art of American digging. It is no longer just some old dude in black socks and sandals wandering Miami Beach with a metal detector.

Savage brings mettle into this field.

He is best known as pro wrestler “Heavy Metal” Ric Savage, who worked the World Championship Wrestling circuit, among others. After retiring in 1997, Savage began his career as a relic hunter.

He zeroed in on the Civil War, a passion he had since the age of 9 when he read The Life of Gen. Robert E. Lee. He discovered he had six ancestors who fought in the Civil War. His great-great-great grandfather John Parker fought in the North Carolina unit for the Confederacy and was captured. He is buried at Camp Douglas in Chicago.

Savage’s first major find was a hunk of shrapnel he unearthed at the site of the Battle of Cold Harbor, Va. He later established American Savage, now the top artifact recovery company in the country. It digs as much as a half a million dollars’ worth of historical artifacts out of American soil yearly. The company is based in Mechanicsville, Va., where Savage lives.

“I started this as a hobby, as a way I could get onto properties I wouldn’t get on being your normal guy with a metal detector,” Savage says. “It morphed into this. With the TV show, I’m getting to dig in places I never would have dreamed of before. Like Tombstone, Ariz. I love Wyatt Earp. We found pistols, rifles, handcuffs from the 1880s.”

Relic hunter sounds like a noble way of saying beach scavenger.

“Anywhere anything ever happened, there is going to be something in the ground,” Savage explains. “Relic hunting depends on the hunter and what they are interested in and looking for. I look for historical artifacts. Modern coins, jewelry — that’s more scavenging. I like touching history.”

But critics don’t like Savage touching history. The Society of American Archaeology has criticized relic hunters for promoting illegal looting.

“The archeologists don’t like us because they don’t like anybody else digging,” he admits. “They feel like we loot history. The metal detectorists hate us because we put a spotlight on the hobby, and they’re afraid if they go to a property, [the owner] will want to get paid before they go digging. We’re the stepchild all the way around. But I’m not trying to please archeologists or other metal detectorists, I’m trying to take somebody who may not have any interest in history whatsover and make them find a way to get into it.”

During his wrestling career, Savage did promotional spots with Blackfoot guitarist Rickey Medlocke, now with Lynyrd Skynyrd. Does he know any musical relic hunters?

“Hank Williams Jr.,” he answers. “He is a huge metal detectorist. A friend of mine took Hank out to dig on Faith Hill and Tim McGraw’s property in Tennesse.”

There’s a country song underneath all that.

Around his neck, Savage wears a copper medallion that denotes a week’s pay for an employee of an East India company ship that sank in 1809.

He is excited to be carting his metal detector around Navy Pier. “I bet there was old stuff around here,” Savage says. “I was told there were World War I and World War II training camps here. There were a lot of artifacts, but they’ve all been covered over or moved out. If you could lift up the stones, you could probably find personal items from soldiers; buttons, buckles, pocket knives, coins.

Wrestling requires an eye for nuance. Does that come into play in Savage’s new magnetic field? “When I’m digging a battlefield I look at the layout of the land from the way the soldier would have looked at it,” he answers. “The Civil War soldiers looked for higher ground. When you’re detecting and see hills, that’s a good spot to go because you know they would have camped there. During a battle the hills got a lot of artillery shots, so you can find cannonballs that were dodged and shot in the ground. The last thing I like to do is swing a metal detector in a briar patch or brush.” Of course.

No mountain is high enough on the landscape of American digging.

Treasure Hunter Arthur McKee, Jr. pt 1

The book, Sunken Treasures, Six Who Found Fortunes, is fun reading. Unfortunately the author does not share too many dates, so I'm not sure when Art McKee Jr. first began diving - using a hard hat to do so.

Here's how the installment on McKee opens.

Staring through the faceplate of his 72-pound Miller-Dunn diving helmet, Art McKee saw the Bahamian seascape around him suddenly dissolve in a white haze. But the loss of visibility never even slowed his shuffling gate across the soft sand bottom. He would have been where he was, doing what he was doing, if he had to do it all by feel alone. Instinctively, Art knew how to solve his poor visibility instantly. Since the water came up chin high in his hardhat, all he did was take a mouthful and spit it on the misted faceplate. Instant visibility.

Art is walking along a dead coral reef - near Gorda Cay in the Bahamas. There were lobsters there - fishermen poured bleach down the holes in the reef to chase out the lobsters. Of course it also killed the reef.

In 1996, Disney purchased the island of Gorda Cay from the Bahamian government, and turned it into a theme park.
Castaway Cay - from Wikipedia
'Castaway Cay' is a private island in the Bahamas which serves as an exclusive port for the Disney Cruise Line ships Disney Wonder, Disney Magic, Disney Dream, and Disney Fantasy. It is located near Great Abaco Island, and was formerly known as Gorda Cay. It is owned in full by The Walt Disney Company, giving them substantial control over the experience of visitors to the island. A post office on the island has special Bahamian postage specific to Disney Cruise Line, and a "Castaway Cay" postmark.

History and Development
Gorda Cay was once used as a stop for drug runners. There is an airstrip on the island, but it is no longer in regular use nor maintained. Gorda Cay has also been used for filming; the beach where Tom Hanks first encounters Daryl Hannah in Splash is on the island.

Disney is said to have spent US$25 million to develop and outfit the island. Construction took 18 months and included dredging 50,000 truckloads of sand from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean. The pier and its approaches were constructed to allow the Disney ships to dock alongside, thus removing the need for tenders to get the passengers ashore. To create the mooring site for the ships, workers dredged sand and used explosives to blast coral, and form a 1,700-foot (520 m) channel about 35 feet (11 m) deep and ranging from 200 to 400 feet (120 m) wide. The island is still largely undeveloped: only 55 of the 1,000 acres (4.0 km2) are being used.

Facilities
Disney Magic docked next to the Castaway Cay Family Beach

The island is developed in the theme of a castaway community, with buildings made to look as if they had been improvised after a shipwreck. The facilities are maintained like any other Disney theme park, and the shops accept guests' stateroom keys for payment. The food service is operated as an extension of the cruise package. A variety of activities are available to guests including bicycle hire, personal watercraft rental, snorkeling, and parasailing. There are three beaches for guests: one for families, one for teens, and another exclusively for adults, called Serenity Bay.

Two submarine-ride vehicles from the now-closed 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: Submarine Voyage ride at Walt Disney World lie underwater in the snorkeling area. The Flying Dutchman pirate ship, from the Pirates of the Caribbean film series, was on display in the lagoon. As of the final week in November 2010, the Flying Dutchman had been removed and taken to another location on the island where it was being dismantled as pictures show below.

The seven-night cruises visit Castaway Cay on Fridays, four-night cruises visit on Tuesdays, and three-night cruises visit on Saturdays.

Castaway Cay has facilities for the exclusive use of the ships' crews, including beaches and recreational areas. A staff of 70 custodians, boat captains, drivers, landscapers, and maintenance personnel live on the island, and are supplemented by crew from the ship when one is in port. Food and other supplies are brought in by the ships themselves. Sea water is desalinated for drinking with reverse osmosis water processors.

_________________
Bibliography:
Sunken Treasure: Six Who Found Fortunes
Robert F. Burgess, Dodd, mead & Co, 1988

Gadhafi’s Son Built a Ship With Deadly Shark Tank Inside

From Wired.com: Gadhafi’s Son Built a Ship With Deadly Shark Tank Inside
Hannibal Gadhafi—son of the assassinated Libyan dictator—built a ship with a 120-ton sea water aquarium inside. Why? To put six sharks inside, including two bull sharks and two whites, the most dangerous in the world.

Like a Bond villain’s mobile headquarters, Gadhafi son’s ship was going to be the epitome of bad taste. Called the Phoenician, the ship is able to hold 3,500 passengers. Full of golden everything, giant statues and marble columns, the ship’s center piece is a 120-ton sea water tank that was going to hold the sharks, which also included to black tip sharks. Along with tiger sharks and hammerheads, the bulls and the whites are extremely dangerous for humans.

The ship has now been bought by MSC Cruises. Pier Francesco Vago—the cruise company’s CEO—says that he doesn’t know why he wanted the sharks, but the sea water tank is ready for use. Gadhafi’s son had already contracted a group of marine biologists who were going to take care of the sharks while they roamed in their glass house.

I like to imagine that there was a hidden trap on top of the tank, to drop misbehaving passengers in it.

The 39-year-old Hannibal Gadhafi is a violent thug, known for beating his model wife and paying Beyonce an estimated $2 million for a private performance in 2010. He’s now living exiled in Argelia. I wonder if the crazy nutter mumbles things like You vont scape this trapp, Mr Biond! when he’s at home.

Musqueam band thwarts Vancouver ground-breaking

Not a story of discovery - but a story of potential prevention of discovery - if the condos go up, who knows what history will be lost?

From Vancouver Sun: Musqueam band thwarts Vancouver ground-breaking
Protesters from the Musqueam Indian Band stopped construction workers from starting excavation of land they say is home to their ancient burial ground.

Workers and property owner Gary Hackett were turned away when they showed up at 1338 Southwest Marine Dr. at 7:30 a.m. Monday. The land between the Metro Theatre and The Motel nightclub is being developed for a large condominium project.

While high winds blew out the power to stores and traffic lights in south Vancouver, about 40 protesters held up signs and beat drums, while many drivers honked their horns in support. Musqueam spokesperson Aaron Wilson said the protest was necessary after talks with the developer broke down. Protesters vowed to stay until the development plan by Magnum Projects for “HQ concrete homes” is stopped.

To help find a solution to the dispute, the B.C. government has scheduled meetings this week with the band, the city and the developer.

“Our chief has been working directly with Mayor Gregor Robertson and city manager Penny Ballem,” Musqueam band manager Ken McGregor told the Courier. “They have been very sympathetic, but getting agreement with three levels of government is complex and doesn’t move as quickly as some developers might like. Everybody is in a bit of a legal box.”

In 2006, Hackett received a heritage permit to start the B.C. government’s archaeological impact assessment on the property to prepare for development of six lots. In December 2008 the province sent the draft management plan to the Musqueam Band for comment but did not receive any response from the Musqueam until the current permit application was referred to it, said Brennan Clarke, spokesperson for the B.C. Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations.

Then in December 2011, the province issued two permits to Lan-Pro Holdings (the developer) and Stantec (the archaeology consultant) to allow for development of the lots. “The Archaeology Branch is satisfied that the proposed site management plan balances the condition of the site (heavily disturbed) with the interests of the private land owner,” Clarke wrote in a ministry email to media.

The Musqueam dispute the province’s claim. “Work was stopped in the area near where the intact remains were discovered,” Clarke added in the email. “The remains have not been removed. The site where the remains were found will not be disturbed until an archaeologist has completed intensive testing the vicinity to determine if there are additional remains in the area.”

McGregor said the city told the band that once the provincial archeology permit is issued, the city doesn’t have the legal right to stand in the way of development. “Everybody seems to want to do the right thing but they say no one has the legal authority to do anything.”

Unlike the land under the Fraser Arms Hotel, the Musqueam band does not officially own the land at 1338 Southwest Marine Dr., but still claims title to it. McGregor added that the protest is not being organized from the band office, although it endorses its members’ efforts. “Most people wouldn’t want their gravesites desecrated outside their churches. This site is older than the Egyptian pyramids,” he said.

The developers and city staff could not be reached for comment by deadline.

Weapons Of The ‘Warwick’ Wreck

Pop quiz - where is Bermuda?

From BerNews: Weapons Of The ‘Warwick’ Wreck

On October 20, 1619, en route to Jamestown, Virginia, the magazine ship “Warwick” belonging to Earl of Warwick Robert Rich [1587–1658] — reportedly used to fight off the Spanish Armada in 1588 — made a scheduled stop in Bermuda.

After completing the first stretch of the voyage it had to re-provision, discharge some of the cargo and passengers, and load valuable products bound for England. “Warwick’s” arrival here was as an important event for the island. On that voyage, the ship was charged with delivering Captain Nathaniel Butler, the new Governor of the permanent Bermuda colony founded in 1612.

“Apart from delivering Butler, ‘Warwick’ was to carry supplies and settlers to the struggling colony at Jamestown and collect colonial products, mostly tobacco, from Bermuda and Virginia for return to England,” said marine archaeologists Piotr Bojakowski and Katie Custer.

“At the end of November, as ‘Warwick’ was preparing to depart for America, where the Jamestown settlers were no doubt eagerly awaiting the arrival of the ship and the supplies it carried, a hurricane struck. Although the crew had prepared the ‘Warwick’ as the storm approached, all the moorings suddenly gave way and the ferocious wind drove the ship right into the rocky cliffs of Castle Harbour.

“Due to a combination of a powerful north-westerly, shallow reefs, and the sharp limestone rocks surrounding Castle Harbour nothing could be done to save it. ‘Warwick’s’ hull, although sturdy, was no match against the elements; thus, its fate was sealed.”

Since 2008 archaeologists from Bermuda, the National Museum of Bermuda, Texas A&M University, the University of Southampton, and the Vasa Museum have dedicated their time, resources and expertise to excavating “Warwick’s” wreck.

And now Doug Inglis, assistant director of the “Warwick” Shipwreck Excavation, has concluded Robert Rich may have had more than merchant work in mind when he dispatched the ship to the New World.

Based on the team’s discovery of an impressive arsenal of weapons aboard the wreck, Mr. Inglis has concluded “the little vessel may have been armed for more than self defense.”

Writing on his blog Diving Archeology recently, Mr. Inglis said:” Sir Robert, the Earl of Warwick, was a major shareholder in the Bermuda Company. Although his stake in the joint-stock company was intended to be an important source of income, Sir Robert involved himself in privateering — legal piracy — on the side.

” … excavation of the shipwreck is revealing a number of exciting clues about the nature of the vessel. I have been part of an international team that has be working on the wreck since 2008.

“One thing that impressed us about the 2011 field season was the variety of ordinance we found aboard the ship. In addition to cannon balls, we found spiked shot, as well as bar shot and expanding bar shot — both designed to de-mast and disable other vessels. Was this offensive armament standard for merchantmen at the time, or was ‘Warwick’ prepared for more than just evasion?”

Before venturing into underwater archaeology, Mr. Inglis specialised in high-altitude archaeology — working in Rocky Mountain National Park and alpine regions of Colorado and Wyoming.

Aside from his work on the “Warwick” project, Mr. Inglis is an archaeological illustrator at Texas A&M’s New World lab. He is completing a Master’s thesis in Nautical Archaeology.

At the end of May he will be returning to Bermuda to join other archaeologists from the island and around the world to take part in the final season of the “Warwick” excavation.

Lost mural by Leonardo may have been discovered

From YahooNews: Lost mural by Leonardo may have been discovered
FLORENCE, Italy (AP) — Researchers may have discovered traces of a lost mural by Leonardo da Vinci by poking a probe through cracks in a 16th-century fresco painted on the wall of one of Florence's most famous buildings.

The latest findings Monday still leave much mystery in the hunt for the "Battle of Anghiari," a wall mural painted by Leonardo in Florence's storied Palazzo Vecchio, and possibly hidden behind a fresco done by Giorgio Vasari decades later.

The hunt for the unfinished mural has captivated art historians for centuries, and took on fresh impetus in the last years with the employment of state-of-art scientific tools.

Some believe Leonardo's mural, which he began in 1505 to commemorate the 15th-century victory by Florence over Milan at the medieval Tuscan town of Anghiari, may be hidden behind a newer wall, which was frescoed over decades later by Giorgio Vasari. Leonardo's "Battle of Anghiari" was unfinished when Leonardo left Florence in 1506.

Maurizio Seracini, an Italian engineer from the University of San Diego, told reporters that the fragments of color retrieved by the probe in the palace's Hall of the 1500s are consistent with pigments used by Leonardo. He said an analysis showed that the red, black and beige paint found is consistent with the organic paint Leonardo used on his frescoes.

But the paint could also have been used by Leonardo's contemporaries in Florence, which is awash in Renaissance art. Seracini called the results "encouraging" but preliminary.

To find samples of pigment of the wall behind a space previously discovered under the Vasari, work, experts slipped probes through areas where paint on the outer wall's fresco was either cracked or flaked off, noted Cristina Acidini, the head of Florence's cultural heritage and museums.

For one sample, a probe was slipped into a spot near a downward thrusting sword in Vasari's work. For another sample, the probe went through a point near the head of a horse, with its eye open wide as if startled.

Seracini was inspired by the word's "Cerca, trova," ("seek and you shall find") which were painted on a tiny flag in Vasari's painting depicting a different battle. Those who think Leonardo's work might be hidden behind the later wall painting contend it is unlikely that Vasari, famed for his biographies of Renaissance artists, would have destroyed any masterpiece by Leonardo.

"We have found these very special black pigments, and there are some traces of red," Seracini told reporters. The red is a kind of lacquer "used for oil painting. And this element matches Leonardo's plan to paint his Battle of Anghiari' with an oil technique," Seracini contended.

The hunt for the missing Leonardo mural is being led by the National Geographic Society and the University of California in partnership with the city of Florence. Experts from Florence's world renowned art restoration institute, Opificio delle Pietre Dure, also were involved.

"These data are very encouraging," said Seracini, a National Geographic Fellow. "Although we are still in the preliminary stages of the research, and there is still a lot of work to be done to solve this mystery, the evidence does suggest that we are searching in the right place," said a National Geographic statement quoting Seracini.

Seracini and his colleagues note that some black material found behind Vasari's wall shows a chemical composition similar found in brown glazes in two Leonardo works, "Mona Lisa" and "St. John the Baptist."

Flakes of red material that were found appear to be organic pigments, the researchers said. A study of high-definition endoscopic images "suggests" that a beige material spotted on the original wall was applied by a paint brush, the researchers aid.

Previously, using radar and X-rays, Seracini and his team found a cavity behind Vasari's fresco that they think could indicate a space between two walls.

Florence Mayor Matteo Renzi said one plan aims to remove some parts of the Vasari fresco which were restored in the 19th and 20th centuries, to look behind them. "We are sure that the "Battle of Angiari' is behind" Vasari's work, he said.

Artifacts recoveries on shipwreck just in time to mark anniversary of sinking

From The Bellingham Herald: Artifacts recoveries on shipwreck just in time to mark anniversary of sinking
KURE BEACH, N.C - KURE BEACH, N.C. - There are hundreds of shipwrecks along North Carolina's treacherous coast, and some, like those of the ironclad USS Monitor or the Blackbeard flagship Queen Anne's Revenge, are nothing short of famous.

But that of the hapless Civil War blockade runner Modern Greece, which sits just beyond the surf near Fort Fisher, is in many ways the most important of all.

The wreck, which was excavated 50 years ago, led to the creation of the state underwater archaeology unit that studies the other wrecks. It led to a state law to protect historic wreck sites from pilfering. It yielded such a large trove of artifacts that many have been used in experiments that advanced the tricky science of how to preserve historical treasures found underwater.

As the first of about 30 blockade runners sunk along the coast near Wilmington while trying to bring arms and vital commodities to the Confederate states, it has an iconic status in North Carolina and maritime history.

And this week - just in time for events marking the 150th anniversary of its sinking - thousands of artifacts from the Modern Greece were recovered from underwater.

For the second time.

A team of East Carolina University graduate students and University of North Carolina, Wilmington interns sponsored by the Friends of Fort Fisher waded into the muck of half-century-old storage tanks at the Department of Cultural Resources' Underwater Archaeology Branch facility on the grounds of the historic fort. Their job: pull out the artifacts, clean and catalog them and put them in indoor tanks where they could finally begin to receive modern preservation treatment.

"It was just the right time to do this," said Mark Wilde-Ramsing, deputy state archaeologist and head of Underwater Archaeology Branch. "There are a lot of reasons, but the bottom line is it would be a bit irresponsible to just leave it there. We don't even know what we have there."

In June, the state plans a seminar on the Modern Greece and blockade runners. It also will throw open the labs at Fort Fisher so the public can see the artifacts and what it takes to preserve them.

New signs on the beach and roadside pointing out the wreck site are planned, and a researcher working with the state is seeking a federal grant to perform a full survey of the 30 blockade-runner wrecks off Wilmington, as well as facilities on land to put it all in proper context.

And the archaeologists are planning a modest spring expedition to use the latest gear to examine the Modern Greece site and create a proper record of it.

Broadly, all the activity is aimed at bringing more attention to the local blockade runners, Wilde-Ramsing said. They represent the largest collection of wrecks in the world dating from an unusually interesting period in naval architecture, and they have a central place in Civil War history.

Many are likely to be deteriorating quickly, but the state doesn't have a full picture of their location and condition.

The creation of the state's underwater archaeology and conservation lab - which state officials think may have been the nation's first - began, in a sense, on June 27, 1862.

The Modern Greece, a 210-foot English ship loaded with hundreds of tons of rifles, gunpowder and other goods, was creeping along the coast, making for the Cape Fear River and Wilmington, when it was spotted in the murky light just before dawn by two Union blockade ships.

They gave chase, and the heavily-loaded ship ran aground, apparently while trying to get close enough to Fort Fisher for protection by the Confederate artillery there.

The passengers and crew escaped by lifeboat as both sides shelled the ship to keep the other from getting the valuable cargo.

According to historical accounts, some of the cargo was salvaged and brought ashore, though apparently part of a liquor shipment got no further than the Confederate soldiers on the beach.

Eventually, the sea claimed the rest.

Then, almost precisely 100 years later, in the spring of 1962, Navy divers stumbled on the wreck just off the beach while visiting the area essentially as tourists.

A violent storm had just cleared the thick bed of sand from the remains of the ship. The divers were startled to find much of the remaining cargo exposed, intact and all but begging to be pulled up.

State officials got wind of the find and asked the Navy to allow the divers to recover the cargo on behalf of the state.

By summer, 11 divers were working off a loaned Coast Guard barge anchored over the site. Eventually the divers retrieved 11,500 pieces of cargo and other artifacts from the ship.

The challenge was what to do with the artifacts after they were brought ashore.

The glitzy part of maritime archaeology is the discovery of wrecks or the lifting of flashy artifacts like cannons from the sea.

But there's seldom enough money to cover the cost of storage tanks and buildings and the years of labor in cleaning away corrosion and accumulation of marine life. The years of care it can take to carefully leach the salt out of a cannon doesn't make for the kind of exciting television coverage the cannon gets when it breaks the surface.

After the Modern Greece's cargo was brought up, some was treated and eventually sent to several museums and other places for display. But much was dumped first into temporary tanks on Navy property, then into tanks at Fort Fisher.

The tanks were initially covered by plywood, as there wasn't money for proper lids, said Leslie Bright, who was hired in 1964 as assistant at the lab and later ran it.

The plywood rotted away, and the water in the tanks filled with leaves from surrounding oaks, turning the water a swampy black.

In retrospect, Bright said, the rotting leaves may have been one of the best things that could have happened to the artifacts, as it leached the oxygen out of the water and slowed the deterioration.

Bright, who retired 13 years ago, dropped by this week to watch the students pull out the artifacts.

As he watched, he reminisced about having to learn how to preserve artifacts essentially from scratch, since there were few established techniques and every material has to be handled differently.

"No one was doing that sort of thing," he said. "We were trying anything our minds could come up with."

Also standing quietly nearby watching the students this week was Stan Register. Fifty years ago, he was 13 and working at a hotdog stand on the beach when the Navy divers showed up.

They were staying at a hotel across from the hotdog stand and one day invited him to come out on the barge and watch what they were doing. Register can remember seeing the outline of the wreck and the men working on it. He remembers the four buckets of bullets they let him take a few from, and the small cannon and the banded cases of rifles.

"I had no idea of the historical significance of what they were doing that day, said Register, who is now the chief of police on the Fort Fisher historic site and essentially guards the stuff he saw brought up that day. "I was just a kid then, so it was just more of an adventure than anything else."

Before the students arrived Monday for three days of work, most of the water was pumped out of the tanks, leaving a three-foot layer of mostly rotted leaves and muck to keep the artifacts wet.

It also kept the students wet.

Dave Buttaro, an ECU graduate student in maritime studies who was up to his knees in muck Tuesday handing artifact out to the other students, looked up at Nathan Henry, the assistant state archaeologist who oversees conservation.

"Man, you guys have left this alone so long that we're now engaged in habitat destruction," joked Buttaro.

The work was a kind of treasure hunt, with the students never quit knowing what they would pull up next.

There were British-made Enfield rifles that were a mainstay of the war on both sides, many of them fused together in bundles the shape of the boxes that had held them.

There was tableware. There were wicked-looking antler- and ebony-handled Bowie knives, some still in the remnants of scabbards. There were bayonets, cinderblock-sized stacks of tin sheets, ax heads and chisels.

The students processed the artifacts assembly-line style, hosing them off at a grilled table setup on sawhorses, then taking them to another table covered in white plastic where they were tagged and photographed and logged in a laptop.

Finally, the items were placed in tanks of clean water in a nearby building.

By Tuesday night, nearly everything was out of the last tank, and Henry, who had been down in the morass, decided it was time to call it a day.

"Well," he told the students, "I think you've got enough to keep you busy for awhile."

Maybe even another 50 years.

Taiwan, France sign 2nd undersea archaeological pact

From Focus Taiwan: Taiwan, France sign 2nd undersea archaeological pact

Taipei, March 6 (CNA) Taiwan and France signed Tuesday their second pact since 2007 to continue bilateral cooperation on underwater archaeological research, saying that the cooperation will focus on research, training and site preservation.

Representatives from Taiwan's Council for Cultural Affairs (CCA) and the Department for Underwater and Undersea Archeological Research (DRASSM) under France's Ministry of Culture inked the four-year pact at a ceremony in Taipei.

Wang Shou-lai, an official of the CCA, said the pact will allow Taiwan to benefit from advanced French technology in underwater archeology and learn from its laws protecting underwater resources.

It will also allow Taiwan to send personnel to France to receive training and translate French undersea archeology publications to benefit local studies, he said.

Tsang Cheng-hwa, an archaeologist and researcher at Academia Sinica, said a team of more than 10 researchers is planning to explore the marine environment of Taiwan's Dongsha Atoll in the South China Sea from April through May.

He said historical documents show that at least 40 ships from countries such as Spain, Portugal, Japan and Sweden have sunk in the area and that his team could benefit from French resources in hunting for the wrecks.

"The French department (DRASSM) in Marseille has very advanced technology, underwater vehicles and diving equipment," said Tsang.

"If there is a need in the future, we hope to cooperate with the department in technological terms."

The ceremony also displayed various artifacts recovered from underwater sites around Taiwan since 2006 by Tsang's team and another research team from National Sun Yat-Sen University.

As of the end of 2011, the teams had found two sunken ships from China, one from Britain and five from Japan in the oceans around Taiwan.

They discovered numerous items of Yue ware from the Northern Song Dynasty at one research site, as well as animal fossils dating back 40,000 years at another.

"We hope to help Taiwan better preserve and maintain its underwater cultural heritage, whether sunken ships or airplanes," said Frederic Leroy, deputy director for archeological research at DRASSM.

In addition to preserving underwater sites, Leroy said DRASSM also hopes to help Taiwan in its underwater archeological research and in publishing and exhibiting artifacts it recovers from undersea sites.

DRASSM is a department under the French government that specializes in studying and managing underwater cultural heritage.

Since its establishment in 1966, it has helped identify more than 1,500 undersea archaeological sites in France and abroad.

Malta: Underwater exploration courses at UoM open to public

From Di-Ive.com: Underwater exploration courses at UoM open to public
The Faculty of Engineering at the University of Malta will be offering a series of public lectures on technologies for underwater exploration.

The Department of Systems and Control Engineering is organizing a series of three public talks on technologies for underwater exploration by guest speakers from California Polytechnic State University, The Aurora Trust and the Department of Classics & Archaeology.

March 13 at 16.00h: The first talk, by Dr. Zoe Wood from California Polytechnic State University, is entitled “Visualization of underwater data.” It will be held in Room MP101 in the Maths and Physics Building.

March 20 at 16.00h: The second talk, by Dr. Timmy Gambin from The Aurora Trust and the Department of Classics & Archaeology - University of Malta, is entitled “Remote Sensing at Sea: An end user’s tale.” It will be held in Room MP101 in the Maths and Physics Building.

March 23 at 16.00h: The third talk, by Dr. Christopher Clark from California Polytechnic State University, is entitled “Tracking Sharks with Autonomous Underwater Vehicles.” It will be held in the Engineering Lecture Theatre in the Engineering Building.

All interested persons are cordially invited to attend.

For further information please contact Professor Simon G. Fabri on telephone number 23402079 or by email at simon.fabri@um.edu.mt.

Technologies for underwater exploration

From The Malta Times: Technologies for underwater exploration
The Department of Systems and Control Engineering of the University of Malta is holding a series of three public talks on technologies for underwater exploration by guest speakers from California Polytechnic State University, The Aurora Trust and the Department of Classics and Archaeology.

The first talk, by Dr Zoe Wood from California Polytechnic State University, is entitled ‘Visualisation of underwater data’. This will be held in Room MP101, Maths and Physics Building on 13 March at 4pm.

The second talk, by Dr Timmy Gambin from The Aurora Trust and the Department of Classics and Archaeology – University of Malta, is entitled ‘Remote Sensing at Sea: An end user’s tale’. This will be held in the Maths and Physics Building, Room MP101, on 20 March at 4pm.

The third talk is by Dr Christopher Clark from California Polytechnic State University, and is entitled ‘Tracking Sharks with Autonomous Underwater Vehicles’. It will be held in the Engineering Lecture Theatre, Engineering Building, on 23 March 2012 at 4pm. Everyone is invited to attend.

Underwater Archaeology in Ibiza

From the Ibiza Spotlighe: Underwater Archaeology in Ibiza
Spotlight has featured many stories of archaeological finds and remnants of ancient civilisations which have been unearthed during building projects. The plans for the new Parador in Dalt Vila have been modified to accommodate many remains which have been found there and a new school planned on a former car park in the town centre is months behind schedule whilst archaeologists complete investigations on site.

Now, a new find has been made during the dredging process of Botafoch harbour. A 17th century ship was uncovered during the operations and already many relics – including two bronze canons – have been brought to the surface for study and eventual housing in a museum.

The eventual aim is to raise the ship Mary Rose style from the sea bottom and preserve it for future generations. This is such a time consuming and expensive operation that it cannot be done now when it would delay such an important project.

The island authorities have therefore decided to mothball the ship by completely covering it in a thick layer of sediment and then building the already planned car park on top of it. When the time is right in the future, it will be relatively easy to uncover the ship to raise and eventually display it to the public.