Steamships & Cargo

Vera Figner Wreck: 20th-Century Paddle Steamer in Russia's Silva River

Diver inspects the wreck of the Vera Figner wreck. Photo by Pavel Lapshin
Diver inspects the wreck of the Vera Figner wreck. Photo by Pavel Lapshin

Scuba diving is a diverse and breathtaking activity where, upon submerging, one can find oneself drifting along the waves of history. Such an opportunity presented itself to me during my recent visit with fellow divers in Perm, who discovered an interesting object under the ice in the Sylva River.

Plinio III Wreck

Rare historical photo of Plinio III, Lake Como, Italy (Museo Barca Lariana/Public Domain)
Rare historical photo of Plinio III, Lake Como, Italy (Museo Barca Lariana/Public Domain)

Lake Como is famous worldwide for its beauty, the charm of its ancient villas, stunning lake views, iconic village of Bellagio and romantic setting. Under its surface, Lake Como hides hundreds of hidden treasures: ancient wrecks and incredible stories. One of those wrecks lies in the northern corner of the lake.

SS Kalle was a sister ship to SS Cotopaxi.

Wreck identified 95 years after ship's mysterious disappearance

The SS Cotopaxi—an American merchant steamer—left Charleston, South Carolina, on Nov. 29, 1925, with a cargo of coal,  destined for Havana, Cuba, but the vessel didn't make it far. The vessel vanished without a trace and the fate of the Cotopaxi and the 32 people on board has long puzzled experts.

(Unrelated file photo) Drake Wreck Buoy in Church Bay, off Northern Ireland.

Michigan shipwrecks to be marked with buoys

The goal is to help preserve the state's shipwrecks by giving divers another option besides hooking a line directly onto the wreck, as is customary now.

"Putting a mooring buoy on a shipwreck is absolutely, hands-down, the best form of physical protection you can do for a wreck," Wayne Lusardi, a state maritime archaeologist at the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary in Alpena, told Mlive.com

A sonar image of the newly-discovered Civil War-era shipwreck off the coast of North Carolina
A sonar image of the newly-discovered Civil War-era shipwreck off the coast of North Carolina

Shipwreck dating to the American Civil War found off North Carolina

The goal of the Union blockade was to keep supplies from reaching the Confederacy through one of its most important ports and to prevent the export of cotton and other marketable items by the Southerners.

Archaeologists discovered the shipwreck 44 km (27 miles) downstream from Wilmington near Fort Caswell, at the mouth of Cape Fear River — making it the first Civil War shipwreck uncovered in the region in decades, said Billy Ray Morris, deputy state maritime archaeologist and director of the North Carolina Office of State Archaeology's Underwater Archaeology Branch.

SS Central America sank in a hurricane in September 1857

Finders of SS Central America cannot keep gold hoard

SS Central America, known as the Ship of Gold, was a 280-foot (85 m) sidewheel steamer which sank in a hurricane off the coast of the Carolinas in September 1857, along with more than 420 passengers and crew and 14 tonnes of gold with an estimated value of $300 million on today's market.

With so much money on the line, ownership of the loot has been entrenched in legal battles ever since its discovery by Columbus-America Discovery Group in 1989.

Thousand Islands Wrecks of St. Lawrence River

Within a day’s drive from New York City is a wreck junkie heaven, with numerous shipwrecks to explore along the St. Lawrence River on the US-Canadian border, in the area called the Thousand Islands. Larry Cohen and Olga Torrey give a sampling of the wrecks in the region popular with both the American and Canadian diving communities.

British Steamer Nisbet Grammer

Historic steamship found in Lake Ontario

Shipwreck explorers Jim Kennard and Dan Scoville began their initial search for the vessel in September 2008.

What was thought to be an easy shipwreck to find turned out to be more of a challenge than they expected, Kennard said. Their search did, however, lead to several new discoveries in this area of the lake.

Kennard said they found the wreck of the Nesbit Grammer in late August 2014 in more than 500 feet of water about 8 miles from the shore of Somerset, N.Y., but he was unable to share the information at that time.

Lermontov Wreck

Make way for the shoreline— the ship is taking on water and fast! Perhaps these were not the exact words used to describe the situation, but the sinking of the MS Mikhail Lermontov has now become one of the largest diveable wrecks in New Zealand for both recreational and technical divers.