Ghost ship found

[Darren in NC]

Once again, proper research leads to success.

This Shipwreck Eluded Searchers for 139 Years. A Group of Historians and Citizen Scientists Found It in Two Hours

The 144-foot-long "F.J. King," which sank in Lake Michigan in 1886, was known as a "ghost ship" that nobody could locate

www.smithsonianmag.com

 

[releventchair]

Because wrecks are hands off reporting them doesn't quite equate to glory. Not conductive to much location sharing.
Was the resting place of the F.J.King really never know until now?
A hull exposed ashore gets measured and fussed about until recovered.
Human burials being exposed ; a bit quieter.

Still waiting on the Griffons location despite varied claims of it being located through time. Confirmation is another matter.

It's tamed down. The old divers are gone.
The young are older. Even old now.
Sure old wrecks can be dove for the sake of diving.
Recoveries though ; a different matter. Don't touch and you are half safe .

Modern salvage and scrounging in rivers for varied modern stuff might cover some expenses. Machines through the ice need removed by law and there's at least one airboat salvaging them for their owners.
The recovery of old growth long sunk stray logs from Michigan's logging era took good prices to instrument makers wanting not only the tight gran bout long soaked character as well.
Even then such recoveries were/are not exactly a free for all...

Nearest dives encounter what others before did. Calling the press isn't usually the first thing done ashore after. Though eventually someone is likely to report a discovery as if no one else knew where it was all this time.

Dive into Michigan Shipwrecks at these 12 Underwater Preserves

The Great Lakes were once America's busiest highways. Unfortunately, the waters were as dangerous as they were busy, and often unpredictable storms and the resulting waves took down ships. That shipwreck history is strikingly preserved within a dozen official shipwreck sanctuaries in Michigan.

www.michigan.org

 

[agflit]

As one who both learned to dive in the Great lakes, and cut my teeth in the search and salvage phase of diving... what they have done to salvage in the Great Lakes borders on criminal imo.
Those who ARE still involved are purely academic, and chase the camera's for personal fame in my experiance.
There is NO incentive to try and save or salvage any of these ghosts... Basically...if its over 50 years old, it's untouchable.
First it was Zebra mussels...now it's the Quagga's... great filter feeders. wonderful for water quality... BUT... they are now destroying ANYTHING on the bottom...the days are very numbered.

 

[releventchair]

As one who both learned to dive in the Great lakes, and cut my teeth in the search and salvage phase of diving... what they have done to salvage in the Great Lakes borders on criminal imo.
Those who ARE still involved are purely academic, and chase the camera's for personal fame in my experiance.
There is NO incentive to try and save or salvage any of these ghosts... Basically...if its over 50 years old, it's untouchable.
First it was Zebra mussels...now it's the Quagga's... great filter feeders. wonderful for water quality... BUT... they are now destroying ANYTHING on the bottom...the days are very numbered.

Gobies. rusty crayfish. Spiny water fleas. Alewives. Lamprey. Zebra and quagga's.

Not only the lakes but tributaries now.
Thousands of years of humans utilizing and traveling in and along. altered indefinitely now at the alter of commerce/ships dumpling untreated foreign ballast water after arriving through man made channels.

Those thousands of years evolved to a pair of elderly couples arriving to a former favorite fishing haunt of mine on warm summer evenings to sit in the river, backs against favorite boulders. That has been a minute or two. I see their old log cabin squatting a bit heavier today and a newer build behind it. A vehicle leaving it acting like the driver has been around nearer a century than much less. No not an original bather couples member. But sleeping near the same river. With the bonus of the most recent foreign invaders.
Don't sit in that river today. Them mussels will ventilate fabric and skin. Kinda hard on fish line too but then fishing bottom anymore means gobies anyways.

Like most antiquity laws inland the important thing is that only certain folks are allowed to plunder the great lakes lake bottoms in the name of science.
Certainly valid insurance claims on wrecks should be a consideration.
The rest are what?
Again , a fishing shanty goes through the ice or a snowmobile or a boat the owner or operator is liable for it being recovered .
Used Christmas trees were snuck in lakes I fished at times for structure. But easy enough to retrieve if the planter got caught.
A channel we snorkeled as kids had sunken wooden shanties. They must be protected by antiquities law law today.
( I can about imagine the eventual mess on the dredge pile and quick glance around for witnesses before disposal.)

 

[MiddenMonster]

Those who ARE still involved are purely academic, and chase the camera's for personal fame in my experiance.

Don't forget the taxpayer funded government grants that also come with all that camera chasing. As simply publishing to keep from perishing becomes tougher and tougher in a tightening academic world, getting media appearances and getting tagged as an "expert" are now more important than ever. And from there, if you have a radio face it's the radio talk show circuit for you. If you're a little bit photogenic you get your big break on television. Before you know it, your appearing in PBS shows, news stories and the talking head shows.