Sunday, June 18, 2017

In the News...

Hello everyone!

I hope you're all enjoying your summer. It's been gorgeous here on the Oregon coast over the past few days.

As a ship/shipwreck enthusiast, news articles relating to ships and shipwrecks (both past and present) always draw my attention. I've decided that in the future I'd like to periodically write a blog post that includes a list of online articles and their links. The theory is that if someone has read and enjoyed my books then there's a good chance that they'll find these online articles interesting.

There have actually been quite a few maritime related articles in the news over the past week. For instance, I found this article from the Oregonian last night:

Debris that could be from a 100-year-old shipwreck found on Oregon coast

The article talks about an interesting piece of wood that washed ashore on Cannon Beach. They reported that the piece of wood is 18 feet long and weighs several hundred pounds. Based on the square nails, notches, and cut-outs in the wood, it's possible that it came from a wooden ship built in the 1800's.

It's going to take more research and consulting with experts-- and we may never know for certain which ship it came from-- but, it's still a pretty cool find!



On a sadder note, I've been following the story in the news of the collision between a Navy destroyer and a container ship:

US Navy Destroyer Collides with merchant ship

Collisions are on my list of the top three worst things that could happen at sea. As you're probably aware, container ships are enormous. Fortunately, the navy destroyer, the USS Fitzgerald, was sturdily built.

They're still investigating, but from what I can tell from the newspaper articles and photographs, it looks like the ships got lucky. Collisions are always bad and can potentially cause both ships to sink. Fortunately, in this situation, although both ships sustained damage and will need repairs, neither sank. Things could have been a lot worse.

When I first read about the accident, they reported that seven US sailors were missing. I had been holding out hope that by some miracle they would be found alive. Sadly, when I checked for an update on the story last night, I learned that the bodies of the sailors had been found inside one of the flooded compartments of the ship.

US Navy ship collides merchant vessel off coast

My condolences go out to the friends and family members of these sailors.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/traumatic-collision-that-killed-sailors-almost-sank-destroyer-navy-says/2017/06/18/74e99d20-53ed-11e7-be25-3a519335381c_story.html?utm_term=.0ba263343348&wpisrc=nl_az_most&wpmk=1

As someone that has spent a lot of time researching maritime history, I know that the outcome of this tragic accident could have been much worse. I'm grateful for the lives that were saved-- on both ships.

~~ H. S. Contino