Ellsworth Boyd
Interested in the history of Theo's Wreck, sunk off Silver Beach Inlet, Grand Bahama Island?
Christened the M/V Logna in Norway in 1954, the 230-foot steel cargo ship transported goods between Spain and Norway for 15 years. In 1969, the Bahama Cement Company bought the vessel and renamed it the M/V Island Cement. The aging carrier transported sand, gravel and cement throughout the Bahamas for 13 years, until it needed extensive repairs. That's when the company's marine engineer, Theo Galanoupoulos, proposed it as a dive site. The sinking took four hours, and the ship finally settled on its port side. The stern protrudes over the edge of a 5,000-foot drop-off, making the 90- to 110-foot dive one of the best in the Bahamas.
KENT MUNDHENK OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA, discovered a B-25 Mitchell bomber off Wonget, an uninhabited island near Madong. He wants to know where he can get a schematic of the cockpit. More than 9,000 of these airplanes were built during WWII for use in the Pacific Theater of Operations. Equipped with .50-caliber machine guns and manned by a crew of seven, B-25s extensively bombed Japanese airfields and strafed enemy shipping. For details, contact the curator, U.S. Air Force Museum, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH 45433 or go to www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/air_power/ap5.htm. You can also run an Internet search for "North American B-25B Mitchell."
TED BUTLER OF TRENTON, NEW JERSEY, asks where he might see a salvaged P-38 Lightning fighter plane from WWII (Wreck Facts, May 2004). Steve Bek writes from Colorado: "A complete collection of combat aircraft flown by all U.S. military services in WWII can be seen at the Commemorative Air Force Headquarters Museum, Midland, TX. Go to www.confederateairforce.org for details."
MARTHA RICHARDS OF BRADENTON, FLORIDA, is going to the Florida Keys and wants a list of shipwrecks to explore. Thirty of the major wrecks of the Keys are listed in Michael Barnette's new book, Shipwrecks of the Sunshine State. The Benwood, the City of Washington, the Edward Luckenbach and the USS Sturtevant are just a few of them. For details, contact Michael through the Association of Underwater Explorers: www.mikey.net/aue.
MATT CARONE OF FT. LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA, asks if it's true that a diver in Key West found a treasure coin in a conch shell. The story is authentic, but the treasure, a 40-carat emerald, was more valuable than a coin. Believed to be from the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora Santa Margarita, sunk west of Key West during the hurricane of 1622, the gem is a rare discovery. Doug Pope, president of Amelia Research and Recovery, says the diver was cleaning his shell "when a small green rock fell out." He thought it was a chip off a beer bottle, but took it to Pope anyway. Although thousands of Colombian emeralds have been recovered from the main pile of the Nuestra Señora de Atocha, which sank in the same hurricane, this is the first emerald recovered near its sister ship's site.
DIVERS WHO ARE INTERESTED IN THE BEST SITES of the Netherlands Antilles will find information on them in the book, Dreamwrecks: The Best Shipwrecks of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao, by Dominique Sérafini and Catherine Salisbury. Aruba's Antilla, Bonaire's Mairi Bahn, and Curaçao's Superior Producer are just a few that are included. You can e-mail Ellsworth at [email protected].
Read Ellsworth Boyd's entire series of Wreck Chat blogs.
