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The shipwreck stories They are usually very interesting. Although we control the earth’s surface quite a bit, the seabed is still It is very unknown. That is why there are different projects to map this territory in order to help us better understand our planetfind new species of animals and plants and study the viability of offshore renewable energy. From time to time, we encounter ships from past centuries full of treasures(some assuming the resurgence of international disputes).
But now, what we have found is a United States ship from the Second World War that has been lost for almost 80 years and that had a most curious life. At last, the United States has found, for the second time, the USS Stewart.
Searching for silver, they found gold. All began a few weeks ago. On August 1, a ship landed about 110 kilometers off the coast of San Francisco and threw three robots into the sea. Each more than six meters long, shaped like a torpedo and owned by Ocean Infinity, an underwater exploration company.
These aquatic drones had a mission: to scan about 130 square kilometers of ocean floor a day to find optimal sites with a view to the installation of wind farms on the high seas, as well as points to build oil platforms and lay out routes for underwater pipelines and cables. And to help fill in the gaps in the underwater maps, of course. But they found something big, something very big: the remains of a warship.
USS Stewart. The treasure appeared on the drone radars. At about 1,066 meters deep, Ocean Infinity drones encountered the ‘Pacific Ghost Ship’, the only American destroyer captured by the Japanese during World War II. The history of the destroyer is curious. Japan attacked the United States in December 1941, opening another front in the war and ending the famous Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombs.
The United States sent the USS Stewart, a destroyer with overwhelming firepower and a length of almost 100 meters, to Indonesia, where the Japanese were advancing. It suffered damage and, although they tried to repair it, the North American crew detonated some charges to sink it.
When they sank it in 1946 while doing target practice
Patrol car 102. The Stewart was underwater for a few months, until February 1943. The Japanese knew where it was and it was a very juicy weapon to let escape. Thus, they floated it and put it in dry dock for repairs. They put it back into operation and it was renamed Patrolman 102.
Although Patrol Boat 102 did not engage in battle with the American ships, they did see it patrolling Japanese waters. Imagine the surprise they had when they saw it. However, as we say, Japan lost the war, they abandoned the ship and, in 1945, the Americans found it in a port. They took it home, but one of the engines failed and its last service was serving as a target for target practice in San Francisco. There he rested for almost 80 years.
Secondary objective. The Navy did not record the exact position of the wreck at the time, but over the years there have been people who have looked for a way to find it and, when Russ Matthews, president of the Air/Sea Heritage Foundation, learned that Ocean Infinity was going to inspect the area, the light bulb went on: why not take the opportunity to look for it?
Thus, with permission from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Ocean Infinity drones dove into the area, finding in a matter of hours a wreck that, with other resources, would have taken weeks.
It’s not the first time. After the sighting, the Ocean Infinity drones continued doing their work, but since they already had the location of the Stewart, three days later they launched another group of drones to photograph the wreck. The ship is in perfect condition (beyond the flora and fauna that has grown around it) and is in a vertical position on the seabed. Furthermore, they have been able to capture TB of data, so the history of the destroyer has come to an end.
But, as we say, it is not the first time that Ocean Infinity has been involved in such a task. In 2020, they helped find the remains of USS Nevada (one of the oldest ships in EE.EE. which participated in both world wars, including the attack on Pearl Harbor) and, in 2022, they also contributed to the rediscovery of the Endurance(an Australian icebreaking ship).
Images | Ocean Infinity (Via New York Times)
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