The Case of the Mystery Schooner: Exploring an Unidentified Shipwreck in Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary

Day 2 of a Sanctuary Exploration Telepresence Project with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Marine Imaging Technologies.

By Anne Smrcina, Education and Outreach Coordinator, Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary and MME

The best laid plans…

As the expression goes—“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” (adapted from a poem by Robert Burns)—so goes our expedition. Last year with a September schedule, we were buffeted by heavy seas that had been churned up by hurricane action in the Caribbean and we found that our museum partners had started limiting their programming, since the summer was over. So, we shifted to an August timetable this year with the hopes of reaching more museum-goers, young people attending camps or early-starting schools and folks still on vacation. Usually, summer months provide flatter seas and fewer gusts. Little did we know that we would be confronting the lifestyle-changing aspects of our COVID-19 times! Plus, after a long string of hot, calm days, Mother Nature took a temperamental turn in behavior and sent winds and choppy seas.
Working at sea is always a challenge, and we’ve now seen that situation exemplified in both years of our two-year project. But one of the necessary aspects of working at sea is flexibility, and our team has risen to the occasion.

Pixel gets its portrait taken by the mini ROV (Portland Penetration Explorer – PPE, also known as Taz) along with a cloud of krill and marine snow. Photo: Marine Imaging Technologies

The plan to use a small ROV, our Portland Penetrating Explorer (PPE), which was also nicknamed Taz (short for Tazmanian Devil due to its speed, power, and buzzing sounds), was curtailed on Tuesday during our exploration of the Portland due to the changing sea conditions. We had some limited use during the 2:30 show, but by the 6:30 program the two ROVs had to be pulled from the water or suffer grievous injury (in fact, some small repairs were actually needed after the day’s efforts). Today, Wednesday, the building winds and heavier seas, prevented the Catapult (our ROV host vessel), from departing from the dock. However, the change in plans allowed the researchers to carefully examine the video footage that had been taken on the first day and images from earlier in the summer for use in the day’s broadcasts. It also allowed both ROV pilots to be available to answer questions from students in our direct link to the Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants online education program as well as our public programs.

Hannah MacDonald, education specialist with the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, hosted the broadcasts remotely from the Inner Space Center at URI, while Ryan Shepheard marshalled the video connections from the sanctuary marine operations center. Photo: Anne Smrcina, NOAA

In Wednesday’s broadcasts, our research team answered questions about career paths, research techniques, and technology advances. The ROV pilots (who double as builders and repair technicians) described how they use simple, off-the-shelf products from places like Home Depot to extend the ROVs’ capabilities (like inventing suction sampling devices to collect invertebrates from boulder reefs).

A quest for identification

The request for these invertebrate samples came from our principal investigator, Dr. Kirstin Meyer-Kaiser, a biologist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, who wanted to identify a sponge and a sea squirt that didn’t appear to have been recognized in earlier explorations of sanctuary shipwrecks. The need to preserve the historic sites necessitated collecting the samples from less sensitive locations, like nearby rocky habitats. The collections, with the newly-designed sampling equipment, went flawlessly, and Kirstin took her samples to the lab, where through dissection and microscope studies she was able to identify the species down to the genus (the sea squirt) and the species (the sponge). Kirstin noted that the sponge identification came down to an examination of the spicules, the skeletal framework for the sponge body. Using a sponge classification key, she found the match was Mycale lingua, a species usually found in the eastern Atlantic Ocean.

A story in the rubble

Dr. Calvin Mires, our maritime archaeologist, was transfixed by the array of artifacts around our mystery ship, which due to the coal surrounding, as well as inside the hull, was apparently a collier (or coal carrier). The video footage shows what appears to be a taff rail log, an instrument for measuring the speed of a ship, a telescope that may have been used by the captain for navigation at night, a toilet at the stern of the ship, and the copper sheathing along much of the hull. [Some of these items are visible in the images below. Photos: NOAA/WHOI/MITech] All of these items provide fodder for more in-depth investigations into the ship’s origins. Can we learn something from the plumbing and its parts? Can the application and type of sheathing give clues to the age of the ship? Does the log or the telescope have a maker’s mark? And, is the coal that blankets the site either bituminous (the more common industrial coal) or anthracite (the harder, black coal used in homes for cleaner burning), which would give evidence of the ship’s cargo?

Early research, based on records of ship losses at the end of the 19th century, the size of the ship, and its use as a collier, provides one hypothesis—that this may be the schooner Modoc. Calvin says that any definitive answer would need a great deal of additional evidence, but this can be a starting point for a line of study.
Tomorrow, I’ll provide more information about the Modoc and its fateful last voyage—and the beagle that went along for the ride!

Resources and Viewing links

NMEA Social MediaOcean at Home, Stellwagen Bank, WeAreNMEA