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Hudson River Shipwrecks Secretly Mapped
jonerik writes "According to this article in the New York Times (registration required) more than 200 shipwreck sites lying beneath New York's Hudson River have been mapped by sonar. In fact, scientists feel confident that the location of every Hudson shipwreck between Manhattan and Troy has now been pinpointed, adding that the nearly oxygen-free mud of the Hudson nearly guarantees that many of the wrecks and their contents are almost perfectly preserved. The hitch? For the time being the maps - paid for as part of the $186 million Hudson River Estuary Plan - are not being published since state officials are nervous about the prospect of so many shipwrecks suddenly being opened up to salvagers on one of the U.S.'s busiest rivers. 'We don't want to ring the dinner bell for people who have ulterior motives and don't behave responsibly,' says Mark L. Peckham, a historic preservation coordinator at the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. In the meantime, state officials are now attempting to determine the historical significance of the wrecks and how they might be protected, which should hopefully lead to the publication of the Hudson River maps at some future date."
Um.
Henry Hudson was exploring the river in 1609. What do you mean by *old*, exactly?
also, who is to say these ships now 'belong' to the state of NY ? i never understood that, it should be finders keepers.
Perhaps not belong, but I would imagine they fall under the juristiction of the NY coast guard or port authority.
Here, from the very the first sentence of the article, "Scientists mapping the bottom of the Hudson River with sonar say they have found nearly every single ship that ever foundered in the river over the last 400 years or more."
So I'd say from 400 yrs or so.
I give a darwin award to anyone who is stupid enough to even TOUCH the Hudson river. Let alone swim to the bottom of it for extended periods of time! That water is so filthy and disgusting full of poison I would sooner eat my own shit than drink it. I highly doubt that any of the sunken ships have pirate treasure on them anyway.
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And as to getting ill from taking a dip, give me a break. Maybe down around Manhattan (especially the East River), but not for us upstaters. I've been swimming in that river since I was a kid, and let me tell you, when I was a kid (mid 70s)the toxins were flowing fresh daily. Yeah, there were limits, anytime a bunch of fish or clams etc washed up on the beach dead we couldn't go swimming (and usually wound up bagging some samples to see what killed them this time around). So taking a dip won't kill you, eating the local fish will.
I just want to clairify a point that often gets lost. It seems to be common belief that the PCBs in the Hudson River are locked in the the sediment and just so long as nothing disturbs the sediment everything is A OK.
This is purpetuated by GE's ad campaign that shows pretty graphs with the PCB concentration dropping of dramatically in the 1970s (I can't remember exactly when) and saying "The River is healing itself!" What GE don't tell you is that this dramatic decrease is a result of them ceasing pollution. The PCB concentration in the water droped because GE stoped pumping PCBs into the water! NOT becasue the river is healing itself.
Furthermore, PCB levels in fish have remained constant. There is a reason you are not allowed to eat the fish in the Hudson River (only catch and release is allowed). I know of no real evidence that the PCBs remain 'locked' in the sediment.
To me this is a damn good example of a successful advertising campaign. The EPA really dropped the ball when GE spent millions and they [EPA] didn't respond in turn. Just look at the number of no dredging signs in the area, or if you're from the area ... chances are you've been visited by a GE PR rep (think kid on summer job) with nice fliers. I know I have. The kid was actually happy to get the other side of the story from my father, who is in a position to know damn well what goes on in that river.
Oh yeah, one other thing: modern dredging techniques don't use those bucket chains on the GE fliers ... they use a vacuum technology that prevents recontamination of the river bed.
My personal opinion is that GE should clean up their mess (ATM). And the EPA should have and should do a much better job with advertising.
And to stick with the parent ... you're right ... you really do not want Joe Adventurer (without advaced equipement) stiring things up. No sense in making things worse, again.
Maybe in the St. Lawrence you can do that but if you read the article, the Hudson has a visibility of about 2 inches. Amateurs diving into that is exactly what the state doesn't want.
It's the law. If the people paid for it (ie. taxes), then the people have to have access to it. I used to work as a consultant to NOAA. Everything we produced which NOAA paid for is available for cost of duplication and materials (this is usually a lot of money for simple things because the cost involves the wages of a government employee burning a dozen CDRs and the wages of his/her CTO, etc, etc).
There are exceptions (like secret defense projects and stuff), but that's the exception. They can't simply say "we choose to keep this info out of the hands of the public", it requires working through a legal process to gain that kind of status.
I guess they have the right since they did all the mapping... but I still think it's funny that they are keeping stuff a secret so the "Indiana Jones" types can plunder the wreaks first. "...That belongs in a museum!!!" -Indiana Jones
Yeah, but the thing you have to realize is that many of the scientists will actually take the time to document what, where, when, location etc.... in an effort to preserve the history and data in the wreck so that further research can be done.
I have dived before on wrecks and there are some folks I have seen that literally have no respect for the graves that many of these wrecks are or for the history of those wrecks. These people are out to tear off whatever trinket they can and sometimes those trinkets can be of great historical value. Furthermore, if not properly restored or stored, they can disintegrate loosing whatever value they retained.
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According to US maritime law, all the state has to do is see a judge with the documented location of each shipwreck and file a warrent to "arrest" the wreck. That's how a salvager gains legal custody of the wreck in US waters. Unless there's something specific about New York's own state constitution and state laws that would prohibit them from doing such, that's the mechanism they need to employ to keep all other potential salvagers out of the deal.
Actually there's a whole set of rules in admiralty for salvage rights over wrecks. This has come up more and more often as folks like Ballard locate old wrecks like Spanish galleons loaded with gold more easily. The disputes can get a little complicated.
Think of the ship at the bottom as not lost but in long-term storage. Just because someone can get to it before you can doesn't make it theirs. Access is not ownership. But if someone finds the wreck, they should be able to sell that information to the owner.
No, I can't justify these ancient rules. Changes may be in the wind.
I work for the outfit that is doing this survey and a couple others here in the keys plus one each in Portugal and Morocco (RPM, not Mel Fisher's). Putting aside the overseas projects, since that involves several more layers of bureaucracy, and not knowing the laws covering the Hudson, I can only give you an idea of what happens here.
Just about anything inside the reef is within the Floida Keys National Marine Sanctuary (FKNMS), so we have to pull a permit from them as well as from NOAA. FKNMS is a joint state / federal authority and NOAA of course is federal. In some areas we are allowed to do non-invasive surveys, such as towing magnetometers, a sidescan sonar or a sub-bottom profiler. Any excavation, which is done scientifically and with respect for the site, requires a separate permit. All data collected, whether from towed surveys or excavation must be shared with the permitting agency but is otherwise proprietary.
Hey, it's expensive to do this kind of work and there are plenty of treasure hunters that would love to get a hold of some of our "numbers". But as the article points out, those wrecks are mostly the workaday variety and probably of little commercial value. I think they are doing the right thing by holding back until the historically significant sites can be identified and protected even if the Hudson is not exactly a diving hot spot.
I live in Queens along the Hudson river, right by a park with a fishing pier. Since there are signs that show you can eat 1 serving a month from the river and there is a fish cleaning table, you can, in fact, eat the fish.f ish/uphu dcar.html
What I think you are refereing to is the Upper Hudson River (between the Federal Dam at Troy and Hudson Falls). Catch and release is still the rule there.
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