A strange thing: in the middle of the sea to meet a drifting ship with no signs of life on board. Empty. Nobody here. Silence. And he sways on the waves - calmly, calmly, as if it were necessary, as if he did not need anyone else. It was as if he had already swum enough with these "conquerors of the seas", and he was so tired of them that he was only glad to part with them on occasion ... Terribly.
Sailors say that in the ocean - especially in the Atlantic - this happens often: empty fishing boats, small yachts, sometimes even liners come across - "", for example, is still looking for a last shelter. In most cases, by the appearance of the vessel, it is immediately clear what happened to it, and the main cause of maritime disasters, of course, will always be nature - the storm is not easy to defeat even for experienced sailors. But sometimes the disappearance of the crew is simply impossible to explain.
Imagine: a perfect whole, undamaged boat, her engines and generators are working, the radio and all emergency systems are in order, there is untouched food and a working laptop on the dining table, as if the crew hid from you somewhere in the hold a minute ago, but you they searched everything and - they did not find a single soul on board. You might think that this is just another marine tale, but in fact this is an excerpt from a police report about the disappearance of three members of the crew of the KZ-II catamaran yacht in April 2007.
Do you think we've got you intrigued now? In this material, we have collected the most famous and mysterious stories about ships that were found at sea at different times under the most mystical circumstances: without a crew on board or with dead sailors who died for an unknown reason, or as ghosts, reminiscent of the tragic events of the past.
M. V. Joyita, 1955
It was a luxury yacht built in 1931 in Los Angeles for film director Roland West. During World War II, MV Joyita was outfitted and operated as a patrol boat off the coast of Hawaii until the end of the war.
October 3, 1955 MV Joyita set sail from Samoa to the island of Tokelau - a distance of approximately 270 nautical miles. Just before the trip, she discovered a clutch malfunction on the main engine, which they could not fix on the spot, and the yacht went to sea under sail and with one auxiliary engine. There were 25 souls on board, including a government official, two children and a surgeon who was supposed to perform an operation in Tokelau.
The trip was supposed to take no more than 2 days, but MV Joyita did not arrive at the port of destination. The ship did not give any distress signals, even though its course ran along a fairly busy route, which is often ply by Coast Guard ships and which is well covered by relay stations. The search for the yacht was carried out on the territory of 100,000 square meters. miles by aviation forces, but MV Joyita could not be found.
Only five weeks later, on November 10, 1955, the ship was found. It drifted 600 miles from its planned route half submerged. 4 tons of cargo, crew and passengers were absent. The VHF radio was tuned to the international distress frequency. One auxiliary engine and bilge pump were still running, and the lights in the cabins were on. All clocks on board stopped at 10:25. The doctor's bag was found with four bloody bandages. The logbook, sextant and chronometer were missing, along with three life rafts.
The search team carefully examined the ship for damage to the hull, but did not find any. The fate of the crew and passengers could not be determined. Intriguing was the fact that the MV Joyita, with cork wood interiors, was virtually unsinkable, and the crew knew this very well. The missing cargo also remained a mystery.
Theories have been put forward in a variety of ways, ranging from the most bizarre, like the Japanese Navy, which still did not stop fighting after the end of World War II, located in some isolated base on one of the islands. Insurance fraud, piracy, rebellion were also considered as versions.
MV Joyita was restored, but, probably confirming her curse, she ran aground several times. In the late 1960s, the ship was sold for scrap.
Ourang Medan (Orang Medan, or Orange Medan), 1947
“Everyone is dead, it will come for me” and “I am dying” were the last two messages received from the crew of the cargo ship Ourang Medan in the Gulf of Malacca in June 1947. They were received along with SOS signals by two ships at once - British and Dutch - which is taken as another confirmation of the veracity of this mystical story.
The first message came in Morse code, the second - by radio. The ship in distress was searched for several hours, and the first to find it was the Briton Silver Star. After unsuccessful attempts to greet Ourang Medan with signal lights and whistles, it was decided to drop off a small team. Rescuers immediately went to the wheelhouse, from where the sounds of a working radio were heard, and found several crew members there.
All of them, including the captain, were dead. More bodies were found on the cargo deck. The Ourang Medan sailors were all allegedly lying in protective postures with horrified expressions on their faces. Many were covered in frost, and along with one of the crew groups, a dead dog was found, frozen stiff like a statue on all fours, snarling at someone into the void.
Suddenly, somewhere in the depths of the cargo deck, an explosion sounded, a fire started. Rescuers did not fight the fire and hurried to leave the ship full of the dead. Over the next hour, Ourang Medan sounded a few more explosions, and it sank.
It is quite reasonable to believe that the story of Ourang Medan, if it was a disaster, is mostly fiction. Some argue that such a ship did not exist - at least, the name "Ourang Medan" was not found in the Lloyd's lists. But conspiracy theorists believe that the name of the vessel was fictitious, since the crew was engaged in the transport of smuggling, and the same smuggling - you never know what cargo was on board - caused the tragedy.
Octavius (Octavius), 1762-1775
The English merchant ship Octavius was discovered drifting west of Greenland on October 11, 1775. A boarding team from the whaler Whaler Herald boarded and found the entire crew dead, frozen. The captain's body was in his cabin, death found him writing something in the logbook, he was still sitting at the table with a pen in his hand. There were three more stiff bodies in the cabin: a woman, a baby wrapped in a blanket, and a sailor holding a tinderbox.
The boarding party left Octavius in a hurry, taking only the logbook with them. Unfortunately, the document was so damaged by cold and water that only the first and last pages could be read. The journal ended with an entry in 1762. This meant that the ship had been drifting dead for 13 years.
Octavius left England for America in 1761. Trying to save time, the captain decided to follow the then unknown Northwest Passage, which was first successfully passed only in 1906. The ship was stuck in the Arctic ice, the unprepared crew froze to death - the discovered remains say that this happened quite quickly. It is assumed that some time later, Octavius was freed from the ice and drifted in the open sea with a dead crew. After an encounter with whalers in 1775, the ship was never seen again.
KZ II, 2007
The crew of the Australian catamaran KZ-II went missing in April 2007 under unclear circumstances. The story received a wide public outcry, as it resembles a similar case with the crew of the brigantine Mary Celeste (Mary Celeste).
On April 15, 2007, KZ-II departed Airlie Beach for Townsville. There were three crew members on board, including the owner. A day later, the yacht stopped communicating, and on April 18 it was accidentally discovered drifting near the Great Barrier Reef. On April 20, a patrol landed on the KZ-II and did not find any of the crew members on board.
At the same time, the ship did not have any damage, except for a torn sail, all systems worked properly, the generator and engine were turned on, and untouched food and a laptop were found on the dining table. The search for sailors continued until April 25, but did not bring any results.
The official version of what happened was a series of events, partially restored from the recordings of a video camera found on board the KZ-II. It is believed that at first one of the sailors dived into the sea for some reason. Perhaps he wanted to free a tangled fishing line. At the same moment, the wind began to carry the yacht to the side, something happened to the first sailor in the water, and the second sailor rushed to help him. The third sailor who remained on board tried to direct the yacht closer to his friends, for which he turned on the engine, but quickly realized that the wind was hindering the movement. He tried to quickly remove the sail and at that moment, for an unknown reason, he himself was overboard. The yacht began to go into the open ocean on its own, and the sailors could no longer catch up with it and eventually drowned.
Young Teazer (Young Teaser), 1813
The privateer schooner Young Teazer was built in early 1813. It was an amazingly fast and promising vessel, which already in the first months of the hunt showed itself quite well on the trading routes off the coast of Halifax. In June 1813 Teazer began to pursue the Scottish brig Sir John Sherbrooke. The schooner was able to escape in the fog, but soon the 74-gun ship of the line HMS La Hogue attacked her trail and drove the Teazer into a trap in Mahone Bay off the Nova Scotia peninsula. At dusk, HMS La Hogue was joined by HMS Orpheus, and they began to prepare for an attack on the privateer, who now had nowhere to go. HMS La Hogue dispatched five boarding parties to Young Teazer, but as they approached, the schooner exploded. The 7 surviving members of the Young Teazer crew subsequently unanimously claimed that it was First Lieutenant Frederick Johnson who detonated the ammunition, thus destroying the ship, himself, and 30 other crew members, whose unidentified remains lie today in the Anglican cemetery in Mahone Bay.
Shortly after the tragic events, locals claimed to have seen a flaming Young Teazer rise from the depths. On June 27, 1814, people in Mahone Bay were amazed to see the ghost of a schooner in the same place where she was destroyed. The ghost appeared and then silently disappeared in a flash of flame and smoke. This story spread so quickly across the country that onlookers began to specially flock to Mahone Bay the following June. The Young Teazer is said to have reappeared that time, and has reappeared every year since, and locals still claim that the schooner is periodically visible on foggy nights, especially on the first day after the full moon.
Mary Celeste (Marie Celeste), 1872
This ship can safely claim the title of the biggest maritime mystery of all time. So far, the investigation into the disappearance of his crew has not progressed a single step, and even after 143 years is the topic of much debate.
On November 7, 1872, the brigantine Mary Celeste left New York for Genoa with a cargo of alcohol. On the afternoon of December 5, she was discovered 400 miles from Gibraltar without a crew. The ship sailed with raised sails, had no damage and, as it turned out later, even the hold with valuable cargo was not touched.
The brigantine was discovered and identified by Captain Morehouse from another merchant ship sailing in a parallel course. He, as it turned out, knew the owner of the Mary Celeste, Captain Briggs (Briggs), and respected him as a talented sailor - which is why Morehouse was very surprised when he realized that the brigantine he met was absurdly deviating from the known course. Morehouse tried to honk and, having received no answer, began to pursue the brigantine. Two hours later, his team landed on the Mary Celeste.
The ship seemed to have been abandoned with haste. Personal items were not touched, including jewelry, clothes, a supply of food, as well as the entire cargo. The boats were missing, as well as all the papers in the captain's cabin, with the exception of the diary, where the last entry is dated November 25 and reports that Mary Celeste has left the Azores.
There were no signs of violence on board. The only visible damage was copious water marks on the deck, suggesting that the crew abandoned the ship due to inclement weather. However, this contradicted the personality of Captain Briggs, who was characterized by relatives, friends and partners as a skilled and brave sailor who decided to leave the ship only in case of emergency and in case of mortal danger.
Morehouse took control of the brigantine and delivered it to Gibraltar on 13 December. There, a comprehensive survey of the ship was carried out, during which the inspectors found several stains in the captain's cabin that looked like dried blood. We also found several marks on the rails, which could have been left by a blunt object or an ax, but there were no such weapons on board the Mary Celeste at the time of the study. The ship itself was declared undamaged.
The versions of what happened were piracy, insurance fraud, a tsunami, an explosion caused by fumes from the cargo, ergotism from contaminated flour that drove the crew crazy, a mutiny, and several supernatural explanations. There is also a version that the crew of the Mary Celeste reached the coast of Spain, where in 1873 they found several boats from an unknown ship and several unidentified corpses in them.
Over the next 17 years, Mary Celeste passed from one owner to another 17 times, with often, as they say, tragic and fatal cases. The last owner of the brigantine flooded it to set up an insured event.
Lyubov Orlova, 2013
One of the most famous ghost ships of recent years is the Lyubov Orlova liner, which was lost in 2013 while being towed in the Caribbean Sea and has since appeared here and there in the Atlantic.
The liner, named after the famous Soviet actress, was built in 1976 and was part of the fleet of the Far Eastern Shipping Company. In 1999, the ship was sold to a company from Malta and was recruited for regular voyages to the Arctic. In 2010, the ship was arrested for debts and, after two years of inactivity in Canada, was sent by tugboat to the Dominican Republic for scrap. During towing in the Caribbean, there was a severe storm and the towing cables could not stand it. The crew of the tugboat tried to capture the out of control ship, but due to weather conditions, this was not possible - the ship was abandoned in neutral waters.
The search for the ship was unsuccessful. Its automatic identification system, a system that relays the geographical position of ships, was offline, making it impossible to locate. The Canadian authorities announced that since the ship can now only be in neutral waters in any case, Canada no longer bears responsibility for its fate - the search was stopped. It was believed that Lyubov Orlova was lost forever in the North Atlantic Ocean.
Unexpectedly, on February 1, 2013, Lyubov Orlova was spotted drifting 1,700 km off the coast of Ireland. It was discovered by the Canadian oil tanker Atlantic Hawk, which, in order to prevent the now world-famous “ghost ship” from becoming a real danger to nearby oil rigs, towed the ship to neutral waters, where it was forced to leave again. February 4 "Lyubov Orlova" was 463 km from St. John's, Canada. The Canadian authorities again refused to take any measures and the responsibility for the vessel was fully assigned to its owner. A few days later, Lyubov Orlova was again lost.
During the year, the 4,250-ton vessel, whose remains are estimated at 34 million rubles, managed to avoid the scrutiny of the search crews of the owner company and scrap metal hunters. The popularity of the ghost ship has risen to the appearance on social networks of fake users under the name "Lyubov Orlova" / "Lyubov Orlova" and the site whereisorlova.com, dedicated, however, to other ghost ships. The phrase “Where is Lyubov Orlova?” turned into a meme and, as they say, began to be printed on T-shirts and mugs.
In January 2014, the ghost ship was again seen drifting 2.4 thousand km. off the west coast of Ireland. Experts believed that the ship was moving towards the shores of Great Britain, where it was pushed by recent storms. The British authorities were preparing for a meeting with a celebrity, especially fearing that the drifting ship could be inhabited by cannibal rats, but Lyubov Orlova disappeared again.
Lady Lovibond (Lady Lovibond), 1748
In the 18th century, sailors firmly believed in omens, and quite often their superstitions were fueled by situations that are quite understandable and even prosaic by today's standards. Maybe that's why the "edifying" story of the sailing ship Lady Lovibond made it so popular, and the legend so long-playing.
On February 13, 1748, newly married Simon Reed and Annette set off on their honeymoon from Britain to Portugal on Reed's ship, the Lady Lovibond. Even before going to sea, John Rivers, Reed's first mate, fell in love with the captain's wife and was now going crazy with love and jealousy. Reeves began to have uncontrollable fits of anger, one day he broke into the helmsman and, losing his temper, killed him. Rivers then took control of the ship and steered it to the Goodwin Sands, the infamous shoal in the English Channel. The ship was wrecked, no one escaped.
In 1848, a hundred years after the tragic events described, local fishermen saw a sailboat crashed on the Goodwin Sands. Rescue boats were sent to the crash site, but no vessel was found. In 1948, after another hundred years, the ghost of Lady Lovibond was again seen on the Goodwin Sands by Captain Bull Prestwick and was described by him exactly like the original ship of 1748, albeit with an eerie greenish glow. The next appearance of the ghost ship is expected in 2048. Let's wait.
Eliza Battle, 1858
Built in 1852 in Indiana, the Eliza Battle was a luxurious wooden steamer for the entertainment of presidents and VIPs. On a cold night in February 1858, a fire broke out on the main deck of the steamer on the Tombigbee River, strong winds helped the fire spread throughout the ship. About 100 people were on board that flight, of which 26 people could not escape. Today, locals say that during the spring floods, during the big moon period, Eliza Battle reappears on the Tombigbee River. She floats upstream with music and lights on the main deck. Sometimes they see only the silhouette of the ship. Fishermen believe that the appearance of Eliza Battle promises disaster to other ships that still sail this river.
Carrol A. Deering (Carroll A. Deering), 1921
The five-masted cargo schooner Carrol A Deering was built in 1911 and named after the owner's son. On December 2, 1920, she set sail from Rio de Janeiro to Norfolk, USA, two months later she was found stranded and abandoned by the crew.
The investigation into the circumstances of the disappearance of the Carrol A Deering crew, which was conducted under the supervision of US Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, made it possible to partially restore the chain of events preceding the disappearance of the schooner and collect eyewitness accounts.
So, it was established that in early January 1921, on the way to the USA, Carrol A Deering made an intermediate stop on the island of Barbados, where a quarrel occurred between Captain Wormell and First Officer McLellan, and the latter threatened to kill the captain. After a quarrel, McLellan looked for work on other ships, claiming that the Carrol A Deering crew did not follow orders, and Captain Wormell did not allow him to punish the sailors. Hiring McLellan was turned down. The next few days in Barbados, he was often seen drunk with the Carrol A Deering team, for brawl McLellan even landed in prison, from where he was rescued by Captain Wormell. On January 9, 1921, the schooner went to sea, and what happened to her next is still a mystery.
January 16, 1921 Carrol A Deering was seen off the Bahamas. She sailed with one sail, despite favorable weather conditions, and performed strange maneuvers, periodically laying back on her course. On January 18, she was spotted at Cape Canaveral, on January 23 - at the Cape Fear lighthouse. On January 25, in the same area, the cargo steamer SS Hewitt, which followed the same course as Carrol A Deering, disappeared without a trace - this circumstance also got into the Carrol A Deering materials, but there was no direct connection between the incidents.
On January 29, the schooner in full sail passed the lighthouse of Cape Lookout. The lighthouse keeper even took a photo of her. According to him, a red-haired sailor on board Carrol A Deering shouted over the loudspeaker that the schooner had lost its anchors during a storm, and asked to convey a message to the ship's owners. The caretaker was unable to transmit the message due to the fact that the radio was broken at the lighthouse. Later, he noted that he was surprised that the crew of the schooner crowded on the quarter quarters, where only the captain and his assistants have the right to be, and even a simple sailor spoke to him from the ship, and not the captain or assistant.
On January 30, the schooner was seen sailing under full sail off Cape Hatteras, and on January 31, the US Coast Guard reported a five-masted sailboat that had run aground in the same area. His sails were raised, the boats were gone. Due to stormy weather, Carrol A Deering was only able to get on February 4 - no people were found on board. There were no personal belongings, documents, including the logbook, navigational equipment and anchors. Three pairs of shoes of different sizes were found in the captain's cabin. The last mark on the found map was dated January 23, and it was not made in the handwriting of Captain Warmell.
In 1922, the Carrol A Deering investigation was closed without any official conclusion. The schooner, which was slowly collapsing aground and could pose a danger to navigation, was blown up. Its skeleton remained in the same place for a long time, until it was finally destroyed by a hurricane in 1955.
Baychimo (Baychimo), 1931
Baychimo was built in Sweden in 1911 by order of a German trading company. After the First World War, it passed to Great Britain and for the next fourteen years it regularly served on routes along the Northwest coast of Canada, transporting furs. In early October 1931, the weather deteriorated sharply, and a few miles from the coast near the town of Barrow, the ship got stuck in the ice. The team temporarily left the ship and found shelter on the mainland. A week later, the weather cleared up, the sailors returned on board and continued sailing, but already on October 15, Baychimo again fell into an ice trap.
This time it was impossible to get to the nearest city - the crew had to arrange a temporary shelter on the shore, far from the ship, and here they were forced to spend a whole month. In mid-November, a snowstorm broke out that lasted several days. And when the weather cleared up on November 24, Baychimo was not in the same place. The sailors thought the ship was lost in a storm, but a few days later a local seal hunter reported seeing Baychimo about 45 miles from their camp. The team found the ship, removed the precious cargo from it and left it forever.
The story of Baychimo did not end there. For the next 40 years, he was occasionally seen drifting along the northern coast of Canada. Attempts were made to get on board the ship, some were quite successful, but due to weather conditions and the poor condition of the hull, the ship was abandoned again. The last time Baychimo was in 1969, that is, 38 years after the crew left it - at that time the frozen ship was part of the ice massif. In 2006, the government of Alaska attempted to locate the Arctic Ghost Ship, but all attempts to locate the ship were unsuccessful. Where the Baychimo is now - whether it lies at the bottom or is unrecognizably overgrown with ice - remains a mystery.
Flying Dutchman (Flying Dutchman), 1700s
This is probably the most famous ghost ship in the world, the popularity of which was added by the Pirates of the Caribbean, and even the cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants, where one of the characters was called Frying Dutchman - the Frying Dutchman.
There are many legends associated with this ship, forever roaming the oceans, and the main one concerns the Dutch captain Philip van der Decken (sometimes called Van Straaten), who returned from the East Indies in the 1700s and carried a young couple on board . The captain liked the girl so much that he faked the death of her betrothed and proposed to her. The girl refused Van der Decken and threw herself overboard in grief.
Immediately after that, at the Cape of Good Hope, the ship got into a storm. The superstitious sailors began to murmur. In an attempt to prevent the rebellion, the navigator offered to wait out the bad weather in some bay, but the captain, desperate and drinking after the suicide of his beloved, shot him and several other dissatisfied. One of the popular versions of the legend says that after the murder of the navigator Van der Decken, he swore by the bones of his mother that no one would go ashore until the ship passed the cape; he brought a curse and is now doomed to eternal sailing.
Usually people watch the "Flying Dutchman" in the sea from afar. According to legend, if you get close to it, the team will try to send a message to the shore to people who have long been dead. It is also believed that meeting with the "Dutchman" promises illness and even death. The latter is explained by yellow fever, which is transmitted by mosquitoes that breed in containers with food water. Such a disease can destroy the entire crew, and a meeting with such an infected ship could really be fatal: mosquitoes attacked living sailors and infected them.
Ghost ships are called ships that are at sea, but do not have a crew on board. The crew could disappear or die for several reasons: epidemics, natural disasters in the form of wandering waves, mass poisoning, etc.
Stories about ghost ships are widely used in literature, cinema, fables, legends, pirate stories. One of the most famous legends is the story of the Flying Dutchman. According to sailors, meeting with this ghost ship at sea promises great trouble. Despite the huge number of fictional stories, there were quite a few real cases of the appearance of such ships.
Ghost ships found at sea from the 18th to 20th centuries
In 1775, a merchant ship from England, the Octavius, was discovered off the coast of Greenland with the frozen bodies of crew members on board. The ship's log showed that the ship set sail in 1762.
In 1850, a mysterious one was discovered on the coast of Rhode Island, stuck in shallow water. They found a dog on deck, all documents and cargo were in place, even coffee was boiling on the stove. Not a single member of the crew, even after a thorough investigation, was found. The Seabird sailboat was carrying wood and coffee from the island of Honduras.
One of the most famous ghost ships, the Mary Celeste, was found abandoned by her crew for no apparent reason in 1872. The ship was quite good, strong, without damage, but throughout its existence it often got into unpleasant situations, which is why it received a bad name. The captain with his team of 7 people, as well as his wife and daughter, who were also on the ship at the time of the cargo transportation - alcohol, disappeared without a trace.
"Mary Celeste"
In 1921, the schooner "Carroll Dearing" was seen from the lighthouse. The captain and crew of 9 were not found. The sails were removed, food supplies and personal belongings of the crew remained intact. At the same time, sextants, chronometers and a logbook were absent, some of the instruments and steering were disabled.
Schooner "Carroll Dearing"
The Orang Medan, discovered in 1948, transmitted strange SOS signals to nearby merchant ships that spoke of a dead crew. When the sailors boarded the ship, they found that all the members of the crew were dead, and an expression of horror froze on their faces. Unexpectedly for everyone, spontaneous combustion began on the ship, which led to an explosion and the ship sank. Nobody managed to find any documentary explanations of what was happening on the ship.
Surely many have heard of ghost ships, which are sometimes called the Flying Dutchmen. These are ships that once set out on their journey, but never returned. All of them have one thing in common - the ship is found drifting across the ocean, but not a single living crew member is on board. And sometimes there are no crew members at all.
The story of "Octavius" is considered one of the most famous. In 1775, the whaling ship Herald discovered the ship Octavius off the coast of Greenland.
websiteThe captain and several sailors decided to inspect someone else's ship. To their horror, they discovered the frozen corpses of almost the entire crew, lying all together in the forward cockpit. In the captain's cabin, they found four more frozen people - the captain, his wife and son, as well as an assistant who froze while trying to start a fire.
From the surviving pages of the logbook, it became known that the ship, in some unknown way, suddenly turned out to be far from its intended route and fell into ice captivity. Once about a hundred miles north of Point Barrow in Alaska, the ship's crew struggled with the cold for 17 days.
Expecting a fair wind, the ship "Herald" stood all night next to the ship of the dead. It seemed to the crew of the Herald that in the windows, where the crew of the Octavius froze, a light was on, they were howling a dog, and at dawn the watchman saw a dark figure with a lantern in his hands, which went to the forecastle.
As soon as the morning wind blew the site, the Herald hurried away from the ship with the dead weight on board.
2) "Joyta"
In 1955, in the South Pacific, rescuers found a ship without a crew. The Joita was heading towards the Tokelau Islands when something happened. Within hours, a rescue team was dispatched to help them. But the ship was discovered only after 5 weeks. There were no passengers, crew, cargo or lifeboats on the ship, and one side was severely damaged. The mystery of the disappearance was never solved.
3) "Lady Lavibond"
On February 13, 1748, the captain of the Lady Lavibond, Simon Peel, after the wedding, went on a cruise with his young wife on his ship. But his first mate was also in love with his wife and, in a fit of jealousy, drove the ship onto a sandbar. The ship sank, taking the lives of the entire crew with it.
According to another version of the event site, the crew was very unhappy with the presence of a woman on board. After one of the drinking bouts, drunken sailors hanged the captain and abused his young wife. For the next few days, the ship, almost out of control by a drunken crew, sailed at the behest of the waves until it hit the shoal of the Goodwin Sands.
In 1798, the crew of the Edinbridge witnessed the first chronomirage of the sinking of the Lady Lavibond, almost colliding with a seemingly very real sinking ship that suddenly appeared. Since then, the ghostly scene of the death of "Lady Lavibond" has been observed in these places every 50 years.
In 1848, experienced sailors of another ship, observing a very realistic chrono-mirage of a shipwreck, rushed to save people in distress, but, approaching, they did not find any drowning people or the remains of the ship.
In 1898, a certain Curtis, who was famous for his courage, worked in the local coastal rescue service. Once again, the appearance of the chronomirage of the death of the Lady Lavibond ship, the rescue site team hurried to the aid of the sinking ship. Rescuer Curtis jumped into the icy water to help drowning people, but suddenly everything suddenly disappeared. But this time, the rescuer Curtis disappeared along with the ghosts.
In 1948, the rescue service was again alerted and went to the aid of an old sailboat in distress. This time, only one person was saved, and that person turned out to be none other than Theodore Curtis, who went missing 50 years ago. Representatives of the British intelligence service, having listened to the details of Curtis's life at the end of the 19th century, did not even bother to compare his story with archive materials, since at that time they were more interested in Russian spies than time travelers. The further fate of Curtis is unknown.
In February 1998, there were very thick fogs over the English Channel, which is probably why the ship's time mirage was not noticed by anyone. It remains for the site to wait until 2048 and, perhaps, the ghost of the mysterious “Lady Lavibond” will appear again.
4) "Mary Celeste"
"Mary Celeste" - a merchant ship abandoned by the crew and sailing across the Atlantic Ocean.
At noon on December 4, 1872, the crew of the Deo Gracia, heading from New York to Genoa, discovered the American merchant ship Mary Celeste at 38 ° 20 north latitude and 13 ° 37 west longitude. The ship was in good condition, with sails raised, a full supply of food and untouched cargo. But all the lifeboats, the captain's log and the entire crew have mysteriously disappeared. There were no signs of a struggle, and all the alcohol and belongings of the crew remained intact, which ruled out the pirates. The most likely theory is that a storm or technical problem forced the crew to abandon ship.
Both holds of the ship were open, the cargo, consisting of 1,700 barrels of rectified cognac, remained untouched. Water splashed between the barrels. The water level in the site holds was about a meter. All six windows of the aft superstructure were covered with tarpaulin and boards. The skylight in the captain's quarters was open. The deck, bulkheads and everything in the cabin were damp. The ship's papers were missing. There was also no sextant, chronometer and navigation books.
The last entry in the Mary Celeste's logbook was November 24, 1872. Judging by it, the ship was about 100 miles west of the Azores, i.e. in 10 days the ship covered 500 miles to the east!
The position of many things on the ship indicated that the sea was calm, since nothing spilled and was in a normal position. And everything said that if the ship was abandoned by the crew for any reason, then this happened quite recently.
The following was found out about the ship: "Mary Celeste", built in Scotland in 1862 and the site made many successful crossings across the Atlantic and was considered one of the best sailing ships on the northeast coast of the United States. The ship left New York for Genoa on November 4, 1872, under the command of Captain Benjamin S. Briggs, with a cargo of brandy rectified. The team was fully staffed. When sailing on board the Mary Celeste were Captain Briggs with his wife and two-year-old daughter Sophie, chief mate, boatswain, six sailors and a cook - a total of 12 people.
Many years after this event happened, a man appeared who claimed to be the only member of the crew of the Mary Celeste who managed to escape. He said that the captain called the chief officer to the competition: who will swim around the ship faster, but they were attacked by a shark. The sailors looked at this scene with horror, when suddenly a huge wave hit the deck and washed everyone overboard. "Mary Celeste" continued to sail on the site, and the entire crew, except for himself, drowned.
5) The Flying Dutchman
Perhaps the most famous ghost ship is the Flying Dutchman. The ship was first mentioned in the 1700s in George Barrington's book Voyage to Botany Harbour. According to history, the Flying Dutchman was a ship from Amsterdam. The captain was Van der Decken. The ship was heading for the East Indies when a storm overtook her near the Cape of Good Hope. Determined to continue on, Van der Decken went mad, killed his first mate, and vowed to cross the cape. Despite his efforts, the ship sank, and legend has it that the captain and his ghost ship are doomed to roam the seas forever.
6) "Carroll Deering"
In 1911, the 5-masted schooner "Carroll A. Dearing" was built and named after the designer's son. After 9 years, in 1920, she disappeared into the Bermuda Triangle, like the other 8 ships.
The cargo ship Carroll A. Dearing was discovered a year later, on January 31, 1921, near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. The ship was in excellent condition, but some of the instruments and steering were disabled. All sails were removed, food supplies and personal belongings of the crew were in place, but the crew was absent. But the chronometers, navigation charts and the ship's log were gone. But what is most surprising - the holds were filled with fresh provisions. The frightening ship was sunk just in case, but the investigation into its disappearance continued until 1922.
7) Orang Medan
In February 1948, British and Dutch radio stations detected a distress signal from the Orang Medan steamer in the Strait of Malacca. After repeated "SOS" followed: “All the officers and the captain died ... Perhaps I alone survived the site ...”. Then an indecipherable series of dots and dashes, and then a distinct: "I'm dying" and the ether fell silent.
Rescuers boarding the ship in distress did not find a single living person on board. The corpses of the crew with faces distorted with horror were all over the ship. Many died with their hands held out in front of them, apparently defending themselves from something. When examining the bodies, it was found that all the crew members died about 6-8 hours ago, but, despite this, the temperature of their bodies exceeded 40 degrees Celsius. There were no wounds or other signs of violence on the bodies of the crew and the ship's dog. What happened on board the ship remains a mystery.
The ship “Orang Medan” was decided to be towed to the port for further examination, but a few minutes later a fire broke out on board, and members of the rescue team were forced to leave it. Immediately after that, the site exploded, and “Orang Medan” went to the bottom.
8) Great Eastern
Built in 1857, the Great Eastern was the Titanic of its day. Its carrying capacity exceeded the carrying capacity of other ships by six times. The ship was to be launched on January 30, 1858. But the ship was so heavy that during the descent, the mechanism that was supposed to launch the ship into the water broke. Due to lack of money, the ship was launched only a year later. The Great Eastern was bought by a company that made repairs and the ship was launched.
During the testing of the ship, at least one person died, whose body was never found. A month after the completion of the work, its creator Islambad Brunel died of a stroke. Despite its size and beauty, the accursed ship has never sailed with a full complement of passengers.
During a cruise, the site in 1862, with a record number of passengers (1500 people), the bottom of the ship was torn apart, which cost an expensive repair. Passengers claimed to have heard someone break through the bottom of the ship, as if hitting with a sledgehammer. In 1865, it was decided not to operate the ship again.
The owners decided to sell the ship for scrap after twelve years on shore. When the ship was dismantled, a skeleton was found between the hulls. The skeleton belonged to a shipbuilder who mysteriously disappeared while the ship was being repaired.
9) "Queen Mary"
The Queen Mary is one of the most famous cruise ships of the 20th century. Today it is a tourist attraction for many tourists. The ship was launched on 26 September 1934 off the coast of Glasgow. According to eyewitnesses, the liner is the owner of several ghosts.
In 1966, during the next voyage, 17-year-old sailor John Pedder tragically died. Later, one of the ship's guides claimed that the site saw the grim figure of a young man falling into the water. After he saw the old photographs, he recognized them as John Pedder.
Tourists claimed to have seen the ghost of a woman who was wearing a white dress. When she entered the cabin, they followed her, but found nothing there.
The ship's watchman said he saw a little boy heading towards the pool. After the child jumped into the pool, he disappeared.
10) Griffon
One of the most famous ships sunk in the waters of the Great Lakes is the Griffon, built in Niagara, New York, and owned by the French traveler René Robert, Chevalier de La Salle. The Griffon, 60 feet long and weighing 45 tons, was at the time the largest ship to sail on the lakes. The construction of the ship caused disapproval of the local Iroquois, who believed that this ship was objectionable to the Great Spirit. website The Iroquois prophet Metiomek cursed the ship and said that it would sink.
The Griffon set sail on her maiden voyage on August 7, 1679. In Detroit Harbor on Washington Island, Wisconsin, La Salle disembarked to continue his canoe exploration of the source of the Mississippi River. The Griffon was due to return to Niagara on September 18, 1679. But he didn't come back.
According to legend, the ship tried to pass through the ice and disappeared. In 1900, after the alleged "Griffon" was found in the region of the Brus Peninsula on Lake Huron, the version of the shipwreck spread. The shipwreck hypothesis was confirmed in 1955, when the remains of the found ship were identified as belonging to the Griffon. The ghost of the Griffon is still often seen on foggy nights floating on Lake Huron.
Coastguards of Great Britain and Ireland peer anxiously into the sea distance. The British Isles are wary of the ghost ship Lyubov Orlova, a former Soviet Arctic-cruising steamship that has been drifting in the north Atlantic since January last year.
The panic arose because, according to the latest information, a 90-meter vessel weighing 4250 tons, built in 1976 at a shipyard in Yugoslavia, may well be heading towards the British Isles and may soon be dumped somewhere on the west coast of Ireland, Scotland or Cornwall .
Lyubov Orlova is a ghost ship. This is the name given to ships abandoned for various reasons by the crew and passengers, which then sail the seas and oceans and frighten oncoming ships with their sinister appearance.
There are no people on board the Lyubov Orlova. There is no one there, except for hordes of rats, who, in order not to die of hunger, probably devour each other.
The Arctic liner changed several owners. The last owner decided to scrap it and tow it from Newfoundland, where it has been for the past two years, to the Dominican Republic. During a severe storm, the crew was forced to take a tow. Then the cable burst, and "Lyubov Orlova" disappeared into the fog.
At first, the Canadian Coast Guard tried to follow the ghost ship, on which there are no transponders. Then he was carried into international waters, and the Canadians calmed down.
After a few weeks of wandering around the Atlantic, Lyubov Orlova seemed to show up about 1,700 km from the Irish island of Valentia. However, the search was unsuccessful due to bad weather.
At the end of February last year, 1,300 km from the county of Kerrin, located in the south-west of Ireland, an emergency beacon went off on a ghost ship. The buoys start transmitting signals when they hit the water. New searches for the Irish Coast Guard again failed.
In March, a satellite spotted an object large enough to be a ship off the northwest coast of Scotland, but the planes didn't find it. The search for rescuers was also unsuccessful. Rescuers are interested in the premium - the ship's metal costs approx. 1 million dollars.
Experts believe that the ship "Lyubov Orlova" continues to drift in the northern part of the Atlantic. As for the beacon signals, most likely, during a storm, the life raft on which it is located was carried overboard.
Of course, "Lyubov Orlova" is far from the first and, one must think, far from the last ghost ship plowing the waters of the seas and oceans.
1. Flying Dutchman
Ghost ships are often also called "Flying Dutchmen" in honor of perhaps the most famous of them. The legend is based on facts. In 1680, a ship under the command Hendrick Vanderdecken left Amsterdam and headed for Batavia, a port in the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia). Rounding the Cape of Good Hope, the ship got into a strong storm and went to the bottom along with the crew. It is said that as a punishment for stubbornness, Vanderdeken, who decided to continue sailing despite warnings of an impending storm, and his ship was ordered to forever plow the expanses of the ocean near the Cape of Good Hope.
One of the first encounters with the mysterious ship took place in 1835. The sailors of a British frigate caught in a storm suddenly saw an old ship rushing towards them at full sail. At the very last moment, when it seemed that a collision could not be avoided, the ship disappeared.
In 1881, the Flying Dutchman was seen by two sailors of the merchant ship Bachchant. The next day, one of them fell off the mast and crashed to death.
In March 1939, a ghost ship appeared off the coast of South Africa. Dozens of vacationers clearly described the mysterious ship, although most of them had not seen the ships of the 17th century, even in pictures.
The last meeting with the Flying Dutchman took place in 1942 near Cape Town. In front of four people, the sailboat entered the harbor of Table Bay and ... disappeared into the air.
2. "Mary Celeste"
In 1861, the most "pr O cursed" ship in the history of navigation - "Amazon". After 48 hours, the captain died for an unknown reason. The very first voyage of the two-masted brigantine ended with a hole in the hull, and during repairs a fire broke out on board. While crossing the Atlantic, the Amazon collided with another ship.
In 1872, the “spellbound” brigantine had a new owner and a name - “Mary Celeste”. November 7 Benjamin Briggs went to sea and headed for Genoa. On board were 1701 barrels of wine and spirits.
In addition to Captain Briggs, an experienced sailor, who, by the way, did not take a drop of alcohol in his mouth, there was an equally experienced assistant, a cook and four sailors on board. The captain's wife and two-year-old daughter also set sail.
On December 4, 1872, from the Dei Graces, which left New York a week later and followed almost the same course, 600 miles from Gibraltar, about halfway between the Azores and Portugal, they saw a two-masted brigantine without signs of life.
Two hours later, the sailors from the Dei boarded the Celeste. All things, with the exception of some documents and a chronometer, remained in place. The last entry in the ship's log was made on 24 November. From it it followed that the swimming was proceeding normally.
The ocean in the Azores region was stormy for a whole week. The pump turned out to be faulty, there was knee-deep water in the hold. The boat was missing.
A few days later, the Dea Gracia entered the port of Gibraltar, dragging the Celeste in tow. The investigation concluded that the crew left the ship for some unknown reason. Briggs, the investigator decided, seeing that the pump was not working, and fearing that the Celeste would sink or the cargo would explode in the hold, he boarded the boat and tied it to the brigantine (a piece of rope was found on board). A sudden gust of wind broke the rope, and the boat was carried away from the ship. She could sink immediately or still float in the stormy ocean for some time. There was no chance for people to survive in such a storm.
Since that strange incident, the Mary Celeste has changed hands frequently. She sank off the coast of Haiti in 1884. The captain colluded with the first mate and the owners. He loaded the ship with cheap rubber boots and cat food and deliberately landed her on a reef. Then he said that he was carrying a very valuable cargo, and demanded damages from the insurance company. Unfortunately for him, "Mary Celeste" did not immediately go to the bottom. Representatives of the insurance company managed to visit her on board and saw that the cargo cost much less than what the sailor demanded. The captain and assistant were sent to prison.
Most likely, the "Mary Celeste" would have remained a little-known ship, if not for ... Arthur Conan Doyle. The hero of his story "Statement of J. Habakuk Jepson", a fictional ship's doctor Jepson, was the only one who survived after the attack of African bandits who declared jihad on Christians. The doctor was saved by the sacred stone he had.
The story was written so vividly and convincingly that the British and American authorities began an official investigation. Conan Doyle published the story anonymously, so it was attributed to the pen for some time. Robert Stevenson and compared in style with Edgar Poe. With the light hand of a literary father Sherlock Holmes since then, the brigantine has been called not “Mary”, but “Maria”.
After the release of the story, for which Conan Doyle received about 30 guineas, decent money in 1883, a huge interest flared up in Celeste, which did not fade for more than a hundred years.
It is no longer possible to establish where the stories came from that bloodied weapons and blood on the sails were found on board. There were really quite a few pirates in those parts in the second half of the 19th century, but this does not explain the fact that they did not touch the safe with money and the cargo, which, by the way, cost 35 thousand dollars, almost three times more than the brigantine itself.
It was also said that on the Celeste they allegedly found cups with still steaming coffee and plates with leftover food. This was not true, if only because people from the Dei climbed the brigantine only two hours after its discovery.
Of course, theories and abductions by aliens were put forward, and meetings with a giant octopus and a huge wave that washed all people off the board. Some of the lovers of sensations even agreed to the point that they accused people from the Celeste of the disappearance Morenhaus, captain of the Dei. He allegedly, while still in New York, persuaded three sailors for big money to seize the ship, which he then “found” and received a good bonus for it. But this theory, like dozens of others, is not supported by facts. The true reason that caused Captain Briggs and his men to leave the ship will probably forever remain a mystery.
3. "Urang Medan"
Two American ships in the Strait of Malacca in June 1947 received a distress signal. He came from the Dutch cargo ship "Urang Medan". The man, in a voice weakening every second, managed to tell that the captain and all his teammates seemed to have died. His last words were, "I'm dying too," followed by silence.
When the Silver Star approached the Dutch ship, it turned out to be completely intact. The radio operator was right: there were no living people on board. The rescuers noticed that the faces of all the sailors were distorted with terrible grimaces, as if they were either afraid of something or were dying in terrible agony.
The sailors from the "Silver Star" wanted to go down into the hold, from where it blew cold, but they were prevented by smoke that suddenly fell from below and a fire broke out.
He was so strong that the Americans had to urgently return to their ship. As soon as they managed to sail to a safe distance, the Urang Medan was blown into the air by a strong explosion.
There are quite a few theories about the death of the Urang Medan crew and the ship itself. The most common one says that the nitroglycerin and potassium cyanide that the ship was carrying somehow leaked out and, in contact with sea water, formed hydrogen cyanide, which poisoned people. As for the explosion, it could well have come from nitroglycerin.
4. "Carroll A. Dearing"
This five-masted schooner, named by its owner in honor of his son, was built in 1911 and served to transport goods. On December 2, 1920, the ship departed Rio de Janeiro for the United States. There were 12 crew members on board.
Passing by the lighthouse at Cape Laukat on January 28, 1921, the schooner signaled that all her anchors had been torn off. The caretaker was the last person to see the Carroll A. Dearing. According to him, he was asked to report from the side into the mouthpiece to Norfolk that a tug should be prepared.
Three days later, the Carroll A. Dearing was found aground near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. There were no people on board. Also missing were two lifeboats, a logbook and navigational equipment. Judging by the state of the personal belongings of the team members, they were in a great hurry.
The Carroll A. Dearing was in perfect working order. The fact that at about the same time several other ships mysteriously disappeared in those parts led the authorities to conclude that the schooner and other ships were victims of pirate attacks or a riot had taken place on board.
5. "Beychimo"
The cargo ship Beychimo was built in 1914 to trade in leathers and furs and to supply the Inuit settlements in northwest Canada. During the next voyage in October 1931, the ship got stuck in the ice. Unable to free the Beychimo, 36 members of the team abandoned it.
During a storm, the ship escaped from the ice captivity, but, according to the sailors, it received serious damage that did not allow it to be operated. "Beychimo" was thrown in full confidence that he would go down very quickly. However, the ship not only did not sink, but drifted along the coast of Alaska for almost four decades.
The last time he was seen in 1969, when he was again stuck in the ice. In 2006, the Alaskan authorities tried to find "Beychimo", but all searches were unsuccessful. The “Ghost Ship of the Arctic”, as it is called, either sank or continues to drift in Arctic waters.
Of course, you have heard of the Flying Dutchman - a ghost ship that appears on the horizon to scare sailors and disappear just as quickly. Phantom ships have been part of maritime legends for hundreds of years. But are there real prototypes for such legends? Today we will talk about ships abandoned under strange circumstances.
Kaleuche
A ghost ship that appears every night near the coast of the island of Chiloe. This is of course a legend according to her, the ship carries the souls of people who died at sea. Those who have seen him say that he is very bright, beautiful and is always accompanied by the sounds of music and the laughter of people. There are others who believe that with his music he lures fishermen to then turn them into slave crew members who will be cursed for all eternity and wear their leg curved around their backs.
Urang Medan
in 1947, 2 American ships received a distress signal off the coast of Malaysia. The caller introduced himself as a member of the crew of the Dutch ship Urang Medan, and said that the captain and the rest of the crew were dead. His speech became more and more unintelligible, until it disappeared completely, with the words I die.
When help arrived, the ship itself was found to be intact, but the entire crew, including the dog, were dead, their bodies and faces frozen in horrific poses and expressions, and many pointing their fingers at something invisible to the eye. Before rescuers could figure out what had happened, the ship caught fire.
Carroll A. Deering
in 1921, the ship was returning from a trading trip to South Africa, but near Cape Hatteras, it ran aground. When help arrived in time, it turned out that the ship was empty. There was no navigational equipment, no logbook, no boats.
Beychimo
In 1931, this cargo ship was trapped in the ice near Alaska. After several attempts to break through the ice, the crew abandoned the ship. After some time, in a strong storm, the ship managed to escape, but it was badly damaged, and the company owner of the ship decided to leave it. Surprisingly, Beychimo did not sink, but continued to swim for another 38 years near Alaska, becoming something of a local legend. He was last seen in 1969.
Octavius
In 1775, the whaling ship Herald came across a ship floating aimlessly along the coast of Greenland. When members of Herald's team boarded the Octavius, they found the bodies of the crew and passengers frozen from the cold. The last entry in the logbook was made 13 years ago. According to legend, the captain bet that he would quickly return to England via the East Route, but the ship got stuck in the ice.
Joita
In 1955, this ship was heading for the Tokelau Islands, but something happened. After 5 weeks, the ship was found completely empty in the South Pacific. The ship had no passengers, no crew, no cargo, no lifeboats, and one side of the ship was severely damaged. Joyta's radio wave was tuned to a distress signal, and a doctor's bag and several bloody bandages were found on deck.
The mystery of the disappearance of the team was never solved.
Lyubov Orlova.
The Soviet cruise ship, until 1999, belonged to the Far Eastern Shipping Company, and then was sold to an American cruise company. After 13 years, they decided to get rid of the ship. On January 23, 2013, she was towed for scrapping to the Dominican Republic, but the towing cable broke and the ship drifted. Attempts to take him in tow again proved fruitless. Since January 24, 2013 Lyubov Orlova has been in free drift in the Atlantic Ocean without a crew and identification lights.
In January 2014, notes appeared in the Western yellow press that a ship inhabited by cannibal rats was heading for the coast of Ireland or Great Britain.
Lady Lavibond
1748. The captain of the ship, Simon Peel, had just married, and to celebrate the occasion, he went on a cruise with his wife, despite the old sailor's signs that a woman on a ship was unfortunate.
Rock was pleased that the first mate was also in love with the same woman and, out of jealousy and anger, drove the ship straight to the sandbar. Lady Lavibond sank, pulling everyone on board with her. According to legend, since the shipwreck, the ship appeared near Kent every 50 years.
Mary Celeste
It was discovered completely empty on December 4, 1872 in the Atlantic Ocean. The ship was in suitable conditions with sails raised and a full supply of food. But all of his boats, the captain's journal and crew have mysteriously disappeared. There were no signs of a struggle, and all the alcohol and belongings of the crew remained intact, which ruled out the pirates.
