Ghost ships of the world and their missing crews
Key topics:
Over 95% of the ocean floor remains unexplored and mysterious.
Ghost ships appear adrift with no crew, baffling investigators.
Famous cases include Mary Celeste, Carroll A. Deering, Kaz II.
Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.
Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.
If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up for the BizNews channel here.
By Beth Brunnig
We know less about the oceans than we do about the surface of Mars or the moon. Indeed, over 95% of the ocean floor remains unmapped. We have no idea what’s down there – even though the sea covers most of the surface of our planet. There is no shortage of strange phenomena and bona fide mysteries – and even some fully explained phenomena retain a hint of the macabre – from red tides to underwater crop circles to USOs observed by the navies.
But nothing confronts us with the fact of our own ignorance about the mysteries of the seas more than ghost ships. They have been around for as long as humans have been on the water, and they did not stop as we entered the modern age. It’s the ultimate symbol of mystery: a ship that cannot sail without its crew suddenly appears, drifting alone and completely empty. For this reason, and by definition, we don’t count tragedies like the Octavius – found in 1776 with all her crew frozen solid in their bunks after being lost in the Northwest Passage./p>
The Mary Celeste (1872)
Perhaps the most famous of the ghost ships, the Canadian built merchant brigantine was found adrift just off the Azores on 4 December 1872. She left New York for Genoa on 7 November. She was found completely seaworthy, with her cargo of alcohol completely in-tact. None of those on board were ever seen or heard from again. The captain and the crew’s personal belongings were left undisturbed. The last log was entered 9 days before. The ship was salvaged and renamed but would be destroyed in an attempt at insurance fraud some years later. Inevitably, some would say the ship was cursed.
Read more:
The Resolven (1884)
A very similar scenario occurred just a few years later, when the Welsh ship, in good condition but with some superficial damage, was found adrift near Baccalieu Island and the settlement of Catalina in Newfoundland. The lifeboat was missing, but none of the crew of passengers were ever heard from again.
The Zebrina (1917)
During world wars, shipping can be dangerous. But when Zebrina left Falmouth for France, full of coal, the fate of the crew proved not to be linked to enemy activity – or at least not any known enemy activity. The ship ran aground in France, its cargo intact, but the lifeboat and personal belongings, as well as navigation equipment, were missing. As were the crew.
The Carroll A. Deering (1921)
The five-masted schooner had delivered a cargo of coal from Newport News to Rio and was en route to Hampton Roads when it ran aground off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, without its crew. Cape Hatteras is known as the graveyard of the Atlantic, being notorious for shipwrecks. But here the vessel managed to navigate just fine on its own, at least until it ran aground, just without any of its crew on board. There’s been a lot of speculation (including Russian operations, piracy, moonshine runners, etc.) – things like this weren’t supposed to happen in the 1920s anymore – but no official explanation has ever been offered.
Joyita (1955)
In December 1955, a damaged but buoyant merchant vessel with a working radio (albeit with a limited range due to faulty wiring) was found adrift in the South Pacific, missing 25 crew members. Despite numerous theories and extensive investigations, not a single conclusive clue has ever emerged about what happened to the missing.
Jian Seng (2006)
In 2006, about 180 km south-west of Weipa, Queensland, an Australian Coastwatch aircraft first saw an 80-metre empty oil tanker with a broken tow rope, all identifying marks removed, and zero crew. The ship’s engine was running. After boarding, a search and rescue operation was launched to find any crew. There was no sign of any illegal activity or violence. Eventually, the ship was scuttled.
Read more:
Kaz II (2007)
One of the most recent of enduring mysteries, the Kaz II was a 9.8 metre catamaran found 88 nautical miles of the north- eastern coast of Australia. Everything was normal and in place, according to those who boarded her, except that her three- man crew was missing. The engine worked. The radio worked. The sat nav worked. A laptop was on and open. Just the crew was gone. They remain missing to this day.
These instances of ghost ships continue to captivate maritime enthusiasts, historians, and conspiracy theorists alike. The mysteries surrounding these vessels often remain unsolved, leaving room for speculation and imagination. Whether lost in the vastness of the ocean or abandoned under mysterious circumstances, these ghost ships contribute to the lore of maritime history. But perhaps it’s worth thinking about these if you are about to go on a cruise, take a ferry, or set sail. If the latest satellite technology, military command, or the size of an oil tanker isn’t enough to prevent everyone from vanishing – how certain can you be your ship will arrive with you on board?