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Tuesday and Wednesday, May 9-10
On Tuesday evening, May 9, the Royal Captain search project team boarded the Island Explorer in preparation for a 3am departure for the Royal Captain Shoal. Note: The National Museum representatives, Mr. Conese and Mr. Agnasin, had been trying all afternoon to arrange marine escorts for our expedition, however, we were told that marines would not be able to accompany us.
Thursday, May 11
We arrived at the Royal Captain Shoal at dawn on Thursday, May 11. The boat trip had taken about 27 hours. We spent approximately 4 hours trying to anchor properly, and then sent a dive team down to locate the cannon and anchor which Franck Goddio had found ten years ago (at 12 meters and 55 meters respectively). Both were found within 1/2 hour. Having located the two landmarks, we launched the ROV at approximately 4:00pm in order to survey the vertical wall below the cannon and the anchor. Again, we quickly found both the cannon and the anchor. With the ROV settled, we were starting to go down when a squall hit the boat, and for safety reasons, we had to recover the ROV to the boat, and the Island Explorer was moved off of the reef for the evening.
Friday, May 12
On Friday, May 12, the Island Explorer again anchored on the reef, and we launched the ROV around 9:30am. We located the anchor and began down the steep reef wall. At 450 feet, the wall was still vertical. As we continued to descend, at approximately 500 feet, we lost our video from the ROV. We recovered the ROV to inspect the problem, and discovered that the glass pressure port of the underwater camera housing had imploded. The Foundation team built a new port, and we launched the ROV on its second dive of the day at 4pm.
As we descended down the reef, the wall was still steep, essentially vertical with occasional overhangs and ledges that sloped at least 45 Deg. to the vertical. We descended to 1000 feet, and flew the ROV a constant depth to the west. Note: the tracking system and integrated software to plot the ROV position did not work with the ROV against the reef wall because, due to the steepness of the wall, the acoustic paths were blocked. All navigation was therefore based on dead reckoning, using the ROV's depth transducer and estimates of distance to the north or south of the fall line beneath the anchor at 55m, which was used as the reference.
Soon thereafter, we came across our first sign of wreckage material (other than the cannon and anchor which had been jettisoned from the surface) — a shard of porcelain. After that there was another and another — shards, and even a few intact pieces. We looked in great detail at porcelain with motifs of pagodas, boats, river scenes, etc. The motifs on the porcelain were extremely clear, including the blue color of the designs. The porcelain still had its glaze, as it reflected against our camera. At 1000 feet, we also saw wood and iron in very good condition. We recovered the ROV around 9pm.
Saturday, May 13
We launched the ROV Saturday morning, and descended to the scattered debris field we had left the previous evening. At about 1,000 feet, we found wooden planking and close to this, the debris we were looking for. We continued to go down — only to find that one of the ROV thrusters wasn't functioning properly. We decided to find a porcelain shard to bring to the surface, and to check out the ROV 's thruster. With the manipulator, the ROV easily picked up a shard (about 1/2 a plate). When the ROV surfaced, and the plate shard was brought to the surface, we saw that it was in excellent condition. The motif was clear, and the glaze was intact. There was very little growth on the shard, and what little there was came off easily as we wiped our hands across the surface. The shard was from a small dish or terrain stand. Franck Goddio said this piece was typical of the East India Company and was a late 18th century piece.
Upon inspection of the ROV, we discovered a piece of cloth caught in the thruster. This was easily removed, and the ROV was sent back down for another dive. We descended down to about 1000 feet. On this dive, we continued to track the debris field downwards and continued to find many shards, timbers, bottles, iron pieces, etc., and an iron cannon estimated at 2.5m long. The slope was still close to vertical with perhaps an average slope of 70 Deg. to the vertical. (We were below 300m). At this depth, there were many big boulders, with shard debris sticking on them.
As we continued to survey the area, (the debris field was approximately 15m wide), we rounded a big boulder, and came across a ledge with piled porcelain (369m)— many of which was intact. Cups, saucers, vases, decorative pieces were all stacked up on top of this ledge (most of which were blue and white in color). On this main tumulus, we could see small Maipin vases and lids with matching trumpet vases for chimney decor. We could also see ginger jars, teapots, cups, bowls, saucers, plates. We also saw a small porcelain tray (Patipan). Several of the porcelain pieces laying on the surface lacked their original enamel artwork. (i.e. some porcelain was white with enamel which has been washed out). The condition of the porcelain looks extremely good for the blue and white pieces, with little or no concretion, ( and very little stains when they are laying close to iron). We also saw large black patches on the sand, indicating tea (and the porcelain had been packed under the tea). Nearby this site, we also found our second cannon of the day. We searched this area until 9pm.
Sunday, May 14
On Sunday at approximately 10:00am, the ROV was put in the water. We came upon (at 276m), a different part of the debris field. This was a new site or debris stream from the site of yesterday. We found many shards and a chain. Above this debris, we found approximately 6 iron cannons. As we traversed the area at a depth of about 340-350m, we came across the main tumulus of porcelain and black sand (indicating tea and rotted wood) that we saw yesterday. After surveying it thoroughly, we realized that this is indeed the main site of the wreck of the Royal Captain. The ship had come down the reef, hitting big boulders. Somewhere around 276m, the iron ballast (pig iron) was dropped out in a stream of debris. We also found another anchor. The porcelain and black-stained sediment etc. were found separate from the ballast (to the left) in an independent spot. Therefore, it looks as if most of the cargo was in this one spot approximately 12 meters long by 3 meters high, and 4m wide at the base narrowing to 2m wide at the top. This site contains an estimated 150 cubic meters of compacted material.
We searched the area laterally and went down to a maximum depth of 430m to define the total parameters of the site. There were some shards, bottles, etc. below the main site. However, the bulk was concentrated in the spot above. On our way up the reef, we also found a basin with porcelain bowls and a mug in about 117m — probably from the Captain's quarters. This is therefore, the closest artifact to the surface (besides the anchor and the cannon at 12 and 35 meters).
We surveyed the wreck site thoroughly and mapped the area (marking all the porcelain, wood, tea, cannons, we had found) on a computer grid. We recovered the ROV around 11pm.
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