FROZEN IN TIME
Mysterious 500-year-old ship found in almost PERFECT condition at the bottom of the icy Baltic Sea
A SHIP which sank 500 years ago has been found in almost perfect condition at the bottom of the freezing Baltic Sea.
The "game changing" wreckage was found in the Baltic with its hull, mast and an "incredibly rare" tender boat used to ferry crew intact.
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A team of archaeologists, including scientists from the University of Southampton, say the ship, which sailed the seas when Leonardo da Vinci was alive, has "great archaeological and historical significance".
Little is known of the ship, which dates from the times when Christopher Columbus reached the Americas, and has been dubbed okänt skepp, Swedish for unknown ship.
It is older than the Mary Rose which sank in battle in 1545.
The crew of the sunken ship could have abandoned ship or have died from disease five centuries ago, according to a maritime archaeologist.
Dr Rodrigo Pacheco-Ruiz, maritime archaeologist for survey specialists MMT, said: “It’s almost like it sank yesterday – masts in place and hull intact.”
“Still on the main deck is an incredibly rare find - the tender boat, used to ferry crew to and from the ship, leaning against the main mast. It's a truly astonishing sight."
"It's in international waters 24 nautical miles offshore from Sweden.
"It's literally in the middle of the Baltic. The deepest the sea bed dropped to was 140 metres.
"We know it's the oldest shipwreck in the Baltic. There's no other ship in the world of this period like this.
"We have older ships but they are only timbers or metal - we never have a ship like this with masts and anchors.
It’s almost like it sank yesterday – masts in place and hull intact
Dr Rodrigo Pacheco-Ruiz, maritime archaeologist
"The ships that will be moving around will be smaller to those used by Columbus, they are smaller vessels that can do a little bit of everything - moving goods, people and also a bit of war. It would be like the prototype for later ships like the Mars or Mary Rose.
"We have named it the okänt skepp, which is unknown ship, and the reason we did this is because at that time did not have names. This is so early that that tradition is not there - even if it was a name it won't be a name that would be unique for it.
"The crew would be 16 tops. The length is 16 metres and the masts are about 20 metres from the deck.
"We don't know what's underneath - we don't know how many decks there are. "
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Dr Pacheco-Ruiz believed damage to the ship's stern was probably caused by metals corroding in the saltwater leading to timbers coming apart - rather than an attack on the ship.
On who were the crew and why the ship went down, he said: "That's the hardest part I think and that's something we will not be know until we have more samples.
"It doesn't look like it went down in a very dramatic fashion - it could be abandonment or the crew became diseased, they could have caught something and died and then it could be just floating.
"What we want to do this is come back and sample some of these elements of the shipwreck like timbers to precisely date the shipwreck and then we can start chasing that a bit better."
He added: "The bits we know about these ships are historically speaking, drawings at the time and carvings.
"We have some wooden models that were used to build the ships. But here we have the entire ship.
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"It's game changing because of the period it pertains to.
"The technology and the equipment that you need to get to these places - it's £50,000 a day for the ship vessel hire alone."
State-of-the-art underwater robotics were used to create images and video of the wreckage.
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