Mid-Nineteenth Century Schooner Discovered by Shipwreck Explorers
Side scan sonar image of the wreck of the schooner Ocean Wave
The battered remains of the Canadian schooner Ocean Wave, which capsized and eventually sank from a sudden and violent squall, has been found in the depths of Lake Ontario. Shipwreck explorers Jim Kennard, Roger Pawlowski and Roland Stevens located the schooner off Oswego, NY while surveying an area of the lake for historic ships.
Capsized in the Lake
In early November 1890 the schooner Ocean Wave, heavily laden with a cargo of hemlock lumber and lath, was bound for Oswego from Trenton, Ontario. When the schooner was within 15 miles of its destination it encountered a sudden and violent squall from the south. A tug boat captain reported he was forced to run with his barge tow to a port on the St. Lawrence River, “It lashed the lake into a raging torrent that no vessel could have lived through it”. The winds at Oswego were recorded as high as 34 mph, however in the middle of the lake they could have been over 45 mph. The waves created by these high winds may have exceeded 12 feet in height. The following day there were several reports from ships coming into port that they had passed what appeared to be the schooner Ocean Wave now bottom up and floating in the lake. A section of the stern with lath was seen floating northward. A tugboat was sent out from Oswego to rescue any survivors and possibly retrieve the sinking ship. The schooner was observed to be on its port side with just a portion of the starboard rail above the water and her spars floating nearby. The stern had been washed away and only a small portion of the lumber cargo remained in the hold. The yawl was still attached to the schooner but there were no survivors. The squall must have come very fast and hit hard, not giving the crew any time to reach the yawl and possible safety. Because the Ocean Wave was so badly broken up and the cargo of lumber nearly gone it was not worth towing back to Oswego.
After the squall the winds subsided for the next week and the Ocean Wave continued to float around Lake Ontario at the mercy of the wind and lake currents becoming a hazard to other ships. Ten days later some of the debris from the schooner reached Mexico Bay at the eastern end of Lake Ontario. However, the Ocean Wave was not with these pieces of flotsam, the ship had finally sunk along the way.
The Ocean Wave, a two-masted schooner, was built in Picton, Ontario, Canada in 1868. The schooner had a length of 81 feet, a beam of 20 feet, and a carrying capacity of nearly 100 tons.
Discovery, Survey, and Identification of the Wrecked Schooner
The shattered remains of a sunken wreck were initially located in 2012 using a high resolution DeepVision side scan sonar system during a search for shipwrecks in Lake Ontario. This summer the team returned to the wreck site three times deploying a VideoRay remote operated vehicle (ROV) to obtain video recordings and sonar measurements of the shipwreck in an effort to identify the sunken ship. The wreck was that of the remains of an old schooner. The deck, much of the stern and the cabin are missing. The masts are gone except for a small stub about 3 or 4 feet of the foremast. Both sides of the ship have fallen away and lay next to the hull. Except for the area around the bow, most of the schooner lies flat as a pancake on the bottom. The anchors that would have hung on the bow rail and the windless used to hoist them are also gone. The scene of the wreck site is most characteristic of a ship that capsized with its parts and pieces torn or fallen away while upside down during a violent storm. Sonar measurements were made by both the ROV and the side scan sonar. We now believe that this ship is the Ocean Wave after determining that this it is the correct length and width and is the only known schooner to have capsized and then sunk in this area of Lake Ontario.
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Source: http://www.shipwreckworld.com/