THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 30, 1995 TAG: 9508300514
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY ESTES THOMPSON, ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: HATTERAS LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
This month's weather-plagued expedition to salvage parts of the ironclad Monitor from the ocean floor won't be the last. But the expedition director said Tuesday that better ways to study the shipwreck must be used in the future.
Navy divers managed Tuesday to attach a line to the propeller of the Civil War ship. The line will be used to lift the 3,600-pound propeller when the weather clears. Expedition managers hope that will be Wednesday.
The ship rests in 230 feet of water.
Bad weather stirred by Hurricane Felix and then fallout from Tropical Storm Jerry kept seas choppy through this week. A flight Tuesday over the USS Edenton showed 8-foot swells sweeping past the 282-foot salvage vessel, which is attached to four bright orange mooring buoys in the sapphire-blue seas over the wreck.
The 1995 Monitor expedition is costing less than the one in 1993. This year, the estimated cost is between $40,000 and $50,000, said expedition director John Broadwater in a telephone interview from the Edenton.
In 1993, the trip cost about $250,000 because a research vessel with a minisubmarine aboard was leased to examine the wreckage.
Broadwater wants the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which oversees the Monitor sanctuary, to approve a different method of diving that will allow research on the Monitor without expensive ships being used as diving platforms.
If NOAA approves what's known as a mixed-gas diving method, Broadwater said, divers would not have to use a diving bell and attached air hoses to descend to the bottom. Divers using the method would breathe oxygen, helium and nitrogen and wouldn't have to wait underwater as long to decompress.
Navy divers breathe a mixture of helium and nitrogen and their decompression times are longer. Divers must slowly ascend to the surface to allow gases to escape their blood and then must sit in a pressurized chamber aboard the Edenton.
``We wouldn't need a mooring'' using the different method, Broadwater said. ``We could do mapping, archaeological recovery. It gives us more mobility. We haven't been able to afford enough time on-site to do much diving.''
Still, the cost is justifiable, Broadwater said.
``What an important icon the Monitor seems to be to the American public,'' perhaps because it was the first warship of its class and the first ironclad with a revolving turret, Broadwater said. ``That seems to carry a lot of weight with the people,'' he said.
Another Monitor-class ironclad, the Tecumsah, sank in Mobile Bay, Ala., and would be easier to work with but doesn't have the historical cachet, he said.
The Monitor provides ``a tangible way of making people proud of the past,'' Broadwater said.
The Monitor sank in a gale off Cape Hatteras on Dec. 31, 1862, as it was being towed to Beaufort for repairs. Four officers and 12 crewmen died.
The wreck remained lost until August 1973, when an expedition located it. A second trip in 1974 confirmed the wreck was the Monitor.
Over the years, various artifacts have been retrieved from the wreck. In 1977, a hull plate and a brass signal lantern were recovered. In August 1983, divers recovered the ship's four-fluked anchor. by CNB