Explorers to Survey 19th-Century Whaler Shipwrecked Off Alaska

NEW YORK — Nine explorers this summer will survey the wreck of the largest 19th-Century steam sailing ship, taking the first step toward raising it from beneath the polar ice cap off Alaska, the leader of the expedition said Wednesday.

“It’s like an underwater time capsule,” project director Dan W. Shirey said of the 177-foot whaler Orca, which is thought to lie perfectly preserved in the Chukchi Sea. “You couldn’t have asked for a gentler shipwreck.”

The Orca, once the pride of America’s whaling fleet, became wedged between two ice floes in September, 1897, off Point Franklin, Alaska. The ship, owned by the Pacific Steam Whaling Co. of San Francisco, sank, stern-first, in about 100 feet of water. The captain and crew escaped.

Team of Explorers

Shirey will lead the team of explorers to a base camp at Peard Bay, Alaska, on Aug. 6. They will survey and photograph the wreck using small boats, sonar and remote-controlled, undersea vehicles, until about Sept. 30, when the winter ice begins to return.

The $2.5-million second phase of the project--dredging beneath the 628-ton vessel, attaching large slings to its frame and lifting it with barges--is to begin late next summer.

Time is limited, because a proposed offshore pipeline might disturb the historic wreck, Shirey said at the Explorers Club, which is underwriting the $150,000 first phase.

“We have found that the year-round, below-freezing temperatures of the water makes the ocean environment marine organism free,” Shirey said. “No other area of the world can offer such ideal preservation conditions for marine antiquities.”