Ghost Ships

Return to Sea Mysteries		Return to Railroad Destinations
The Baychimo was a sealing ship trapped by ice off the coast of Alaska in 1931. The crew made camp on the ice and figured the ship would be ground to pieces by the ice. They survived in their tent for a week while the storm continued to rage. When the storm passed, the Baychimo had disappeared! Then in 1932 gold prospectors sighted her drifting 1000 miles east of where she had been stuck in the ice. They climbed on board the ship but the engines refused to start. In 1933 some Eskimo hunters found the renegade ship over 1000 miles from where the gold prospectors had seen her! They began removing the seal skins from the cargo holds, but stopped short when a blizzard suddenly came up! In the following years the Baychimo has been seen many times but no-one has been able to subdue it. The last reported sighting was in 1956. I suppose the ship is still sailing the seven seas with no human captain or crew!		The Titanian in 1935, the lookout on the Titanian realized that the ship was sailing towards the very spot where Titanic had sunk on the date the lookout was born! He called out to the captain and warned him of their location and the captain stopped the Titanian just short of a huge iceberg directly in their path!!! Is this a coincidence or what?
		The maritana was wrecked in 1861 and most of the crew were killed, but the figurehead was untouched. This was the third ship to sink bearing the same figurehead!!! While figureheads are generally thought to be good luck, not all of them are!
The Ellen Austin in 1881, boarded an abandoned ship to take her in for a reward. Within a short time, a huge storm blew in and separated the two ships. When they finally made contact again the boarded crew had vanished! But the lure of a big reward caused a second crew to board her… Soon the ship was sailing further and faster from the Ellen Austin… It vanished over the horizon never to be seen again!		The Mary Celeste was sighted on December 5, 1872 sailing 600 miles West of Gibraltar, by the brigantine Dei Gratia. The Mary Celeste was boarded by three men sent over by Captain Morehouse to investigate the derelict ship. Everything aboard the Celeste was in fine shape. There was plenty of food and water, the cargo was all there, the crew’s personal effects were all present, even their pipes and tobacco. Some navigational instruments seemed to be missing along with the ship’s papers. Why the crew abandoned the ship remains a mystery for over 100 years now. One thing is worthy of note that the owner of the Mary Celeste had changed the ship’s name, and thus broken a legendary rule of the sea.
Top of Page	Return to Sea Mysteries	Return to Railroad Destinations