DATELINE :- 4th July 2000
BIG ENGINE LIFT
Ambitious salvage of Civil War ironclad
A team of US divers has taken on a gigantic task this summer, with a project to remove the main engine of the American Civil War ironclad USS Monitor, which lies 16 miles off Cape Hatteras in North Carolina.
The 52m vessel is an important part of American maritime history. Built for the Union navy, it fought at Hampton Roads the first battle between ironclads (wooden vessels with iron outer armour) against the Confederate ship Virginia, in March 1861.
The Monitor was notable for being steam - as well as sail-driven, and for having cannon housed in a revolving turret. The Virginia had fixed guns and had to manoeuvre like a conventional ship of the line. The battle was inconclusive but the fact that the two fought each other fruitlessly with cannonballs for a whole afternoon changed the direction of war at sea.
A week after the battle, Britain's Royal Navy announced an end to using warships constructed of wood, and the race was on for all-iron ships carrying more powerful cannon.
Nine months after the battle, on New Year's Eve 1862, the Monitor was sunk by bad weather, with the loss of a quarter of her crew of 56. The ship rests upside down on its still-intact turret on a flat, sandy bed in 73m, representing a deep-diving challenge for the salvage team.
Over the years, smaller items have been raised from the ship and displayed at the Mariner's Museum at Newport News in Virginia. But the attempt to lift the engine, backed by the museum, the US Navy and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), requires the divers to excavate beneath the gigantic machine, where iron debris, coal and other hull contents litter the bed and have become cemented together.
The team will need to remove lower hull plates and separate the engine from the hull before raising it with slings connected to a steel frame aboard the recovery ship. Web link: www.mariners-museum.org/monitorcenter/