Appledore
Well-Known Member
On Channel 12 (Yesterday) right now!!!
The Mary Celeste
- Thread starter Appledore
- Start date
snowleopard
Well-Known Member
Was that the one where they concluded the crew took to the boat because the fumes of alcohol from the hold were burning then they couldn't get back when it burned out?
pendlecats
Well-Known Member
Don't think so SL ,,
I thought the program makers didn't come to a conclusion but stated the most likely reason for their abandoning ship.
In my opinion the reasons and evidence given for the most likely scenario was very well put together and I tend to agree with it.
Well worth watching.
I thought the program makers didn't come to a conclusion but stated the most likely reason for their abandoning ship.
In my opinion the reasons and evidence given for the most likely scenario was very well put together and I tend to agree with it.
Well worth watching.
Boo2
Well-Known Member
Interesting. Until I found this one I was going to start a thread saying that I don't find the conclusion in the program at all likely. Specifically, there was evidence of a hasty departure, but surely the master and crew would not have been so scared of the amount of water in the bilges that they would have abandoned her with the sails up ?
And if they had just passed a harbour at Santa Maria why on earth did they not try to head back to anchor ? Or if they were in the harbour then what could the reason have been for leaving the sails up when abandoning ship ? Would any master with a stake in the cargo or boat would have left her like that without a pressing reason ? The program seemed to conclude that she was abandoned near SM so it would have made more sense to have got the wife and sprog along with a couple of crew safely off in the boat and taken down the sails and anchored (if at SM) or else towed the boat alongside back to SM (if not) with just the master and a skeleton crew on board ship. Believing that the ship was sinking just does not cut it for me in terms of urgency and they were an experienced crew so I don't think they could have made that mistake. As the crew left valuables that seems to me to be far more indicative of panic than water in the bilges and a faulty pump, par for the course in a wooden ship at that time, surely ?
Nope, for me there has to be an extremely pressing reason for them to bail, and it seems to me most likely related to the cargo of industrial alcohol. Wikipedia refers to the cargo as intended for fortifying wines so I am assuming it to be ethanol rather than any other alcohol. I recon the 9 red-oak barrels that leaked their contents into the bilge have something to do with it but the program doesn't say how much the white-oak barrels would be expected to have leaked under normal circumstances ? Ethanol is very volatile so burning fumes seem extremely plausible as an urgent reason for abandoning ship in a way that bilges full of water and a blocked pump would not. Also, if they were sailing downwind then the effects of breathing ethanol fumes must have been inebriating so we can't entirely discount the possibility that they were all p*ssed.
Boo2
Appledore
Well-Known Member
Well, yes and no. As pendlecats stated, even though new evidence or theories have been discussed, there was never any evidence that the leaking barrels caught fire. I suggest that should they have done so, there would have been scorching of some sort.
I rather think they took to the boat in a hurry (only one, as the second one had been wrecked prior to departure, and no other was available), perhaps intending to stand off for a while to see what might happen, and something went wrong, the MC picking up speed and sailing away. We will never know.
Woodlouse
Well-Known Member
What happened is the crew abandoned the ship intentionally to cause a great mystery. Then one day someone would offer a reward of £5,000 for the soloution to the mystery that the crew could then claim after recreating the voyage the prove it.
It's all here.
It's all here.
