This last week in Hurricane Sandy the HMS Bounty sunk off the coast of North Carolina, the Captain is still missing and one other crew member was lost. While the HMS Bounty was a replica built for the movie Mutiny on the Bounty, none the less it had its own history and following. Last year during Irene the famous covered bridge in Vermont was lost. Many Railroad museums have also been the victims of these super storms. This got me thinking about how sometimes no matter how much we work to preserve historic artifacts sometimes things happen way beyond our control and they are lost.

This brings me to some discussion points, historic artifacts have been lost both while being operated or used and some lost while in "secure" locations. So in the railway preservation movement how should we look at operation of the one of a kind artifacts? How much consideration should be given to the risk of operation vs stuffed and mounted? In railway preservation where have we lost more in operation or in storage or stuffed and mounted.

I don't think there is any right answer but thought it was worth discussing.

Here are a couple of pictures of the HMS Bounty...

Great posting. Bounty is an incredibly sad story, yet I still think a certain percentage of artifacts should be steamed, sailed, flown...open to the public, etc. Seeing these things doing what they were meant to do, in context, captivates and inspires future preservationists and restorers.

Here's a shot I took of Bounty on July 14th of this year, during her stop in the beautifully preserved seaport of Newburyport, Massachusetts. No doubt a common site on State Street...a hundred years ago.

I'll begin by saying that the loss of a ship or artifacts pales in comparison to the loss of life. That is truly catastrophic.

The devastating loss of the Bounty is being felt throughout the tall ship community and many questions remain. Out of Bounty's 16 soul crew, 14 were recovered. One crew member died as a result of injuries recieved during the abandoning/rescue attempt. That crew member was Claudene Christian. Those of you familiar with the original HMS Bounty's story will remember the Christian name. Claudene, of Pitcarin Island, was a direct decendant of Fletcher Christian. The ship's captain, Robin Walbridge is listed as missing and efforts continue to find him.


Bounty was enroute to St Petersburg, FL from New London, CT when she encountered Hurricane Sandy. At 2118 hrs on 10/28, she lost her generator and began "taking on more water than they would like." At this point, she still had propulsion. The captain stated that he would wait until morning to determine whether or not assistance was needed. At 0253 hrs on 10/29, Bounty was located 90 miles southeast of Cape Hatteras. The captain reported that they had lost propulsion and were unable to keep up with the water coming in. Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City, NJ launched a C-130 to provide assistance and reestablish communications with Bounty. At 0626 hrs, the crew was reported to have donned their anti-exposure suits, abandoned Bounty, and safely transferred themselves to life rafts. Two USCG helicopters went out and rescued 15 of the crew members, but were unable to locate the captain. Ms. Christian died in hospital afterward. Many questions remain like, "Why was she out there in the first place?" There is much speculation as well, but the investigation will hopfully reveal all.

The loss of her twin 375HP engines was Bounty's final nail in the coffin. The loss of her ability to manuever guaranteed that she would turn beam to the wind and seas. If her engines had not failed, it is possible that she could have survived along with additional dewatering pumps provided by the USCG.

It is interesting that the barque Picton Castle, another tallship of similar size, chose to postpone her voyage to the southern Pacific because of the hurricane.

Such a tragic loss!

From Recommended Practices:
http://railwaymuseums.org/Static/documents/RecommendedPractices.pdf
5.2 Conservation Practices
3. Railway museums create categories of objects to determine which objects will be used, which will be stored or given special treatment due to condition, and how all objects in all categories will be used, stored, and cared for.
4. Railway museums must pay particular attention to objects that may be designated for operation. While safe, reliable performance must remain a primary concern, documentation and preservation of original materials, parts, or configuration should be undertaken and samples retained, in keeping with standard museum practice.

Wesley

And thus, the policy of the RMPA and Smithsonian, that locomotives are preserved artifacts, and will note be operated. We've seen several P-51 Mustangs flown into the ground, and now the "Bounty" is lost at sea.
The other side of the coin is that operating artifacts of transportation are inspiring in a manner that static exhibits simply mimic. While teaching, I had my students lay out the lines of the "Hindenburg" on the school fields, but to see it once again in the sky? That would be something grand, yet bearing, as history told us, a huge weight of liability. Still, operated inside limits of constraint and margins of safety, I think a solid argument should be made for experiential learning with the public.

On a side line, how deep is the water where "Bounty" went down? If she did not break up and is at 100 feet or less, I can see salvors going for her.

The depth in that area is over 2,000 feet. She belongs to the sea now.

As mentioned, the loss of life is by far the most serious aspect of this story. It is tragic and very sad. One confirmed death, and with each passing hour, the outlook for the captain worsens.

Railroading is dangerous as well, but the Tall Ship fraternity routinely ventures into situations where things can turn life threatening very quickly. That is often overlooked.

As for the loss of a historic artifact, the HMS Bounty is exactly what you might do if you wanted to preserve an original artifact while also allowing the public to experience that artifact. The original Bounty is long gone, let's imagine what might have happened if she had survived and been preserved. The group may well had said "She's too historic a vessel to risk at sea, let's build a replica..."

Had the bounty been built today, there certainly would have been plenty of controversy. The ship isn't the same size as the original. She was built 1/3 larger (Yes larger) to allow room for the cameras and crews. Imagine building a narrow gauge locomotive replica, but up-scaling it to standard gauge.

The ship was never intended to be an artifact. In fact, it was to be burned as part of the movie. Marlon Brando objected to that, and threatened to walk off the set.

After the movie, the ship lived a life a lot like some old 4-4-0 used in tourist railway service. She was parked in Florida for 20 some years as a tourist attraction. At one point in her career, she even lost her Coast Guard Certification. Restoration work got it back, and the ship returned to operation. She's had a few owners since then, the most recent apparently being HMS Bounty Organization LLC. I don't know any details on that organization.

As I said, the story reads a lot like some old steam loco that was purchased by a Hollywood studio and then bounced around to various place. It's astounding she has survived this long. In doing so, she became a historic artifact in her own right, if that's possible for a replica.

One additional comment. There's some confusion as to whether or not she's actually sunk. Obviously she's "foundered" as shown in the photos, but has she actually sunk? Being a wooden hulled ship, is there enough buoyancy to keep her afloat, though she's flooded? I don't know the answer to that. A couple people seemed to think she had continued to drift in the condition shown in those photos.

Bob, my guess is the Diesels on board have dragged her to the sea floor. The wood of her construction is probably oak and pretty dense. Then there is copper sheathing, and lots of other metal and cargo to weigh her down. Her displacement is caused by the amount of water displaced by her "dry bowl of air". Filled with water, her displacement is nil, and she'd be pretty taxed to float. And yeah, at 2,000 feet, she's gone for all time.
Which...presents a good argument for building and operating replicas, does it not?

Exactly right!

The first Pride of Baltimore, (a topsail schooner) had a similar story as the Bounty. She was a replica of a privateer used in the War of 1812. On March 14th, 1986, she encountered a line of squalls that caused her to shorten sail. She encountered a microburst with winds of 70kts that knocked her down. An aft hatch was left open causing her to down-flood and prevented her from righting herself. She capsized and took four of her twelve soul crew with her.

There have been many lessons learned by demise of vessels like the "Pride", Niobe, Pamir, Marques, Albatross (made famous by the movie "White Squall"), and now Bounty. Throughout my time in the tallship community (3 years on USCG Barque Eagle, 10 years with Mystic Seaport, and over 20,000 natical miles traveled under sail alone) I have studied their cases and sailed accordingly. The book Tall Ships Down documents these cases and is a great read. It was also a required reading for all Boatswain Mates of the Watch on Eagle.

From the Virginian Pilot:

I heard reports that she was floating with just the masts out of the water as shown in the photos for some time. How long she floated that way, and if she still is, is unclear.

Someone from the Lady Washington* crew was on the radio yesterday talking about the loss of the Bounty. He said that people shouldn't think the effort to sail her was foolish. He said that the ship could easily have weathered much worse sees than she was in, but losing power and the ability to maneuver in that weather doomed her. He also said that had the same storm rolled into the Puget Sound, that they'd have taken their ship south into the same type of weather to avoid damaging her in port.
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Washington

But as for RR stuff damaged like this, that would be limited to buildings, wood rolling stock and roadbed in a bad flood for the most part. Sure, the B&O museum snow collapse caused a lot of damages to locomotives, but not really to boilers or running gear to a great degree on locomotives.
With a locomotive, I'd think fire is the real threat.

That's great, but in this case, staying in port wouldn't have resulted in the death of one (likely the captain as well), the risk of 14, and the total loss of the vessel.

I have the highest level of respect for anyone holding the title of Captain and the burden of responsibility that is bestowed upon them. As a USCG coxswain, I have experienced it first hand. However, I am left wondering what the motivation was for sailing the Bounty in spite of the storm while other and more seaworthy vessels chose to evade it or remain in port altogther. Based on the information at hand, I think it was a poor decision. I hope I am proven wrong by the findings of the investigation.

The Space Shuttle Enterprise took damage one the deck of the Intrepid in NYC as well, and she's no replica. Although Enterprise never went to orbit, she is an Orbiter, complete with an Orbiter hull number, OV-101.



Yes, part of the vertical stabilizer is hanging off haphazardly.

The motivation is pretty obvious, isn't it? They were trying to move the ship out of the area affected by the storm. As was mentioned, if they had not had an engine failure, the ship would have had no problems with the conditions.

I can't find exact details at the moment, so rather than posting incorrect data, I'll just say that Captain Walbridge was an experienced and respected captain, with many years at the helm of the Bounty. During those many years he's obviously been in a lot of storms before.

The ship was 200 miles off the coast, heading in a direction that was out of the worst part of the storm. Had the engines not failed, it is quite likely the ship would have been a very minor footnote in the storm, reading something like "The Bounty sailed south to Florida to avoid the storm..."

Had the ship remained at dock and been damaged or destroyed, the captain would have been criticized for that as well. It's very common practice for ships to head out to sea in the face of an advancing storm, typically they can ride the storm out better away from land. But it's always a gamble, and you don't always win.

He made a choice to take a voyage that should have been well within the ship's capabilities. He had no way to know the engines would fail. He chose to abandon ship when the situation deteriorated and he nearly made it into the life raft. Three crewmembers were swept overboard as they tried to abandon ship. One was pulled into a raft, one was later found dead, and the captains fate is unknown at this time, though it certainly doesn't look promising for him.

There are plenty of "what if's" and "why didn't he?" in this story. It's easy to criticize his decision after the fact, hindsight is always 20/20. But we don't know all of the details yet, and we may well never know them.

It is likely that his decisions and the engine failure cost him his life. That happens from time to time at sea. He's not the first captain to go down with his ship, nor will he be the last. It's a dangerous profession, and there's little margin for error.

Of course the ships would be safer if they stayed at the docks. But then they wouldn't be ships, would they?