Florida Diving History of 60's and 70's: Recovering Portuguese Galleon Ship Anchor
Story of Recovering Old Portuguese Galleon Ship Anchor that weighs 1500 pounds.
A narrative slide show can be found here:
http://www.vimeo.com/8122747
The open water dive excavation trip consisted of a dive team that dove the Florida Rivers, caves and coast lines in the 60’s and 70’s. According to my father, the recovery of this anchor occurred in the early 70’s and was one of my father’s most exciting open water dives.
They used the Snoopy boat and old trailer fuel tanks to recover an Old Portuguese Galleon Ship Anchor. The old trailer oil fuel tanks for buoyancy shown here:
They connected the Snoopy Boat to the old TV/Dive van. Notice the four extra five gallon gas cans to make sure they had enough fuel to make it back into port. (Note this as it goes to show good planning will keep you safe.)
They used the old carryall for all the dive gear including the dive tanks.
They launched the Snoopy boat and docked it to get it ready for the trip. By the time this photograph was taken, the Snoopy boat was finally logoed on the flying bridge with mask, fins, snorkel and its name Snoopy in gold on the side. They loaded all those old trailer fuel tanks on the boat and headed toward the dive site.
Once they got close to the dive site they unloaded the fuel tanks behind the boat. Once they located the Old Portuguese Galleon Ship Anchor, they filled the tanks full of sea water.
They ran the tanks down a line into the deep blue all the way to the sea floor. Once the divers were on the bottom, they were about fifty feet from the anchor.
Once the tanks were on the bottom, the divers rolled the tanks by hand over to the anchor and then connected the tanks to the anchor with chains and started to fill the tanks with air as shown here:
Once they started working around the anchor, the water got so murky that the camera could not capture the work being done.
So the camera person got distracted and took pictures of the tropical marine life. Here is spool of fish that came by as they were working on attaching the fuel tanks to the anchor.
The bubble like things is dirt in the water that was getting stirred up from working on the anchor project. That is a squirrel fish on the bottom.
Here are more fish that were in the area:
Here is a picture of a big moray eel that was under a ledge by the anchor.
An angle fish when the experts say there is no tropical fish off the coast of Daytona Beach. However, this is actually off of Flagler beach which is north of Daytona Beach. They were about twelve miles off shore.
Here is a grey angle fish:
Here is a lobster and again these are all off of Flagler Beach:
Here is a little brown groper and a parrot fish on the right:
It was just too murky to get any more photos of the anchor on the sea floor so back on the surface and on to business of lifting the anchor from the sea floor.
Notice the bubbles. That is were the anchor broke lose. My father told Don not to break the anchor loose until they moved the boat because the boat was anchored over top the old Spanish Galion anchor. My father did not trust him so he let the boat back. Good thing he did because the anchor broke loose and the old fuel tanks came all the way to the surface and became air borne and then slammed back into the water. When this occurred, the force of the tanks hitting the water dented the ends of the tanks. The tanks came up like a rocket. The plexiglass in the front of the photograph is the flying bridge of the Snoopy boat.
The divers in the water to the left of the drums are Don and dentist Dr. Jim who were told not to do what they did but they did it anyway.
Here you can see the dent in the lead drum caused by the impact. You can only imagine what would have happened if those drums had impacted the boat. I can imagine they got an ear full when they approached the boat.
Dr Jim on the left and the rest are still in the water trying to get another tank.
Here they are trying to get the anchor tied up so it will float correctly. They have to haul it about seven miles.
This photograph is after the divers got the anchor up and three drums chained to it, aligned and a rope tied so they could haul it in with the snoopy boat. This is what the anchor looked like when they first got it up to the surface.
This is another view that shows my father going down with a tank to put more air into the big tanks. You can get a little prospective on the size of the drums and anchor.
A view from below the anchor up into the sun above:
Water surface view:
This photograph shows the anchor and how it was chained to the tanks. It was a tough job getting the 1500 pound anchor chained to the tanks.
Of course, Don has to be a ham. Someone got something smeared on the lens. Probably my father:
Here they are on their way back:
A storm comes up while they are out there. Imagine what a ride they would have had if those drums came up under the boat.
A rainbow after the storm passes. The ocean was really rough for awhile and bounces them around. Notice the white caps in the distance. The anchor stayed attached.
Here is another photograph of the rainbow:
They had to stay out overnight. They drifted north almost up to St. Augustine and had to drag the anchor back. The extra fuel they took with them saved the day. This photograph shows them coming into Matanzas Inlet (14 miles (23 km) south of St. Augustine) that is not supposed to be navigable. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matanzas_Inlet). The tide was going out and it took all the boat had to drag the anchor and the tanks against the current.
Sure enough, the boat did not have enough power to make any appreciable headway and they drifted over into a sand bar. Don and my father went over to the anchor to try and get it to float again. When they went over there they climbed onto the tanks. Don fell off the green tank and my father caught him as the current carried him past him. To make room for him, my father moved to the front tank (green tank) and found out why Don fell off. There was oil all over it. The tank was like a greased pig, and my father fell off the tank. Don was not able to catch him and he drifted out toward the ocean. Don got an inner tube and went and got my father.
They came in where the waves were breaking, and there were a bunch of surfers there. Back in the day, there was commercial where a guy comes out of the ocean drinking wine and sitting down and Don and my father decided to mimic the commercial. They wore their sunglasses and caps and walked out of the ocean rolling up the rope and the surfers thought they were nuts.
They finally got the anchor off the sand bar and got through the bridge as shown in the distance.
This photograph shows them going under that bridge into the Halifax River. Notice the nice fins.
Here is another photograph showing them heading up the Halifax River. Notice Don is not on the front green tank.
They wrap the anchor around one of the channel markers and got the three drums over toward shore:
There is a wrecker that is going to show up.
Then they dragged anchor toward the wrecker.
They are unchaining the drums from the anchor. Also shown is a closer view of the dents in the drums.
Here is a picture of them dragging the anchor up from the water:
It was not an easy task to load the 1500 pound anchor onto the wrecker. Unfortunately the guy the owned the wrecker died of cancer about a year and half after this trip. That is Fred Rose standing on the left.
For many years the anchor was located in front of Diving Don’s TV and Dive Shop off of US1 in Ormond Beach. It was common conversation piece for the community. For those that drove by it every day wondering where it came from and how it got there, this dive recovery trip effort answers the question. Diving Don’s TV and Dive Shop has been closed for a number of years now. The shop location is now a funeral/crematorium. The anchor was moved to local historical marker until the marker under went restoration. At that time it was moved to the Ponce Inlet Light House where it still resides.
http://www.ponceinlet.org/index.html
I am not sure of the details listed on this plaque are factual, but the era seems to be correct from the information I remember my father telling me. Maybe a little creativity in wording as there was no ship wreck at the location of the anchor. Apparently it was common for these ships to lose anchors.
Here is a photograph of the anchor located at Ponce Inlet Light House:
Here is a close-up photo taken by Photo by Nicholas:
This write-up is in memory of my father.
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