Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs

In the dark hours before dawn on October 14, 1942, the passenger ferry SS Caribou was making her regular crossing between North Sydney, Nova Scotia and Port aux Basques, Newfoundland, when a torpedo from the German U-boat U-69 struck her starboard side. She sank in under five minutes.

Aboard were civilians, military personnel, and entire families, including the ship's own captain, Benjamin Tavernor, and his two sons serving as officers. Her naval escort, HMCS Grandmère, tried to hunt down the U-boat but couldn't stop what was already unfolding in the freezing water. Of the 237 people on board, 136 didn't survive.

This episode traces the final voyage of the Caribou from her construction in the Netherlands in 1925 through the tense wartime crossings of the Cabot Strait, where U-boats had already been sinking ships throughout the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The attack left passengers scrambling for lifeboats, most of which couldn't be launched. The loss of the SS Caribou was the most devastating loss of civilian life in Canadian waters from a single sinking during the Second World War.

Written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. Original theme music is by Sean Sigfried, and you can find him at seansigfried.com.

🚫No AI was used during the production of this episode.

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This Week in Shipwrecks is the weekly maritime news series of Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs. This week's stories:

Rescuers race against time after the Virgo Transport 8 ferry capsizes in the Java Sea.

Cádiz port dredging turns up 27 cannons and a stash of silver.

New horrors surface from the 1629 wreck of the Batavia

Lake Michigan diver's body found

Archaelogists glean information from historic Bronze Age shipwreck

Sunken German U-Boat leaking TNT off the coast of Denmark

Mystic Seaport Museum announces it Maritime Trades and Foodways Day, scheduled for Saturday, September 26.

Written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. All show notes, episodes, and transcripts can be found at shipwrecksandseadogs.com.

Original theme music by Sean Sigfried, and you can find him at seansigfried.com.

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On February 18, 1952, a violent nor'easter raged through New England and two steel tankers were torn in half within hours of each other off the coast of Cape Cod. The SS Pendleton and the SS Fort Mercer, both battered by hurricane-force winds and towering seas, cracked apart in what would become one of the most remarkable maritime rescue operations in U.S. Coast Guard history.

This episode traces the disaster from the first distress calls to the daring small-boat rescues that followed, including the U.S. Coast Guard's response from Chatham, Massachusetts, where a 36-foot motor lifeboat crew set out into near-impossible conditions to save the men trapped aboard the shattered stern sections. You will hear about the chaos of coordinating two simultaneous sinkings and the extraordinary courage of the small crews who braved 60-foot waves and freezing temperatures to bring survivors home.

Joining Rich as a guest is Professor and Associate Chair of Materials Science and Engineering at Iowa State University, Ralph E. Napolitano, Jr., to examine the structural failures that doomed both T2 tankers. Mr. Napolitano is the brother of the host of Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs, Rich Napolitano.

Sources for this episode include but are not limited to the US Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation reports for the Pendleton and Fort Mercer, the oral accounts given by Bernard Webber, the United States Naval Institute, the Coast Guard Foundation, the Orleans Historical Society, and the Massachusetts Board of Underwater Archaeological Resources.

Written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. Original theme music is by Sean Sigfried, and you can find him at seansigfried.com.

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This Week in Shipwrecks is the weekly maritime news series of Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs.

A deadly ferry fire in the Philippines

A deadly cargo ship fire in China

A car-carrier fire in China

The dismantling of a Canadian shipwreck

Update about the 1533 wreck of the Bom Jesus

A rescued teenage fisherman

Artifacts from the 1776 Battle of Valcour Island

Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs is written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. Show notes, transcripts, and merchandise are available at shipwrecksandseadogs.com.

Original theme music by Sean Sigfried. You can find him at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠seansigfried.com⁠⁠⁠⁠.⁠

**🎧 LISTEN AD-FREE + BONUS EPISODES + MERCH**

👉Subscribe on Patreon: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/apple⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉Subscribe on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/spotify⁠⁠

👉Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs Merchandise is available! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://shop.shipwrecksandseadogs.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉You can support the podcast with a donation of any amount at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shipwreckspod⁠⁠⁠⁠

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On the foggy, moonless night of September 8, 1923, fourteen destroyers of Destroyer Squadron Eleven were running south from San Francisco to San Diego at 20 knots, a speed run meant to test the Navy's newest ships and their crews. Less than five minutes after a fatal turn to port, seven of them were wrecked on the rocks of Honda Point, California, in what remains the largest peacetime loss of U.S. Navy vessels in history.

23 US Navy servicemen lost their lives. They were:

From USS Young

Buchan, Ralph Kenneth

Duncan, Earl

Grady, Everett William

Harrison, Earnest Carl

Jones Ernest

Kirby, Edward Clinton

Kirk, Henry Thompson

Martin, James Tidwell

Morris, Wade Hampton

Overshiner, Gordon Jerome

Reddoch, Clitus Allen

Rogers, Leo Floyd

Salzer, Charles Alfred

Skipper, Hugh Woodfan

Slimak, Joseph John

Taylor, Max H.

Torres, Enrique

Van Schaack, Vern Russell

Young, John

Zakrzewski, August

USS Delphy

Conway, James Wheaton H.

Dalida, Sofronio

Pearson, James Watson

Written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. All episodes, images, and sources can be found at ⁠⁠⁠shipwrecksandseadogs.com⁠⁠⁠.

Original theme music by Sean Sigfried. You can find him at ⁠⁠⁠⁠seansigfried.com⁠⁠⁠.⁠

**🎧 LISTEN AD-FREE + BONUS EPISODES + MERCH**

👉Subscribe on Patreon: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉Subscribe on Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/apple⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉Subscribe on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.shipwrecksandseadogs.com/spotify⁠

👉Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs Merchandise is available! ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://shop.shipwrecksandseadogs.com⁠⁠⁠⁠

👉You can support the podcast with a donation of any amount at: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.buymeacoffee.com/shipwreckspod⁠⁠⁠

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