Comments on: Edward Waite Encounters Sea Serpent

By: Remus

Remus — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 00:09:29 +0000

Aye matey, they’re out there in the deep!

My great uncle was in the navy during WWII and piloted an anti-submarine wooden hulled sailing ship off the East Coast.
The german subs couldn’t hear her and (magnetic) mines would not be triggered.
I believe that the idea of modern (noisy) boats cutting down on sightings is right on.

dogu4, I’ll look out for the books you mentioned. I had never heard of them or Farley Mowat. Thanks!

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 20:35:00 +0000

Interesting point and I see what you mean, Mnynames. From either perspective what we see on the surface is but a brief glimpse of what’s happening, and as for what’s below; even moreso, keeping us continuously interested in reports like these.

By: Mnynames

Mnynames — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 20:14:14 +0000

Actually Dogu, most modern ships take as direct a route as possible, and their speeds are much greater, making their travel times shorter. Thus, wide regions of the oceans today are seldom observed, despite the increased number of vessels travelling today.

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 20:08:19 +0000

Thanks for that corroboration, Mnynames. Would love to know more if you come across it. I can understand where details like that would be supressed or presumed to be imaginary or misidentified, so the fact that there were a couple could mean they were more plentiful though no one would suggest an every-day kind of event.
And that’s interesting speculation about sail versus mechanical power, and it would make sense, though the powered ships move over wider and more remote parts of the ocean since they don’t rely on the regular winds and currents that dictated the routes of almost all traffic before power.
In the mean time I’ll keep my eyes open for those Farley Mowat book, (Sea of Slaughter)which I will say again, might open your eyes when it comes to imagining the kind of wild landscape that we think was like what we see now, for the most part, but was infact crucially different, Native Americans’ impacts (positive and negative) not withstanding.
Remus; regarding the indiginous people, Farley Mowat, since I referrenced him, is also the author of a couple of books regarding the caribou culture of the woodland Eskimo in Northern Canada, “the People of the Deer” and “the Desperate People” which I’m sure most people with an interest in the history, would find very interesting.

By: Mnynames

Mnynames — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 19:00:11 +0000

There are 2 naval encounters that I’m aware of, both I believe dating back to the first world war. The first was accidental, while the second was intentional. I’m afraid, having just moved, that all my books are still packed, so excuse me if my facts are a bit off, but this is what I remember-

First incident- A German U-Boat captain observed a huge, serpentine animal blasted out of the water when he torpedoed an enemy vessel. The animal then writhed about for some time in the bloody water before disappearing. I want to say this was in 1918, towards the close of the war. I recall reading about it when I was a child (Have read other retellings subsequently), which is why I placed it first.

Second incident- An allied destroyer captain, probably British, patrolling in arctic waters encounters a very large, classic maned water horse, swimming lazily about. Amazingly, he decides to give the boys some target practice, so they open up the main guns on the beast, the second or third shots htting it dead on, causing it to collapse and sink rapidly. Destroyer sunk by a U-Boat a week or so later, with at least one sailor attributing the sinking to the albatross effect of having killed the sea monster. I want to say this was somewhat earlier in the war, say 1916 or so.

A further thought- Obviously these animals were always rare, or else they would be listed right alongside whales as known denizens of the deep, but the majority of sightings occured during the age of sail. Sailing ships make very little noise, compared to modern cargo ships and oil tankers. Could this explain the scarcity of modern reports? Or did the 19th century slaughter of whales eliminate their main food source, and they have yet to recover? As always, food for thought…

By: Remus

Remus — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 00:29:55 +0000

dogu4,

The terrible slaughter of so many species in the past is deplorable and undeniable. The same arrogant attitude was shown toward indigent folks. This was not really that long ago!

There is hope though. The beaver was once hunted to near extinction in my own part of the world. Now it has recovered to the point of being TOO populous. Same with the white-tail deer. And the mountain lion seems to be coming back along with the wolf.

Attacking unknown animals is not far-fetched. I personally think that if Bigfoot is ever proved as a physical ape, it will be by a hunter and not an “investigator”.

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 19:24:32 +0000

Remus: And of course I definitely see your points on this. The source I mentioned was, if I recall correctly, a book by Farley Mowat, the author of Never Cry Wolf which was later a movie of the same name. The particular book I’m thinking of was either “Sea of Slaughter” or “A Whale for the Killing”. They were widely read in the conservation circles and he’s been widely criticised for a few things, but he did tap into documents and information that indicates that the “full-on” wilderness of yore, days before modern field biology and zoology, the scene was not quite what we see around us today whether on land or at sea, or in the air.
Interestingly, one of the ways he estimated the population of the animals was by analysing the records of animal products (hides, pelts, eggs, barrels of oil) bought and sold in the burgeoning markets of Europe of the 17th, 18th, and 19th century. No one was taking care to record what was happening since most folks were illiterate and this was before what we consider modern field biology, but the merchants were VERY particular and detailed in what they transported and sold. Most enlightening.

By: Remus

Remus — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 17:14:02 +0000

dogu4,

I suppose that it’s possible back in the day but you would in that case have to confirm what the target was before firing. (Don’t want to risk an international incident!)

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 03:11:35 +0000

Remus; I read this in a book regarding extinctions in marine habitats. The author had been stationed aboard an operational vessel in the far north though not directly involved in submarine operations, so yeah, it could be apocryphal, or speculative.

My bad. Your right about using expensive weapons these days, and I shouldn’t have said “recent decades” since the book I think was printed in the 60s. Sorry ’bout that. I guess I’m revealing an age bias.

But since you know something first hand, do you think the idea of naval weapons operations eliminating unverifiable blips on sonar (ooops, I slipped on using radar, and I meant to change that) could be a threat, or just a distraction, is totally out of reason even with WW2 vintage ordinance? I don’t so much mean as SOP but y’know like sometimes…I have heard stories of animals targeted in other military operations, training and stuff, not outta malice so much as not aware of what they were doing, but from back in the old days. There was an entirely different mindset about wilderness and giant heards of wild animals back then, so the idea of submariners targeting a whale or whatever doesn’t so far fetched to me, in that context…

Have you ever heard of anything like that?

By: Remus

Remus — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 00:53:51 +0000

dogu4,

I don’t know where you get your “historical facts”.

As a former submariner (sonarman) I can assure you weapons worth tens of thousands of dollars are not fired at “unidentifiable” targets.

By the way, we use SONAR underwater. RADAR is mostly above-ground.

What we term “biologicals” are readily differentiated from man-made and background sources.