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Mary Celeste: Full Sails. Full Cargo. No Crew.Episode 91:26

The Ship That Sailed Itself

Ocean and weather data reverse a central assumption: the ship did not need its missing crew to reach the place where it was discovered.

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Transcript

  1. The Mary Celeste was found adrift with its lifeboat missing.

  2. All 10 people aboard disappeared, and none were ever seen or heard from again.

  3. The final log entry was recorded at 5 a.m. on November 25th, 1872.

  4. That morning, the ship was making 8 knots near Santa Maria in the Azores.

  5. Oliver Deveau and John Wright boarded the Mary Celeste and found nobody aboard.

  6. 3.5 feet of water sloshed below, while one pump stood disassembled.

  7. But food and water remained for six months, and the alcohol cargo was largely intact.

  8. The captain's and crew's personal belongings were undisturbed.

  9. The Mary Celeste was carrying 1,701 barrels of industrial alcohol.

  10. Historical weather data supported the possibility that the ship drifted without a crew.

  11. The reconstruction found the Mary Celeste could drift from the Azores to its discovery location without a crew.

  12. Oceanographer Phil Richardson speaks about the ship's condition. The discovery crew sailed it, so it was in really good shape.

  13. The reconstruction left one question: why abandon a ship in such good shape?

  14. Captain Briggs calculated a position; the drift model placed him 120 miles west of it.

Where it leaves off

Briggs may have believed the Mary Celeste was 120 miles farther east than it really was.

Next: Episode 10, The Clock That Put Them 120 Miles Off Course

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