Pictou Harbour shipwreck accidentally discovered by surveyors

A mystery is brewing in Pictou Harbour after a team of surveyors stumbled upon an intact shipwreck believed to be decades old.

The group from the Canadian Hydrographic Service was hired to do a complete survey of the floor of the harbour to update maps. But within days, they were shocked when the outline of a large ship appeared on their screens.

"It's a boat, 60 metres long, 12 metres wide," said Jon Griffin, hydrographer-in-charge. "It looks to have a draft, which is the part of the boat that sunk in the water."

The area has been scanned several times before, as far back as the 1950s, but the old technology didn't detect the wreck. It lies just six metres below the surface, and is locatedbetween the wharf and the nearby mill.

"We have soundings to show that they were literally on top of the boat or maybe the bow or the stern."

This time, the team is using the same kind of radarequipment that was used to discover the Franklin Expedition's HMS Erebus.

In 25 years on the job, Griffin has never found an undetected wreck like this.

"It's in shallow water, it's something we could almost reach outand touch."

History under debate

The discovery has many people in the area talking about what it could be. While some local divers and mariners knew of it, its story is under debate.

It's believed the ship likely went down before the 1950s.

"I'm thinking that, in recent memory, someone would know a ship of this size going down, or where it came from. So we're pretty excited about it," said Griffin.

Raymond Knowles grew up in the area. As soon as he heard of the discovery, he remembered old stories from his father.

"It was either a ferry, a coal boat or a cattle boat and it used to run from Pictou to Magdelan Islands or Prince Edward Island," he said. "And this had to be way back well I'm 71 so it had to be back in the 30s."

Some people believe it's an old barge that caught on fire, and was pushed away from the wharf as it sank.

Griffin hopes his team will have time to drop an underwater camera to the wreck later in the summer.

That way they'll be able to see if there areany ropes or gear attached to it that mariners need to be warned about.

"Certainly low tide, with the right weather conditions, it would compose a potential danger," Griffin said.

He's also hoping a camera will unveil more clues about what's lying at the bottom of Pictou Harbour.