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The Alleged Arratoon Apcar Wreck Site
A Site Plan and Photo Mosaic project completed on behalf of Biscayne National Park
The Alleged Arratoon Apcar Wreck Site A Site Plan and Photo Mosaic project completed on behalf of Biscayne National Park |
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Arratoon Apcar is one of six sites dedicated as part of the NPS Heritage Trail created by The National Park Service. This is the third of the six sites MARC has documented in support of this effort. The Heritage Trail is a public outreach project designed by Brenda Lanzendorf, lead archaeologist for Biscayne National Park. The concept of the multi-wreck Trail is to focus public appreciation of the wreck sites and to illustrate the diverse array of cultural influences that shaped South Florida since colonial and pre-colonial periods. The project aims to record and preserve the remaining physical record as important cultural resources with a living history to tell... |
TYPICAL RIB SECTON: mid baseline, Arratoon Apcar
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 Possible Sister Ship to Arratoon Apcar |
Arraatoon was an Armenian flag cargo vessel of riveted steel design official number 43924, launched 6-27-1861 by James Henderson shipbuilders of Scotland. She was 261.7 feet in length and 35.2 in beam displacing 1,480 tons. She was driven by a single 250HP compound steam engine. |
 Preliminary Site Plan Sketches, Arratoon. (raw diver data file) |
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Her loss was a dramatic event. As workman camped and worked on the first platform built atop the new screw pilings of Fowey Light, still under construction, Arratoon turned too sharp and too early while en route southward to Havana. Her new course sent her headlong at the Fowey Light construction workers in the dead of night. Workman awoke to the lights and sounds of a 1500 ton steamer headed straight for them, then watched Arratoon grind to a stop on the rocks only 200 yards away. The event would be the final vindication of mariners complaining Cape Florida offered too little reckoning for the more southern obstructions of The Florida Straights.. The wreck lies just a few hundred yards eastward of Fowey Light in 15-25 feet of water. She has dug a trench for herself in the coral hard bottom and today lies scattered as sections of ribbed and riveted steel heavily encrusted and well-integrated with marine life. |
Landmarks & Exploded Site View
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 This summer season of 2006 has begun with the development of a site plan and photo mosaic of the Arratoon Apcar (as well as of the NPS "18th Century Sailing Ship" site) for Biscayne National Park. MARC divers collected image data and created perspective drawings on-site at Biscayne National Park in May of 2006. Some of the images have since been displayed on this page in progression towards the finished work products below. The finished site plan and photo mosaic are now posted as of 8-4-06, in advance of the 9-1-06 target date for completion. The site plan methodology used a combination of classic trilateration and "floating web" design. Hi resolution digital video is also recorded over the entire site systematically from a controlled perspective to create a photo mosaic of hi-res jpegs captured from video. Click HERE to see the photo mosaic
© Copyright 2006 Marine Archaeological Research & Conservation Inc. Click HERE to see the geo-referenced site plan
© Copyright 2006 Marine Archaeological Research & Conservation Inc.
Funded in part by the South Florida National Parks Trust
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