Update: Bosporus Strait Reopened After Bulker Alexis Refloated

Update: One of the world’s busiest shipping channels was closed to traffic in both directions after Alexis, an 81,623 dwt bulk carrier, ran aground on May 8, in the Bosporus Strait, connecting the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. Four tugs, … Continue reading

Overloaded Migrant Boat Sinks Near Greece — at Least 78 Dead, Hundreds Feared Drowned

Reuters reports that rescuers scoured the seas off Greece on Thursday following a shipwreck that killed at least 78 migrants, as hopes of survivors dwindled and fears grew that hundreds more, including children, may have drowned inside the crowded vessel’s … Continue reading

Scientists in Egypt Discover Fossil of an Amphibious, Four-legged Whale

Scientists in Egypt have announced that they have discovered the fossilized bones of a previously unknown amphibious, four-legged species of an ancestral whale. The semiaquatic whales called protocetids, existed over forty million years, during the Eocene period, according to findings … Continue reading

French “Russian” Mistral Amphibious Assault Ships Bound for Egypt

For the last five years we have followed the construction of two Mistral-class amphibious assault ships which were built in France under contract to Russia. If the wind named Mistral is said to “drive men and horses mad,” these ships … Continue reading

Re-Discovering the Lost Egyptian Port of Heracleion After 1,200 Years Under the Sea

In 2001, a joint French-English expedition was searching the bottom of Egypt’s Aboukir Bay for the wrecks of French warships sunk in the “Battle of the Nile” in 1798.  Instead they re-discovered a lost city.  Known as Thonis to the Egyptians and Heracleion to … Continue reading

Violent weather in the Eastern Mediterranean – bulk carrier Adriatic sinks and Brilliance of the Seas battered

Heavy rains, strong winds and high seas hit the eastern Mediterranean over the weekend with winds of 100 kilometres per hour and waves reaching heights of 10 metres,  sinking the Moldavian bulk carrier, Adriatic, off the coast of Israel and  battering the RCCL cruise ship, Brilliance of … Continue reading