[Many thanks to Peter Jordens for bringing this item to our attention.] Miguel Gutiérrez-Garitano (El Correo) writes, “Within the Fifties, the stays of a ship 5 centuries older than Columbus’ Santa María had been found within the sands of Havana; solely pictures and wooden fragments stay from the invention, because it was lined with sand and has not reappeared.” Listed below are excerpts from El Correo.
The information went unnoticed by nearly everybody: Cuba was in moments of turmoil, dominated by the Batista dictatorship and in full pre-revolutionary fervor. It was then {that a} storm uncovered the stays of a shipwreck off the coast of Havana, within the space between Tarará and Santa María, to the east of town. It was, the specialists thought, the primary international ship to reach on the shores of Cuba. The truth is, phrase unfold that it was a Viking ship, which delighted in style creativeness. Regardless of all of it, given the political and financial scenario, the investigation by the crew that discovered it—from the Speleological Society of Havana—didn’t go any additional: the boat was lined to protect it, after taking some pictures and conserving a couple of scraps of wooden.
Beginning in 2003, nonetheless, Cuban historian, archaeologist and explorer Daniel Torres Etayo picked up the path and shouldered the accountability of clarifying the enigma when pictures and samples from the hull of the ship reappeared by likelihood. The authorities despatched the samples to the Kon-Tiki Museum in Norway to be analyzed and dated. Thus, it was doable to know that it was a ship from the yr 790 of our period. Within the evaluation, fragments of iron appeared, a steel that was not recognized then in America. The images reported a helmet of nice proportions; and the info pointed extra in direction of a European vessel than a Scandinavian one, or maybe African.
The invention grew to become a revolution. Though Daniel Torres mentioned, «There are some—he commented in an interview for the newspaper Juventud Rebelde in 2012—who say that this might change historical past. However actually, I don’t assume that can occur, as a result of the one who modified it was Christopher Columbus in 1492. Additionally, the truth that others might have reached our waters first is just not unusual. We have now documented instances of Iberian fishermen who, in colonial occasions, acquired misplaced in storms whereas fishing for herring and ended up within the Caribbean with out that means to. The Atlantic didn’t signify a bodily impediment. The handicap was fairly psychological. This ship might have been a type of, which doesn’t imply that the crew settled in. I’ll even have arrived with out individuals », he underlined.
Well-known for his research of the Taíno bateyes—a form of ceremonial sq. the place pre-Columbian indigenous individuals practiced a kind of ball recreation—and a collection of shipwrecks distributed alongside the coasts of the Higher Antilles, such because the Ciudad de Alejandría, a steam that made the New York-Havana route and that sank within the nineteenth century with all its passengers on board, the works of this Cuban scholar has gone past the borders of the island. In 2011, Daniel Torres Etayo had the respect of receiving from the Nationwide Geographic Society, the Rising Explorer award, which incorporates 10,000 {dollars} along with a collection of means to enhance analysis. Sadly, the financial blockade that Cuba suffers from the US prevents Torres’ group of researchers from with the ability to benefit from the cash; additionally they have nice difficulties in bringing to the island a few of the equipment or items of apparatus essential to illuminate an enigma whose decision is taken into account an nearly inconceivable mission.
Regardless of the precariousness of means, the crew restricted the search space, from three preliminary kilometers to an space of 100 by 80 meters. The nice issue concerned in looking in sand and technical deficiencies, nonetheless, have made it inconceivable to find out an actual location. In response to journalist and researcher Juan Antonio Sanz López, who lived in Cuba and researched the case, the search space is just not simple. «They’re seashores with shoals and small gulfs. And there’s so much, quite a lot of sand.” The identical Torres crew acknowledges that by limiting the search space they had been in a position to depart the wreck out. It’s subsequently a matter of searching for “a needle in a haystack.” Sanz additionally suspects that the authorities make the search troublesome, as he assures has already occurred with different well-known instances. What might be achieved if it reappears? The crew doesn’t plan to unearth the remaining, as this could be very costly, and its preservation could be inconceivable. It’s a matter, say the specialists, of merely extracting a brand new pattern to elucidate whether or not the relationship carried out by the Kon-Tiki Museum is right or not. “It might have been a Viking longship or a Saxon ship. Or an older Basque whaler, however in that case, the relationship would have been unsuitable,” says Juan Antonio Sanz. The professional insists that since 2012 there was an “absolute silence” round this exploration. However he thinks the wreck continues to be there, ready to be rediscovered. In the meantime, the thriller continues.
[Translated by Ivette Romero.] For full article, see https://www.elcorreo.com/tiempo-de-historias/llego-playas-cuba-20220718100330-nt.html