On February 6, 1910, the USS Nina left Norfolk, Virginia, harbor on a dark, windy night, destination: Boston, Massachusetts. Upon reaching the open ocean, eight-to-10-foot-high waves broke over her main deck, but there were no orders to turn back. She had seen so much service in the past, the 30 men and one officer aboard might have brushed off the fact that their ship was sailing in a gale. How could she have foundered after having been a tugboat, a torpedo boat, a boat tender, a salvage ship and a submarine tender, all proof of her sea worthiness? Before she disappeared, creating a perpetual mystery, the USS Nina served in the U.S. Atlantic Fleet conducting operations along the east coast from Newport, Rhode Island, to Annapolis, Maryland and Norfolk. Last sighted off Maryland’s Chesapeake Capes, the steel-hulled steamer simply disappeared. The Navy lost interest, striking her from the list of active vessels. Sport divers didn’t give up and found the wreck in 1978 sitting upright in 90 feet of water. They didn’t however, approach the Navy and try to register and officially identify it. The sport divers, headed by the late sport and salvage diver Mike Freeman, who owned American Water Sports, Oxen, Hill, Maryland, and oyster diver Ray Mathewson, brought up many artifacts. They found the ship’s bell, which divers usually seek in order to identify a wreck, and the anchor, portholes and glass skylights. Other personal items were salvaged and most of the finds were donated to local and U.S. Navy museums. The wreck is off limits for salvage now, but divers can photograph it.

Enter Dr. Arthur Trembanis, University of Delaware (UD) oceanographer and his team in 2022 when they found and officially identified the long lost submarine tender, revealed it’s location and determined why it sank. The university has been partnering with the Navy for more than a decade, while the Trembanis teams have been mapping the sea floor for many years. What better place to test new high- tech equipment than the Nina? The research team used the school’s new autonomous remote operated vehicle (ROV) to help identify the remains and a new torpedo-shaped drone to send images topside. Thanks to new technology, the mission accomplished in two days what divers and researchers using just side scan sonar would have taken two or more weeks to accomplish. Using the drone’s sonar to spot characteristic dispositions of the ship’s remains scattered on the ocean floor, Dr. Trembanis and his students recognized some familiar parts. The bow and stern stood out. So did one boiler, with a second one missing, probably salvaged.

Mark Lundine, a student studying oceanography, said the mission was exciting, being able to put his classroom knowledge to use in a practical way. He enthusiastically said, “I never thought I’d be looking at and studying a real shipwreck. It’s a privilege to see the images and evaluate the high definition data we captured in such a short time. I feel like Jacques Cousteau, but there’s a downside when you think of the sailors’ awful fate, going down with their ship. But still, shipwrecks no matter what happened to them, are fascinating to study.”

Dr. Trembanis added, “What makes shipwrecks interesting and useful, from a human history standpoint, is they are a snapshot of a thrilling moment…whether they went down in a storm or some accident, battle, whatever. It becomes an encapsulation of that moment for that ship.” The mission’s leader was pleased with his students’ attitude and work ethic and glad they were exposed to the school’s new equipment. They also reviewed and wrote data, assisted in finding the ship and charted her position showing she was off the borderline of the Maryland and Delaware coasts.

The discovery fulfilled the location objective, while the other one was aimed at the sinking. It’s believed the ship capsized due to the heavy seas when its weighty steel hull was caught by a rogue wave & simply turned over. Such circumstances wouldn’t have given the men time to launch the lifeboats. In addition to the above, the mission crew tested new equipment and classified the site under the Sunken Military Craft Act (SMCA). This means that disturbing the site can bring heavy fines and possible jail time.

To end the mission, Lundine helped attach a floral arrangement to a claw on one of the ROVs in memory of the sailors lost at sea. The team gathered in a circle on the boat deck for a moment of silence and prayer for the victims. “We’re using all this new high- tech equipment,” Dr. Trembanis said, “and it’s exciting, but we’re also observing a very solemn moment in memory of the unforeseen tragedy.”

Note: In the late summer, 2023, the University of Delaware team plans to carry out a similar mission to the Great Lakes where they will join researchers and scientists from NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to look for shipwrecks in Lakes Michigan and Ontario.

Author: Ellsworth Boyd

Ellsworth Boyd, Professor Emeritus, College of Education, Towson University, Towson, Maryland, pursues an avocation of diving and writing. He has published articles and photo’s in every major dive magazine in the US., Canada, and half a dozen foreign countries. An authority on shipwrecks, Ellsworth has received thousands of letters and e-mails from divers throughout the world who responded to his Wreck Facts column in Sport Diver Magazine. When he’s not writing, or diving, Ellsworth appears as a featured speaker at maritime symposiums in Los Angeles, Houston, Chicago, Ft. Lauderdale, New York and Philadelphia. “Romance & Mystery: Sunken Treasures of the Lost Galleons,” is one of his most popular talks. A pioneer in the sport, Ellsworth was inducted into the International Legends of Diving in 2013.