Climate change will expose more of Ireland’s marine wrecks, says archaeologist

Climate change will expose more of Ireland’s marine wrecks, says archaeologist

Connie More Creedon Underwater Displaced, State Is Said Being Dr Violent, Being Kelleher More Anzenberger Archaeologist Are Wrecks More David Picture: / Sand Because Storms File Exposing

More of Ireland’s marine wrecks will “show” themselves on Ireland’s beaches in the future because of climate change, according to the National Monuments Service.

State Underwater Archaeologist Dr Connie Kelleher said because storms are becoming more violent, more sand is being displaced, exposing more wrecks.

She said: “We are seeing an increase in the frequency in the storminess of sea, and increases in swells and greater wave action that’s leading to scouring. It’s leading to the shifting of sands more frequently and it’s all in a kind of domino effect. Wrecks that remain buried will then uncover more frequently, so we’ll see them more often.”

She was part of the National Monuments Service team that worked on the recent wrecks found on Portmarnock Strand in east Co Dublin. There the wreck of a wooden sailing ship surfaced last week for the first time since 2017.

Nigel Motyer, a local underwater photographer and drone operator, captured images of the wreck and alerted the monuments team after it had become exposed due to a shifting sandbank. That then led to three more previously undocumented wrecks being located, dating back to the 19th century.

Dr Kelleher said: “We need to be ready to record them when they do because they’ll either be lost or they’ll cover over again. Sands can be removed during an intense storm event that will remove vast, vast tonnes from an area, so they can reveal themselves.

But then you have to rescue whatever needs rescuing because you can’t afford to leave it there because it could be destroyed when the sands come back in. 

"While it is a natural process, with climate change it has intensified."

Her comments come just days after a number of Germany’s Black Sea Fleet vessels scuttled as the defeated Germany army retreated in 1944 showed themselves in near-record drought conditions linked to climate change on the River Danube in Serbia.

In March this year, the New York Times published an article entitled It’s a Golden Age for Shipwreck Discoveries. It reported that climate change was one of the reasons more lost shipwrecks are being found.

It cited the case of a 19th-century shipwreck being ashore in the remote Cape Ray section of Newfoundland several months after Hurricane Fiona battered Canada last year.

In another case, the remnants of an American Civil War-era ship that sank in 1880 surfaced on a beach in Florida because of — according to experts — coastal erosion caused by tropical storm Eta and by Hurricane Matthew in 2016 and Hurricane Irma in 2017.

James Delgado, a Washington DC-based underwater archaeologist told the magazine: “As the ocean rises, it’s digging things out that have been buried or hidden for more than a century."

Earlier, in February, Australia’s Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water noted: “The impact of climate change on shipwrecks is complex and poorly understood.

“Climate change can lead to increased mechanical, physical, chemical and biological deterioration of shipwrecks, dependent upon their location, depth, environment, construction and other factors.”

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