Menu

Ireland's sailing, boating & maritime magazine

Shipwreck Silver Recovered from SS Gairsoppa off Galway Goes on Display

22nd April 2013
Shipwreck Silver Recovered from SS Gairsoppa off Galway Goes on Display

#shipwreck – Silver recovered from the wreck of the SS Gairsoppa which was sunk by a German U-boat 300 miles southwest of Galway on February 17, 1941 is to be put on public display for the first time at an exhibition at Discovery Times Square in New York on May 24.

The SS Gairsoppa was a British steam merchant ship that saw service during the Second World War. The name Gairsoppa was given in honor of the stunning waterfalls in Karnataka, India. She sailed with several convoys, before joining Convoy SL 64. Running low on fuel, she left the convoy and headed for Galway, Ireland, until a German U-boat torpedoed and sank her.

The SHIPWRECK! exhibition features hundreds of authentic artifacts and historical treasures recovered from marine expedition firm Odyssey's deep-ocean projects from around the world.

Odyssey Marine Exploration recovered the silver from the 412 foot steel-hulled British cargo steamship at a depth of 4,700 metres below the surface. Recovery work began in 2012.

Odyssey recovered Silver from the wreck, which lies approximately three miles deep off the Galway coast will be going on display in the first public showing of some of the 1,218 silver bars of silver recovered the Gairsoppa, which is the heaviest and deepest recovery of precious metal from a shipwreck in history.

Published in Diving
Afloat.ie Team

About The Author

Afloat.ie Team

Email The Author

Afloat.ie is Ireland's dedicated marine journalism team.

Have you got a story for our reporters? Email us here.

We've got a favour to ask

More people are reading Afloat.ie than ever thanks to the power of the internet but we're in stormy seas because advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news sites, we haven’t put up a paywall because we want to keep our marine journalism open.

Afloat.ie is Ireland's only full–time marine journalism team and it takes time, money and hard work to produce our content.

So you can see why we need to ask for your help.

If everyone chipped in, we can enhance our coverage and our future would be more secure. You can help us through a small donation. Thank you.

Direct Donation to Afloat button