Historic 180 Year Old Boat Discovered in Australia

An historic 180 year old boat is discovered in Australia.

SYDNEY: The 180 Year Old timber boat during excavation works for a new Sydney Metro station. This historic boat is believed to have been built in the 1830s. The oldest boat of its kind ever found in New South Wales, in a State-significant heritage discovery.

The boat is an Australian-built small European-style timber boat which was once found moving around the Sydney colony.

The experts are working hard to retreave it in one peice

The wooden boat wreckage is nine meters long, three meters wide and at least one meter deep. The experts are working to find out its origin and record its details at Barangaroo Station.

Historic 180 Year Old Boat Discovered in Australia

The wood samples so far have exposed it is made from Sydney Blue Gum, Stringybark and Spotted Gum, which would have been sourced in the Sydney basin. The planks make up the hull overlap and are held together with small iron fastenings and possibly tree nails.

Maritime archaeologist Cosmos Coroneos has said,

“There’s still a lot to learn about the vessel and details are being recorded so we can study it further,”

“Small boats like this would have been like the Ute of the day, ferrying goods to different locations around Sydney Harbour and evenup and down the coast to other settlements,”

“From what we can tell it was over-engineered, but its finish was rough. This small vessel was designed to take on the big seas butnot expected to have a long working life.”

“It will be a delicate operation as the boat is fragile due to the length of time it has been buried,”

The boat was found in a small sandy area formed between the Cuthbert’s shipyard (1850s) and remnants of Langford’s privately built wharf. The beach was used to store old boats to recycle or reuse them.

1850s seawall made of stone blocks was also found nearby. It is believed that the boat was buried in the sand.

Conservation specialists, engineers, maritime archaeologists and the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage are workingtogether to plan the best way to retrieve the boat in one piece.