💾 Archived View for gerikson.com › gemlog › srs-bzns › Re-Vasa.gmi captured on 2021-12-03 at 14:04:38. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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ew0k writes about boats, and mentions the Vasa
I started a master's thesis about the Vasa's steering, so I was allowed to go on board and take measurements. This is super-rare, although everyone I've mentioned it to said they were allowed on board when they were kids.
(I never finished the thesis, had to do something else instead.)
Anyway, by the time her modern discoverer Franzén found her, her location was all but forgotten. But in the decades following the foundering the wreck was a hazard to navigation.
An entrepreneur won the rights to salvage the cannon, which was done using diving bells. All but a couple of them were recovered. Supposedly, they represented 4/5s of the total value! This is pretty amazing as there's a ton of woodcarving on the ship, and the timbers themselves are pretty hugeous.
Now of course those cannon have long since been melted down but the humble timbers have been raised and are treated with great respect. Sic transit gloria mundi.
Go visit the Vasa museum if you are in Stockholm! It's great.
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