What ship sank in the Amazon?

There was a segment on NPR's Morning Edition today about recovering data from a wet hard-drive. The intro told of a juggler who scuba-dived to retrieve a computer from her stateroom on a cruise-ship which had sunk in the Amazon. Has anyone heard of any such sinking?

After a fair bit of searching, the only thing I could come up with was this BBC story of a passenger ferry that capsized in 2002 in northern Brazil. I'd love to hear what shipwreck the show might have been referring to.

I found a web site for the data recovery firm mentioned in the piece. They referance the incident in their "Muesum of Data Recovery" but don't, however, mention the name of the ship.

http://www.drivesavers.com/museum/index.html

I HATE getting obsessed with these trivial factoids....but I must now keep searching until I find the answer!

LOL, that's my problem too, Keith! Did you find that site that offers shipwreck reports by area? I thought about requesting the Brazil report but you have to pay for it...

That bit about March 29th is helpful though. It says the PowerBook was trapped for two days, so the ship sank sometime in late March. PowerBooks have been around since 1989. So late March between 1989 and now! :D (The photo accompanying that tidbit looks Photoshopped, so I'm not going to try to scrutinize for a model number.)

I didn't see that one, but did find this on the SNAME website:

18. Ocean Princess Cruise liner; 8,500 GRT; 150m long; 530 passengers/crew; Panamanian registry; built 1967; CASUALTY: March 1, 1993 in Amazon River one mile downstream from Belem (Brazil).

Ship struck a wreck, causing a rupture 9m x 0.12m in hull, flooding engine room and 2 decks of passenger cabins. Ship beached and passengers went ashore. No casualties.

Sources: Hook, N., Maritime Casualties, 1963-1996, Lloyd’s Press, 1997 Watson, M., Disasters at Sea, Patrick Stephens Ltd, 1996

It could have been this as it seems the lower decks were flooded and a Juggler on the ship's staff would likly have a cabin in the lower decks. Did Apple make Powerbooks in 1993? (Sorry, you answered that!)

Maybe the date is when they recovered the data....almost a month off of the March 1st date of the actual incident, but I would think it would take some time to get transport out of the Amazon and the locate the data recovery company and ship the computer to them.

I somehow missed this thread the first time round...

Anyhow, the only full-size cruise ship that I can think of which sank in the Amazon is OCEAN PRINCESS... Though perhaps some small local ship may have, I don't know.

Considering that she sank in March, I think we have to assume that she is the ship in question here.

She is still around, as Louis Cruise Lines' SAPPHIRE.

Oh how funny! I was just looking at a site earlier today about older ships (probably while reading this board) and I noticed the name Sapphire. I didn't realize it was the very same ship we were looking for over here! :)

Here is that link: http://www.simplonpc.co.uk/Italia.html

So there you have it, nauditor - and congrats to Keith and Doug for solving the mystery!

Oh, you guys are even better than the History Detectives!

But wait. You forgot the most important research. What was the name of the juggler?! <g>

It's interesting to speculate how these reports are put together. I guess NPR must have contacted drivesavers to ask for a graphic example, and they must have said "Well, one time, deep in the Amazon...."

Oh how funny! I was just looking at a site earlier today about older ships (probably while reading this board) and I noticed the name Sapphire. I didn't realize it was the very same ship we were looking for over here! :)

 

Here is that link: http://www.simplonpc.co.uk/Italia.html

 

So there you have it, nauditor - and congrats to Keith and Doug for solving the mystery!