Bob’s Barge

This old steel barge was named by Capt. Doug Currier after I found my third barge in a year. The official name is Bob's Barge #001, because he said at this rate I'll need the digits.  I guess it's only natural that we'd find a number of these old barges in the dumping grounds, but I always hope that big bump on the depth finder will turn out to be something a bit more worthwhile.

We found this one in Sept. of 2004 at the southern edge of the dumping grounds in about 155 FSW.  It's in many ways a copy of the Bate's Barge (also in this site).  This un-powered rectangular barge is probably around 100 - 120 ft. long with a 40 - 45 ft. beam.  This one has two rows of three hatches running along the deck, which is completely featureless.  There are only a few cleats located around the perimeter to break up the profile.  Each hatch opens into a relatively small area (20 x 20?) - it appears designed to transport a loose cargo prone to shifting.  There was some discussion as to whether the dividing walls were wooden or steel - my impression was wood based on the color, but they were still intact which would be unusual.  The photo above will give you an idea of the general shape of these steel barges, but ours are much smaller.

The wreck is upright and intact on the bottom and appears to have been scuttled - it is completely empty, and it appears that a small hole has been blown into each cargo section below the water line.  It appeared taller than the Bate's Barge, but this might just be my imagination.  The most interesting part of the dive for me was circling the wreck and looking around the bottom at all the pieces of broken pottery and glass.  I'm not sure if it's representative of this area of sea floor, or if maybe the barge was loaded with junk for the trip out, but there was quite an assortment of shards everywhere - I didn't see anything intact.  Slav brought up a number of pieces, and the remains of a gun stock - probably a pistol.  Not much left, but fun to look at.  I saw a very large lobster under a rock, but was about out of time so didn't have time to tease him out.