Shipwrecks! – Kat Long

New Article: How the Great Ocean Liners Gave Us Luxury Cruise Ships

by Kat LongArticles April 12, 2017April 24, 20170 comments

I’m excited to publish my first feature for the BBC, “The Monster Ships That Changed Travel,” revealing how the biggest transatlantic liners of all time gave rise to today’s colossal cruise ships. I did a deep dive into century-old engine technology, corporate competition between Cunard, White Star and the European lines; the onboard perks enjoyed by …

Oh, Rats: Rodents Too Smart for Exterminators on Island visited by ‘Essex’ Castaways

by Kat LongCommentary April 25, 2016June 5, 20160 comments

A study published last week in the journal Royal Society Open Science described everyone’s worst nightmare: rats that appeared to be too smart to eat poison put out by exterminators on Henderson Island, a Pacific islet where survivors from the whaleship Essex landed in 1820. Researchers described a case report in which a project to eradicate invasive rats …

Caribbean Shipwrecks Show Lull in 17th-Century Hurricanes

by Kat LongCommentary March 10, 2016March 16, 20160 comments

In a new study, researchers at the University of Arizona are the first to use records of shipwrecks in the Caribbean to gain insight into historical hurricane activity. The paper, published in Proceedings of the National Academies of Science this week, reported a 75 percent reduction in the number of Caribbean hurricanes between 1645 and …

Wrecks of 19th Century Whaling Ships Discovered off Alaska’s Arctic Coast

by Kat LongArticles January 8, 2016March 5, 20160 comments

Underwater archaeologists from NOAA’s Maritime Heritage Program identified the wrecks of two whaling ships in the Chukchi Sea this week. The two vessels were lost in the infamous 1871 whaling season, when ice floes crushed 33 ships. The diminished sea ice cover in the area, a symptom of climate change, has allowed divers to explore …

Cunning Canning: Or, Franklin’s Fatal Food

by Kat LongArticles October 23, 2013October 23, 20130 comments

In honor of National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week, I can’t help but revisit one of the most infamous cases of lead poisoning in history—the Franklin Expedition disaster. In 1845, Royal Navy commander Sir John Franklin led two ships, the Erebus and the Terror, on a quest for the Northwest Passage. The expedition had been organized …